Email testing results - Personal Promise versus Practical Proof.

I recently relaunched my newsletter after a long while of silence. (Yes. it is an embarrassing story I know).

The upside was, I did get to do a unique experiment where I did a multi-channel reactivation campaign involving email testing.

Turns out – my subscribers looooved it. In terms of open the kimono and oversharing.. that asked for a follow up.

But while in the first email I told people I was doing a “mystery test”, this time nobody knew. (even more mysterious!)

And amazingly... I got another winner with 8.49% higher open rate. Woot. Significant results.
2 for 2 – that doesn’t always happen. Especially if you are only using 2 subject lines, there is a big chance that the test outcome will not be significant.

So join me on this question: Hmmm.... what will peak interest more?

The contestants were:
A: You'll get 7.31% more email opens with this.. + all news
B: I got 7.31% more email opens with this... + all news

So what are we testing in this case?
The Hypotheses, always a good idea to state a Hypotheses.

I was wondering…. (a curious nature is always great for coming up with email testing ideas).

Would people be more interested in results someone else got? Or in results they would / could get?

Rationale: People want more of their own results (obviously), they get promised this all the time and there is not that much proof being given, only promises. On the other hand a case study / example has instant proof, but doesn’t necessarily apply to them.

In short: Promise versus proof. see if you can apply it to your own testing.

Now the big reveal: :P
A: I got 7.31% more email opens with this... + all news
B: You'll get 7.31% more email opens with this.. + all news

Have your favorite picked?

Press play:

Post rational and further thinking:
We so often hear that you should be customer-centric, always focus on the “ what’s in it for them” (WIIFT) .. There is a danger in following that through too far, and I’ve seen it happen. Like people

Because we take that all the way down into our email, the danger of only thinking about the “WIIFT” very narrowly. And end up with only “Tips and Tricks to improve XYZ” (boring!) or lets send them tips as a placeholder for value – that later on aren’t in-depth enough.

Using the Jordie’s chopping block method a deeper test (if I had more versions / variations, but keep it to the same test, focusing just on the starter words and WIIFM.

Think of Something like:
* You WILL get 7.31% more email opens with this.. + all news
* Get 7.31% more email opens with this.. + all news
* Add 7.31% more email opens with this.. + all news

Subscribe to the newsletter for more of these.