For realtors, email newsletters are a valuable tool for gaining new customers and selling more properties. But when 306 billion emails are sent every day, how can you make your email stand out?
The answer lies in the subject line. You may treat the subject line as an afterthought, something you do haphazardly before hitting the send button. However, the subject line is arguably the most important piece of your email. When you’re competing with dozens of other brands and companies in people’s inboxes, a compelling subject line can set you apart from everyone else.
Creating a strong subject line may feel like a chore when you’ve just spent hours refining your email, but that extra effort is worth it. The best email subject lines for real estate can help you attract new leads, stay connected with former clients, and grow your business. In this post, we’ll show you how to create catchy subject lines for real estate emails.
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What makes the best email subject lines for real estate
The best subject lines for real estate emails are relevant, enticing, and informative yet mysterious. You want to give readers a sneak peek of what they’ll find in the email, but you don’t want to give everything away in the subject line and discourage them from opening it.
Keep these tips in mind when crafting your subject lines:
1. Less is more
Your subject line should be brief. Lengthy subject lines can fall out of view in the reader’s inbox, especially on mobile, which can account for a large proportion of all your email opens. To prevent this from happening, try to keep the subject line under 40 characters or at about 5-7 words.
2. Add a sense of urgency
Subscribers won’t open your email if they don’t think it will contain something important. To entice recipients to open your emails, your subject lines should invoke a sense of urgency. This can make your readers feel as if they’ll miss out on something important if they don’t open the email.
Is one of your listings about to expire? Are you holding only one open house at a certain property? Use your subject line to convey this information.
However, while subject lines that invoke a sense of urgency can help increase your open rates, you should avoid phrases such as “act now” or “call now.” These can cause your emails to be flagged as spam. (Keep reading for tips on how to get past spam filters.)
3. Include personal touches
Personalized subject lines often have higher engagement because recipients feel like you’re talking directly to them. When making a big decision such as buying or selling a house, clients want to feel as if their realtor is giving them individualized attention.
You can include personal touches in your subject lines whenever possible. Phrase them in a way that shows you understand the plight of a homebuyer or seller. Let your clients know that you see them as people, not just as a ticket to your next commission.
4. Keep your subject lines relevant
You may be tempted to trick people into opening your emails with a misleading subject line for getting more opens. Resist that urge. If you try to trick your email subscribers, they’ll become frustrated; this may cause them to unsubscribe.
Make sure your subject lines accurately reflect the content of your emails. Don’t mention a property for sale in the subject line if your email is all about staging a living room. You’ll come across as more authentic, and email recipients will be more likely to view you as a trustworthy and knowledgeable resource.
5. Ask questions
Some of the best email subject lines for real estate are presented as questions. When you ask a question, your readers will innately want to find an answer. Even if they only respond in their heads, they’ve already engaged with your email.
Asking questions can also encourage your subscribers to stop and consider something they haven’t thought of before. A question like, “Is your home ready to sell?” can prompt them to open the email and check to make sure they are fully prepared to sell their home.
Preventing your emails from being marked as spam
Spam filters can be quite sensitive, and some email clients have stricter spam policies than others.
To decrease the chances of your emails being flagged as spam, avoid these common spam triggers in your subject lines:
- Too many punctuation marks in a row, like !!! or ???
- Spammy words and phrases such as “free,” “guarantee,” and “click here”
- Excessive use of symbols such as #, @, and %
- Writing in all caps
Using emojis in your email subject lines
Emoji won’t necessarily cause your emails to be flagged as spam, but you should use them strategically. Too many emojis can make your emails appear unprofessional, and you don’t want to take up too much valuable space in the subject line.
Additionally, some email clients don’t support emojis, so they may not render properly for all email recipients. If you’d like to use emoji in your subject lines, stick to one that is the most relevant to your content.
Measuring the success of your subject lines
In order to determine how successful your subject lines are, you should be analyzing the open rates for each email you send. Open rate is the percentage of emails that were opened compared to how many contacts were sent the email.
The average open rate for the real estate industry is 13.42%. If most of your open rates consistently fall below that number, you may need to pay closer attention to which of your subject lines perform best.
One of the best ways to do this is by utilizing A/B testing, or split testing, Through this process, you can send two versions of the same email with one distinguishing factor (in this case, the subject line). A/B testing is a valuable tool that can help you understand which subject lines work and which ones don’t.
Constant Contact’s A/B testing feature is easy to use. When you’re ready to send your email, select the A/B testing option, and add your two subject lines. Specify what percentage of your audience list should receive the test emails, and then, choose how long you want the test to run. Once the testing period has ended, Constant Contact will send an email with the winning subject line to the remaining recipients. You can then check your reporting to analyze the data and use your findings to create strong subject lines for future emails.
Sample real estate subject lines
The best real estate subject lines utilize a combination of all of the strategies mentioned above. They should be clear, concise, and offer value to the email recipient. Here are a few real estate email subject line examples:
- How does your home compare?
- [Client Name], is your home priced to sell?
- Don’t Miss Out on [XYZ Property]
- Your Dream Home is Waiting
- 10 Secrets Other Realtors Won’t Tell You
- 5 Ways to Boost Your Property Value by 30%
Additional tools to help your email marketing strategy
The best email subject lines for real estate can only do so much to boost your email marketing performance. If your email designs are clunky or the content is difficult to read, recipients won’t read your email through to the end. For help creating user-friendly emails, check out these 14 real estate email templates. And for help making sense of online marketing, get The Download for real estate.
