Every interaction with users before you land in their inbox happens in your space. The ad they saw, the landing page they arrived on, the form they entered their info into—it’s all on your turf, and there’s no other brand trying to lure your audience’s attention away once they are on the page.
This changes when they’ve left the page and you send them an email—so many other brands, offers, and messages are trying to grab their attention. Whether or not you get them to choose you over the others depends heavily on your subject lines.
Here’s what an average inbox looks like:
This 50 character subject line is the difference between your lead seeing your offer and connecting with you and your email just sitting in their inbox, snubbed and unread.
And because there’s so much riding on your subject lines, the internet is filled with best practices that help you optimize the lines, and almost as many tips and tricks you’ll find on landing page CTA button colors. These tips only work when you consider individual visitor needs and brand messaging.
This is what this post will help you do—create the best email subject lines for your campaigns by featuring a handful of optimized subject lines that will help inspire yours.
What are email subject lines?
Your email subject line is the first line of text your subscribers see when you send them an email—it’s placed next to the sender’s name and meant to give subscribers a teaser of the email content.
In addition to hinting at the email content, the best subject lines need to grab your recipient’s attention with emojis, good copy, the right tone, and segmentation.
Think of your email subject lines as you do your landing page headlines. Your headline needs to be message-matched, relevant to your offer, and highlight your UVP so that visitors will continue with the rest of your page.
Similarly, if you fail to make an impact with your subject line, users will abandon opening your email, which will, of course, impact your overall conversion rates.
Inbox rules are changing, how to ensure your email subject lines get you conversions?
With more and more businesses starting an email newsletter and inboxes getting crowded with emails, the new Gmail spam filters are making it tougher for marketers to get their messages into leads’ inboxes.
Since February 2024, Gmail has implemented new regulations for bulk senders (brands sending over 5,000 messages a day) to enhance email security and reduce inbox spam. he new requirements include mandatory email authentication to confirm the sender’s identity, a simplified unsubscription process for users to a single click available in their inbox, and a strict spam rate threshold to minimize unwanted emails.
This means it’s getting harder than ever to get your subscribers to notice you in their inbox—just two or three random and irrelevant subject lines, and you risk them hitting the unsubscribe button, which is now conveniently available next to the subject line.
When your subject lines hit the right spot and intrigue subscribers just the right amount, your email open rates increase. When the email offer is relevant to your leads, your click rates go up. When your email landing page is optimized, and they click on your CTA button, your conversions go up, and users move down your marketing funnel.
Good Email Subject Line ➡ High open rates ➡ High click rates ➡ landing page conversions ➡ High campaign ROAS.
It’s a conversion loop that starts with your email subject line and, if all goes well, increases campaign return on ad spend.
So, what makes a click-worthy subject line?
To create an impactful email subject line, you need to phrase it to stand out in your subscribers’ inbox and grab their attention. Generic phrases and boring sentences won’t cut it—shock and awe combined with relevance and the proper customer segmentation make your subject line worthy of the click.
Your email subject line and body copy should also follow the rule of one—one audience, one offer, and one CTA button. This is what makes your email relevant and personalized to your offer and the audience.
And now the finale—best email subject line examples that will help you inspire your next.
17 Best email subject line examples
3 Best funny and irreverent email subject line examples
Humor and laughter trigger positive feelings for your subscribers, which creates an instant connection between your brand and them. This connection fosters engagement, emotional connection, and memorability, making your email more likely to be opened and acted upon.
When creating funny email subject lines, consider your brand voice, go as far as you can safely go, and sprinkle in emojis for the right effect.
3 Best retargeting email subject line examples
Retargeting campaigns are all about getting lost customers back to your offer or their abandoned shopping carts. The subject lines retargeting leads need to be relevant to their experience on your website or the items in their cart.
Use discount offers and product UVPs to get leads to reconsider your brand.
You can also use short, vague subject lines to intrigue them enough to click.
4 Welcome email subject line examples
These email subject lines need to introduce your brand to your new leads. Start with a welcome note and throw a discount to get them to click.
5 Sales email subject lines
Sales email subject lines don’t necessarily have to be overly salesy. Mention your discount and hint at the offer, but it’s best to talk about value in your brand voice so subscribers want to click.
Optimize your email subject lines to get your leads moving down your funnel
A lot rides on your 50 character email subject line—you need to make it relevant for individual subscribers (use segmentation), wow them with phrases that stand out in their busy inbox and are true to your brand voice, and use emojis to warm their hearts.
Another thing you must do after you’ve decided on your email subject line and drafted your email copy is to connect all your email offer CTA buttons with relevant landing pages. Landing pages continue the conversation about your conversion goal beyond the email and convince subscribers to take your desired action.
For this, you need to create your landing pages at scale, just like your email campaigns, and for that, you have Instapage.
You can use Instapage’s Global Blocks and Instablocks™ to quickly and easily create a high volume of optimized landing pages. Global Blocks makes it easy for advertisers and marketers to manage and update your landing pages in a single click.
Create a custom block, use it globally across all your landing pages, and update all those pages with one click. This helps you with high-volume, high-velocity campaigns and create, manage, and update global brand templates at scale.
Start scaling your landing page creation process without additional team help today. Sign up for an Instapage 14-day free trial.