Is being clickbait so bad?

GM! Paperboy here 🗞️

Many of you emailed me stressing about deliverability leading up to BFCM.

Let’s break it down. I see this as two parts:

• Warming up inboxes to boost deliverability

• Segmenting intelligently to reduce deliverability hurt

I’ll cover a hack for the first part today as it’s something you can start doing tomorrow. The second part will be covered in a future email.

Side note: if you’re looking for a low-hanging-fruit win going into BFCM check out our sponsor Aftersell. They help drive more revenue by making it stupid easy to run post-purchase offers on Shopify. I can think of very few 8 or 9-figure brands that don’t run this style of offer.

Warming up the inbox

Gmail, yahoo and other major inboxes are scoring your sending domain & IPs behind the scenes.

They look at clicks, opens, file sizes, response rates, and so much more.

As an email marketer, as long as you are sending high quality email content, segmenting to engaged users and following deliverability best practices (dedicated domain, lack of spammy words, reasonably sized image files, etc.), you mostly don’t need to worry about those metrics.

I say mostly because there is one thing we do at my agency to try to skew inbox provider algos to help us ahead of promotional periods.

And that something is deliverability bait.

Yes it’s a term I made up. It feels wrong, but trust me, it works.

Basically it’s farming clicks, replies, forwards in an engaging way.

Key word here: engaging.

Let’s begin with a prime example from Dr Squatch:

Why do I love emails like this?

It forces people to click into the email and see what the offer is. They need to know what the discount is. Plus, who doesn’t love 🎰

Here’s another example:

Subject: I need your opinion, Tim

Hi Tim,
Ron here, founder of Widget Co.
We're launching new Widget colors and I'd love your input since you recently bought one.
What color should we launch next? We might go with green or white, but I'd love to hear what you think first.
Just reply to this email with your ideas. And if we pick your color, you'll be entered to win one of 20 free Widgets when they launch.
Thanks!
Ron from Widget Co

I love this example because it’s super easy to reply, and the customer feels like they get something out of it.

Here are more examples of deliverability bait:

• What color should we launch next?

• Vote on our next product launch

• Help name this product

• Weird question about your X habits

• Our customer just went viral sharing this (click to watch)

• This customer story made our whole team cry

• We’re giving away a $100 gift card

• Forward to your friend, get paid $25 when they purchase

• Click to reveal a mystery offer

The rules are simple:

• The email should lead people to a deliverability-enhancing action: Click, Reply or Forward

• The email should be relevant and create intrigue, excitement or tap into another core emotion

• The customer should have some tangible or perceived reward (this is super important otherwise your action rates will be low and this whole exercise is wasted)

• Bonus: you learn something about the customer along the way

That’s all there is to it.

Feel free to intertwine this tactic into campaigns throughout the year, not just ahead of BFCM. You can run it during your black friday offer (like the example above) or just use it ahead of promotional periods to bump up deliverability.

With great power comes great responsibility. Use your best judgment on how to use this tactic within the scope of your customer & brand. Use it too much, and your customers might feel like you’re tricking them or asking too much of them.

I’ll try to send more BFCM-related content over the next couple of weeks. Reply to this email with any burning questions and I’ll either reply to you or write a whole newsletter about it.

Meme of the Day: Protect your margin!!

That’s all for now,
Paperboy 🗞

p.s. Did you like the newsletter? Hate it? Reply and tell me why! I read and reply to every message.

p.s. p.s. check out this mystery box email concept

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I use AfterSell with 7 and 8-figure brands at my agency. I would never promote a product I don’t personally use.