How to come up with good email headlines.

I've been doing my own marketing for a good few months now and I wanted to share the benefit of my hindsight with you all, I think that it's good to test and re-test and then test some more in marketing, but having just recently stumbled upon this forum; I also think it's awesome to draw from everyone else's experience too.

Something that I've learnt through trial and error is email headlines and I think it's safe to say that I've nailed down a formula on creating the perfect headline and I wanted to share with you all.

When I first started out my headlines were a bit pathetic like 'please read me' and then I wondered why my emails weren't' getting opened!

Anyway, here are a few things that I always try and stick to and which have seen my open rate go from 15% up to 38% for the last campaign (above average for my industry!) so I hope you find this useful:

1) Create urgency:
Anything that can be followed with an exclamation point goes down well! 'Open now!' 'Last minute offer!' 'Last chance to buy!' 'Once in a lifetime opportunity etc!'

2) Play on FOMO (Fear of missing out!)
Humans are a nosy species and in general, they don't like to miss out on what everyone else is doing! Headlines such as 'join thousands' 'don't miss out' play on this and create enough intrigue which makes people want to open up and read your awesome content. It's important that you back this up with something that everyone else is doing to make yourself sound reputable of course!

3) Create connection
It's really hard to do this in just a few words but being able to tell your readers that you've listened to their feedback, or you care about them is a great way to get your emails open so you can go on to make a sale. Try 'we care about your future' or 'we listened to your suggestions' as a way to make them feel loved and wanted.

4) Keep them guessing
When people are used to seeing your name pop into their inbox they learn to gloss over your content very quickly. If a headline has worked well for you in the past by all means stay on the same theme but don't' re-use the same one. I made that mistake once and what was my highest open rate then became my lowest - the originality had gone and it also looked like I'd re-sent the same email by mistake. Schoolboy error right there!

5) Don't rush it
While coming up with a good headline is the essence of your email campaign it doesn't mean it has to be done at the beginning. I like to brainstorm a few ideas and then create the email and then go back and see what works best with the content. This also helps me to make sure I'm delivering the content that people expect form the headline.

So they're just a few things that I've discovered work for me/, and I'm interested if anyone has got any more to add to this list?