Category Archives: B2B

When I first heard I had to write about D2C marketing, I did what many professionals do when presented with something they know nothing about — I quietly panicked and then asked ChatGPT.

To my surprise, however, I learned D2C marketing isn’t as foreign to me as I thought. And it likely isn’t to you, either.

Dollar Shave Club, Blue Apron, and Glossier are all well-known brands built on the business model and considered masterclasses in marketing — let alone D2C marketing.

With D2C business sales predicted to reach nearly $230 billion by 2025, here’s what you need to know about the model and marketing within it.

Table of Contents

• What is D2C marketing?
• D2C Marketing Strategy
• D2C Marketing Tips
• D2C Ecommerce Tips

B2C vs D2C Marketing

If you’re anything like me, D2C marketing probably sounds a lot like business-to-consumer (B2C) marketing. I mean, they’re both going after private consumers, right?

Well, while that’s true, D2C is still unique. ChatGPT explained it well using the metaphor of a lemonade stand.

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Lemonade stands as we know them — people making lemonade and selling it at stands outside of events or their homes — are inherently D2C. You make the lemonade (as a manufacturer), put out a sign (as a marketer), and hand it directly to the people buying it (the consumer).

However, if you decided to go B2C with your lemonade enterprise, you wouldn’t sell directly to people on the street, let alone have a stand. Instead, you’d give it to a third-party storefront or another retailer to sell it to people for you.

You see, B2C works with third parties or “middlemen” like wholesalers, retailers, or distributors to get your product into consumer hands. Retailers often even help shoulder some of the marketing to drive sales.

D2C doesn’t have any of that help. Your product goes straight from the manufacturers to the consumer who bought it through the brand’s website, store, or popup. Overall, it’s a more direct line to the buyer than B2C.

But why has this model become so popular in recent years?

Pros & Benefits of D2C Marketing

Truthfully, a lot of D2C’s rise came out of necessity.

During the COVID-19 lockdown, people couldn’t leave their homes. They were forced to shop online, and with the rough economic environment, many opted to shop small. Many D2C brands are digital or ecommerce-focused, so they thrived in this climate. (Take Peloton, for one.)

But even more established, traditional brands like L’Oreal began investing in D2C branches for a number of reasons.

Low Barriers to Entry

Thanks to services like Shopify, Square, and on-demand manufacturing, it’s pretty easy to start a D2C venture. All you need is an idea and the Internet.

In fact, as I dug deeper into this topic, I realized I’ve even dabbled in D2C with my on-demand clothing brand.

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I built it entirely on free tools, and every sale offsets any manufacturing expense.

Speaking of which …

Lower Costs

By cutting out the “middlemen,” D2C brands save money.

They don’t have to pay their partners, so they have lower costs and a higher profit margin. In turn, they can pass those savings on to buyers in the form of a lower price tag, and lower prices can lead to more sales. It’s a beautiful cycle.

More Control

D2C brands handle every stage of the buyer’s journey, which means they have total control over how things are done and the customer experience. This means more responsibility, of course, but it also leaves less room for inconsistency.

Better Data

By controlling the entire product cycle and buyer’s journey, D2C brands can access more, and usually better, data.

This gives them a more complete picture of their business to understand where it’s doing well and where it needs improvement. It also enables them to provide a better customer experience through personalization.

Better Customer Experience & Relationships

In a crowded market, 86% of consumers say they will pay more for a superior customer experience. In fact, 70% of customers expect anyone they interact with at a business to have the full context of their previous engagement and actions.

With their streamlined processes, control, and data, D2C brands are better equipped to offer the personalized experience and attention to detail that modern buyers look for.

Improved Brand Loyalty

Great customer experience and affordable prices foster brand loyalty and improve customer lifetime value (LTV). For brands, this means longer-term repeat business and even referrals to new customers.

Cons of D2C Marketing

Now, we can’t talk about the good things about D2C marketing and not address the bad.

With full control comes full responsibility for any issues that arise.

For example, it’s common for a D2C business to face supply and fulfillment issues.

Like if the shirt type I chose for certain designs on my website is no longer made or goes out of stock, it will halt production and fulfillment until I make adjustments.

This can be especially hard to manage if your team is small (or, like me, a team of one). You can only work on so many things, so it’s easy to feel spread thin.

D2C business also requires you to be a ‘jack of all trades.’

You need knowledge of product development, supply chain management, marketing, sales, and more. Add the highly personalized customer service people expect from D2C businesses, and you’ll find your venture challenging to scale.

It can be a lot of pressure, but it can also be extremely fulfilling. If you’re running a D2C business or considering it, familiarize yourself with D2C marketing strategy.

D2C Marketing Strategy

With much of their online presence, D2C marketing is pretty grounded in digital strategy. These include but aren’t limited to:

• Content Marketing & Search Engine Optimization (SEO): These two strategies work together to offer value to your customers and get found in their hunts for answers.
• Website Strategy & Conversion Rate Optimization (CRO): These are tactics centered around making your website as intuitive and helpful as possible so visitors will be more likely to convert on a form or purchase.
• Email Marketing: Once you have someone’s contact information, you can deliver more pointed, personalized content directly to their email inboxes. These are commonly focused on sharing sale or discount information or delivering other content related to their past engagement with you.
• Social Media Marketing: Social media is another place where D2C brands are getting found and building brand awareness through engaging content.
• Pay-per-click (PPC): Whether on social media, search engines, or otherwise, PPC ads help brands surpass algorithms and reach their target audiences. This kind of exposure is powerful for D2C brands without a physical storefront or additional partners.
• Influencer Marketing: Without retail or wholesale partners, having relevant influencers and creators promote your product can significantly impact how people perceive your brand.

With these areas in mind, let’s dig into some specific D2C marketing tips and D2C ecommerce best practices.

D2C Marketing Tips

1. Create a sense of community.

Building a community is a powerful strategy for brands in general, let alone D2C.

It brings like-minded people together, not just because they like your product or service for practical reasons but because they like what your brand stands for.

They share your values and mission, and your community offers them a sense of belonging.

Community gives consumers something larger and deeper to promote and want to talk about. And all of that helps your brand awareness.

Beauty brand LiveTinted has done a great job of fostering community through social media.

Brand founder Deepica Mutyala has always loved makeup but never saw the faces of people like her represented in the industry, not to mention shades or solutions for her skin tone.

She started LiveTinted to change that and foster a community where everyone could feel included and seen.

LiveTinted started as a solely D2C brand but can now also be found in ULTA stores.

The community it created is arguably one of the biggest reasons it was able to expand to such a large scale.

How do you create a sense of community around your brand?

• Engage with your audience: Respond to comments, ask questions, and spark conversations.
• Create shared experiences: Offer exclusive content and host live events where people can connect in person or through streaming events where people can engage in real-time online.
• Establish a private space: Think a newsletter, a Facebook or LinkedIn Group, or even a members-only online forum.
• Encourage user-generated content (UGC): More on that shortly.

Learn more about communities in marketing in The Ultimate Guide to Community Management [According to Experts Who Do It Daily].

2. Lean into your mission.

What does your brand care about? Does it have a unique mission? Does every purchase support a charitable cause?

Highlighting these things in your marketing makes buying from you that much more meaningful. Each sale is no longer just a transaction to a consumer but a small act of good.

For example, the shoe brand Allbirds is rooted in sustainability.

Not only are its shoes made from natural resources, but its packaging is made from 90% recycled materials. The company also works with the non-profit SOLES4SOULS® to donate lightly used products to charity.

These practices are discussed in detail on the Allbirds website.

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The brand even releases an annual sustainability report to hold itself accountable for these claims.

But remember, don’t just embrace a cause or mission because you think it’ll help you sell more. People can sense performative activism from a mile away.

If you have something that genuinely fits your product or even inspired your founding, like Allbirds, using your platform and resources gives your audience something greater to want to support.

3. Show your sense of humor and personality.

Probably the most well-known D2C brand out there is Dollar Shave Club (DSC).

Since its launch in 2012, the brand has become a case study in marketing, largely because of the signature personality and humor it exudes in everything it does.

From its legendary launch video (above) and social media content (below) to its website copy and actual subscription boxes, Dollar Shave Club makes a boring industry fun to talk about.

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People can buy razors at pretty much any store, but they order from DSC because of the witty and relatable lifestyle they represent and the memorable personality that comes with it.

4. Share educational content to build trust.

An experiment by Conductor found consumers who read early-stage educational content are 131% more likely to buy from a brand immediately after than those who don’t. Use this to your advantage.

Think about your industry or product and what your target audience wants and needs to know about it. What do they need to know before making a purchase?

How do they choose the right option for them? Or what do you know that can improve their daily lives?

By sharing honest, valuable information like this via blog articles or social media, people will learn what you offer and begin to see you as a trusted expert in the space they want to buy from.

Fitness brand Peloton, for instance, regularly shares health tips and advice on its social media:

Electric toothbrush company Quip takes a similar approach, sharing oral health care advice on its blog.

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5. Encourage and highlight user-generated content (UGC).

Encourage your customers to create and post content about your brands on social media.

Aside from showing appreciation for your customers, this content is social proof for your claims. It shows potential new customers that you’re not all talk; you actually provide the results and experience you promise.

Take this example from Daily Harvest.

Not only do followers get to see what their product actually looks like and how others enjoy it, but the brand gets content for their social media.

The easiest way to source UGC is by creating a branded hashtag like Coke’s #shareacoke or Nike’s #justdoit, but you can consider creating create an ambassador or loyalty program.

This can also help with creating a sense of community, which is a nice bonus.

Check out How to Leverage User-Generated Content in Your Marketing Strategy to learn more about UGC.

6. Work with relevant creators and influencers.

69% of consumers trust information from influencers and their family and friends over brands. That means teaming up with trusted influencers or creators in your space can arguably do more for your D2C brand than other types of marketing.

Working with influencers can help you reach new audiences, build brand awareness, and generate social proof.

Influencer collaborations are a regular part of Happy Socks’ strategy:

Learn more about your options for influencer marketing.

7. Invest in paid ads.

With so much competition, getting organic traction on social media and search engines is increasingly difficult.

Paid advertising offerings like Google Ads and Facebook Ads can help you surpass algorithms and get in front of your target audience.

Glossier, for instance, is no stranger to using ads on TikTok.

The D2C beauty brand uses sponsored creator content to highlight its products and includes a call to action to purchase the featured products on its website.

But make no mistake: You shouldn’t start running ads lightly. Isabelle Lam, co-founder and Chief Operating Officer of the Canadian-based snack brand Remix Snacks, urges D2C marketers to consider their costs and margins before investing in ads.

She shared in conversation, “When we first started growing our D2C platform, we put a lot of money towards hiring an ads agency and increasing our ads budget to increase our website traffic and sales. However, we slowly realized that our gross margins were making it very difficult to make a profit, no matter how many sales we made.”

“This was likely due to high shipping costs, and we ultimately had to go back to square one and re-evaluate our pricing strategy to ensure we had healthy margins.”

8. Personalize your customer experience.

One of the biggest differentiators of D2C brands is the personalized experiences they can offer their consumers. In fact, people buy from D2C brands expecting them.

Thankfully, with fewer middlemen, you likely have access to the data needed to craft these experiences in your marketing.

What are some ways you can personalize your marketing?

• Address your buyer by name in emails or even on your website.
• Make product recommendations based on past purchases
• Send emails with content suggestions based on purchases or past behavior (i.e., pages they’ve visited or offers they’ve downloaded.)
• Have team members respond to all social media engagement. Don’t automate.

Function of Beauty’s entire business is centered around personalization.

It sells haircare products customized to your specific concerns and lifestyle and it sets the stage for its personalized experience by asking you for your name before anything else.

Pro tip: HubSpot users can use personalization tokens to personalize their emails and even website copy. They can also use smart lists and email automation to deliver segment users and better deliver timely content.

D2C Ecommerce Best Practices

Find more ecommerce sales and marketing tools in our free Ecommerce Planning Kit.

9. Enable social shopping.

HubSpot research shows social media is the preferred product discovery channel for Gen Z, Millennials, and Gen X and one in four consumers have already bought products directly in social media apps.

That’s a large chunk of the consumer market. With this in mind, in addition to marketing your product on social media, consider setting up social shopping.

Instagram, TikTok (see below), and Facebook all have native features that allow audiences to purchase without ever leaving their platforms.

After someone sees your product on social media, say through an ad, a piece of your content, or even an influencer post, they can take action immediately.

Businesses get to close more deals and buyers have an easier shopping experience.

10. Reduce friction in your shopping experience.

On the subject of removing friction, work on reducing friction in all of your shopping experiences, including your website.

What does this look like?

• Minimizing the number of clicks it takes to complete a purchase
• Making relevant add-on suggestions
• Having abandoned cart emails and retargeting setup
• Enabling digital payments (i.e., Apple Pay or Google Pay)

Cornell University research found that “one-click” checkout leads to more website visits, buyers purchasing a more comprehensive range of merchandise, and an average spending of 28.5% more. And it makes sense.

The easier you make it for people to take action, the more likely they will.

Men’s clothing brand Bonobos does a great job of streamline its shopping experience with the “quick shop” option on its website.

Pro tip: Thoroughly test every change you make to your website.

Isabelle Lam stressed quality testing after making UX updates, saying, “It‘s easy to miss things like features or pages not working properly, so have multiple people go through your website as if they were visitors.”

“These little mistakes may seem like nothing, but they can make a huge difference to your customer’s experience, especially if it’s their first time on your website.”

In addition to quality, test performance. Did things improve or decline after these changes? Monitor your website metrics and lean into what works.

11. Run sales, discounts, and deals.

According to Capital One, 89% of Americans say price plays a major role in their purchase decisions more than any other factor. In fact, the company found discounts are a major factor for 74% of U.S. online shoppers.

While you certainly don’t want to discount your way into ruin, don’t underestimate the power of sales or premiums. Away Suitcases uses UGC and influencers to draw attention to its sales:

Getting Closer to Consumers

At the end of the day, D2C marketing is a unique endeavor. Whether direct-to-consumer is your sole sales channel as a business or one of many, start testing out these tips and best practices to see what your audience responds to.

When done right, they can only bring you closer to your consumers and closer to even the most ambitious profit and growth goals.

I’d venture to guess you get tons of emails in your inbox every day. From coupons to daily deal sites to family invites, it’s a lot to sift through—and you’ll likely only click if an email has one of the best subject lines to capture your attention.

According to HubSpot Research, 65% of surveyed marketers say that subject lines have the greatest impact on open rates. After all, subject line is your very first impression of the email.

A good email subject line conveys urgency, curiosity, personalization, and so much more.

If you need help crafting the best email subject line, I’ve got you covered with over 60 email subject line examples to glean for inspiration, 100 you can download, plus an Out-of-Office Email Generator to make your email address even more delightful to your contacts.

Table of Contents

• Best Email Subject Line Examples

• Retargeting Email Subject Line Examples

• Straightforward Email Subject Line Examples

• Professional Email Subject Line Examples

• Attention-Grabbing Email Subject Line Examples

• Newsletter Subject Lines

• HubSpot Email Marketers’ Favorite Subject Lines

Retargeting Email Subject Line Examples

A retargeting email subject line is one that encourages recipients who have already interacted with a website to take action.

So, let’s say I’m shopping online at my favorite store and I place a bunch of items in my virtual cart before clicking out of the website without buying anything. 

I might get an email from that website encouraging me to complete my purchase. The subject line could be something simple like “You still have items in your cart!”

Here are some examples of retargeting email subject lines.

1. “We Saw You Checking Us Out 😏”

Sender: DollsKill

A clothing brand like DollsKill uses cookies to monitor what its customers have been eyeing. Sending an email subject line reminding them of items they admired can reel customers right back into their next purchase.

What I like: The statement itself has a playful, conversational tone that comes off flirty, a reflection of its company branding.

The emoji also adds more fun and temptation to the message — reiterating that “you know you want to” feeling regarding items they have already clicked on before.

2. “Uh-oh, your prescription is expiring.”

Sender: Warby Parker

Not too long ago, a HubSpot alum received this email two weeks before he needed to renew his prescription — talk about great timing.

And when your eye prescription is expiring, it happens to be an excellent time to upgrade your glasses. By sending an email at the right time, Warby Parker increased its chances of this email getting opened.

But timing isn’t the sole reason I included this example. This subject line is brilliant because it appeared at the right time and with the right tone.

What I like: Using conversational words like “uh-oh,” keeping the subject line sentence case, and leaving out the period at the end, the subject line comes across as helpful and friendly — not as a company trying to upsell you.

3. “The timer’s going off on your cart!”

Sender: King Arthur Flour

Similar to Warby Parker, this subject line uses urgency. If I don’t take action on my King Arthur Flour shopping cart — like actually buying the items — it will be cleared, and I’ll have to start all over again.

Okay, so maybe this is a low-risk scenario. But when it comes to my baking goods, I personally don’t like to take any chance of forgetting what I was going to buy.

That’s where the personalization aspect of this subject line comes in:

King Arthur Flour — especially its online shop — tends to attract both professional and home bakers who take all things culinary a bit more seriously than, say, someone who only buys flour on occasion from the supermarket.

And wouldn’t you know? Those are the same bakers who probably don’t want to spend time building their shopping carts from scratch.

Pro tip: Know your audience when you’re writing email subject lines. Is there something that they take seriously more than others? If so, incorporate that into your copy.

4. “What Did You Think? Write a Review.”

Sender: REI

I received an email with this subject line about a week after buying a portable stove at REI. I had just gotten back from a camping trip, too. It was perfect timing for them to ask me what I thought of it.

Companies ask satisfied customers to write reviews all the time. But when you specifically send these requests to the people who just purchased something from you, you’re being smart with your mailing list and reaching recipients whose interest is still warm.

What I like: It’s not expecting a good review. REI is genuinely asking me what I thought of the stove I bought. Maybe I hated it (though I didn’t). The company just wanted me to speak up.

5. “A Sneak Peek for VIPs Only.”

Sender: Serena & Lily

Loyal subscribers can preview clothing collections via email, as seen here with Serena & Lily.

By offering a “sneak peek”, customers know they have more exclusive access and will want to click open the email to see what they want before the general public can see it.

This concept keeps the customer relationship alive and coming back for more if the email marketing is done right.

Pro tip: Incentivise your customers with exclusive deals that can be accessed via email. This will entice them to click so they don’t miss any opportunities to save. 

6. “Foxing VIP Upgrades – Brooklyn Bowl Philly”

This email subject line comes from a music venue in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and was found in a colleague’s inbox.

“Foxing is a band that I really enjoy,” said recipient and HubSpot staff writer Erica Santiago. “I bought a ticket to see them at Brooklyn Bowl and, a week before the show, the venue sent an email about upgrading to VIP.”

What I like: The subject line is simple and contains the most important information: the band name, the VIP opportunity, and the venue.

Straightforward Email Subject Line Examples

Sometimes it’s best to just cut through the fluff, but being straightforward doesn’t have to be boring. Straightforward email subject lines leave room for emojies, puns, and other easy ways to engage your audience.

7. “👗 Free (Cool!) Clothes Alert 👖”

Sender: Clover

First of all, I have a not-so-secret love for emojis in email subject lines. Personally, I’m partial to turquoise — so when I see an email implying that I might somehow be able to obtain free turquoise clothes, chances are, I’m clicking.

That’s part of what makes this subject line work. It draws the recipients’ eye by using visual content (emojis), and it hints at an offer of something free. That hint is an incentive to open the email because there’s something to gain inside.

Pro tip: Don’t be afraid to use an emoji or two to add a little pizazz to your subject lines. Just don’t overdo it. No more than two will suffice.

8. “🐶 Want a Custom Emoji of Tullamore & 6 Months FREE Walks? Book a Walk Today for Your Chance to Win!”

Sender: Wag!

For reference, Tullamore is the name of my colleague Amanda Zantal-Wiener ‘s dog. And the subject line she received, written above, is another winning example of perfect emoji placement — especially when it’s a cute dog.

Here’s a great example of how personalization goes beyond the email recipient’s name. Wag!, an on-demand dog-walking app, includes the names of its customers’ pets in a portion of its email subject lines.

But this type of personalization is more than just a first-name basis. If there’s anything my colleague Amanda loves more than free stuff and baking goods, it’s her pup.

Wag! knows that, and by mentioning Tullamore by name in the subject line — in tandem with an offer, no less — it caught her attention and piqued her interest.

Pro tip: Add a personal touch to your subject lines that your recipients will appreciate. Just make sure you’re not being creepy only use information they gave you with consent and that is relevant to the email.

9. “Best of Groupon: The Deals That Make Us Proud (Unlike Our Nephew, Steve)”

Sender: Groupon

It’s hard to be funny in your marketing, but Groupon’s one of those brands that seems to nail it repeatedly. After all, who can forget this classic unsubscribe video?

This subject line is no exception. The quip, “(Unlike Our Nephew Steve),” actually had uslaughing out loud. Why? It’s completely unexpected.

What I like: The first part of the subject line looks like a typical subject line you’d get from Groupon, highlighting a new deal. The parenthetical content? Not so much — making this one a delightful gem to find in your inbox.

10. “Rock the color of the year.”

Sender: Etsy

In six words, Etsy was able to promote a product solely by its color, and inform you that there is apparently a “color of the year.” The email is truly too intriguing not to open.

Etsy is an e-commerce website for user-created marketplaces. I was impressed by its subject line because it uses mystery to drive value into a suite of products. This email isn’t an invitation to buy clothing or jewelry; it’s an invitation to find out what the color of the year is.

Pro tip: Take advantage of the fact that straightforward email subject lines leave room for mystery. Try not reveal too much and leave recipients wanted more so they’ll read the full email.

11. “How to Live at Home 24/7”

Sender: Feather

If you’re anything like me, the COVID-19 pandemic had you wearing PJs from day to night, only changing when you had Zoom meetings at work.

As a social distancing precaution, you likely used delivery services instead of going out and getting food on your own — which means that you were effectively living at home 24 hours per day, seven days a week.

This email from Feather, a furniture rental store, perfectly encapsulates a frustration many of us faced: How do you live at home 24/7 without feeling like you’re going crazy? With this subject line, Feather promises to help you find a solution by using furniture that makes it easier to stay at home for extended periods.

Pro tip: Use a “How To” subject line to tell recipients what they can achieve with your products. Then, in your email, include links to the products that will help them achieve those goals.

12. “Take $20 off your order of $25 or more.”

Sender: UberEats

You don’t always have to make your email subject line flashy. In this case with UberEats, just the offer alone is good enough to make any hungry customer click.

Pro tip: Your product offering, if it’s appealing, can speak for itself in your subject line. Customers know they can take advantage of the opportunity in the body of the email, as I will for dinner tonight.

13. “Where to Drink Beer Right Now”

Sender: Eater Boston

Okay, you caught me: I’m a beer lover. But that’s not what hooked me here. The subject line arrived in my inbox just at the time I needed it: at 6:45 on a Wednesday evening. Absolutely. Genius.

Think about it: You’re just over hump day and want to decompress with a few coworkers after work. Right as you’re about to head out, you get a notification on your phone that says, “Where to Drink Beer Right Now.” Perfect timing makes this subject line something you can’t help but click on.

Pro tip: For your own emails, think about how timing will affect how people perceive your emails. Even if you send an email in an off-peak hour, you could get higher engagement — if you have the right subject line.

14. “1,750 points for you. Valentine’s flowers & more for them.”

Sender: JetBlue

It’s such a specific number — 1,750 — of course you’re going to open this.

Coming from an airline, an offering of “points” might as well be gold to someone who likes to travel. And, if that recipient also has a significant other, sending this email leading up to Valentine’s Day is a home run.

What I like: The best part about the subject line above is how particular JetBlue was about the number of points available.

Instead of, say, “20% off your next return flight of 1,000 miles or more,” this subject line gives it to you straight: 1,750 points, and all you have to do is buy flowers for your loved one.

You’re already wondering how far you can fly with 1,750 points, I can tell.

15. “Free Oversized V-Neck”

Sender: Los Angeles Apparel

I don’t know about you, but free is my favorite price when it comes to apparel. This brand has a simplistic and straightforward approach to its subject line by letting customers know what they can get in their next order.

And by keeping it short, it makes the subject line even more effective because the only other context the customer can see — is when they click open the email.

16. “Here’s that discount you wanted.”

Sender: LAMODA

This subject line almost feels like it’s reading my mind. When I scroll through my endless emails, considering the businesses I want to buy from, I’m waiting for a discount or sale to be announced.

It’s straightforward and knows exactly what its customers want — key to getting clicks.

Pro tip: Nothing is more exciting to customers than a chance to save money. Spo make sure that is front and center in your subject line whenever a deal is on the table.

17. “3 Ways to Improve Your Pins”

Sender: Pinterest

For those who love to curate their social feed, Pinterest is one of the best places to do it. For those trying to grow their following, they’re probably looking for all the advice they can get from the website itself.

Providing a numeric list of strategies to use in the ever-changing algorithm can prove useful to click on Pinterest’s emails periodically.

This uncomplicated messaging in a subject line presents users with exactly what they’re looking for right in their inbox.

Pro tip: Never spell out the number! Use the numeric symbol. It saves space and captures the eye.

18. BOGO $1 Deals: Men’s Denim and Cargos👖

Sender: Rue21

Rue21 kept its subject line simple and to the point. At a mere glance you already know what you’re getting into.

Professional Email Subject Line Examples

Professional email subject lines have to strike a careful balance between authority and creativity.

These emails are often brisk and to the point. Full of transactional or time-sensitive content, there isn’t a lot of room in these emails for fun. This puts most of the creative weight on crafting a powerful email subject line.

The examples below can show you how to command, tease, and entice any subscriber to click on your professional emails.

18. “[Client] sent you a payment – it’s arriving [date]”

Sender: Bill.com

Bill.com is a popular tool for accounts payable, expense management, and more for small businesses. One of the secrets to their popularity is their useful automations. These workflows include emails that are direct, useful, and easy to scan.

For example, this email subject line is exactly what any freelancer or vendor wants to see in their inbox. In one short phrase, it tells them they’re getting paid, who’s paying them, and when it will land in their account.

What I like: This is another valuable example of why you want to personalize your emails. This subject line saves time while creating a great user experience.

19. “Signing completed for Screening Criteria”

Sender: Urban Development + Partners

Finding a new place to live can be stressful. The application process alone can take many steps, and it also usually includes sharing private information like rental history or recent pay stubs.

It can sometimes feel like one tiny mistake will mean losing the home of your dreams.

This professional email series solves that problem with a unique email and subject line for every step in the process. The subject quickly covers which step is complete and why.

So, when the next email, like “Your Rental Application”, appears in the inbox it’s clear that’s the next step in the process.

What I like: It shows how the right subject line can simplify the entire buying process for your audience.

20. “Your TSA PreCheck Eligibility Notice”

Sender: Universal Enroll

Some professional processes take longer than others. In fact, some processes can take months before everything is set. And no matter how patient you are, you might refresh your inbox hundreds of times waiting for that important update.

TSA PreCheck can be one of those processes, especially if an exciting trip is on the horizon.

What I like: This effective subject line gets right to the point. Any reader knows that once they open this email, they’ll have the answer they’ve been waiting for.

21. “[Action Required] Verify your email address”

Sender: Amazon Chime

One of the most valuable things that a professional email can do is motivate someone to take action. Vague email subject copy can lead to a situation where someone might open and read, but then again, they might not.

By using brackets in this subject line, Amazon emphasizes that the most important thing about this email is taking action. Then, it quickly outlines what needs to happen.

But while brackets are a great way to draw attention, try to use them sparingly. If every email includes brackets it will be easy for your readers to skip over them.

And the copy you include in brackets matters.

Pro tip: Adding quirky or creative copy in brackets could be a fun creative decision, but it will erode your ability to add urgency to emails with brackets if you need to later.

22. “Parking Receipt – Parking Kitty”

Sender: Parking Kitty

Over 300 billion emails go out each day. While some users open every email, most email inboxes are an archive of emails that you don’t need to open now, but you save them because you may need them someday.

For example, email receipts. When you’re ready to find those emails in your inbox, they should be easy to find. But how many times have you scanned your inbox looking for a receipt and every email subject line is the same?

That means opening and scanning every email, and a lot of wasted time for you.

Parking Kitty is the clever name of a parking mobile pay app in the Pacific Northwest. If you’re looking for expense report receipts after a recent trip, this email is easy to find in your inbox.

It’s also smart for brand awareness because it reinforces their memorable business name.

Pro tip: Craft a message that coincides with your branding, or craft a brand that will coincide with most of your messaging. Either way, cohesion is the key.

23. “Your free PDF is attached: Great Talks Most People Have Never Heard”

Sender: James Clear

Lifetime learning is essential in the business world, and this professional email subject line is perfect for busy thought leaders. It starts with a quick reminder that a free PDF is here. Then it shares the title of the PDF.

This may seem like an obvious subject line, but that’s what makes it just right. First, it reminds the recipient that they have a gift in their inbox. Next, it reminds them what that gift is. All the details are in the subject.

It’s an enticing offer, so there’s a good chance it will get opened right away. But it’s also crisp and clear, so it will be easy to find and download later.

Pro tip: Remember, people receive tons of emails a day, so make sure to keep the most important information in your professional email subject line so it doesn’t get lost in the shuffle.

24. “Whoops — we hadn’t had our coffee this morning”

Sender: Catchafire

Accidents happen to everyone. But professional emails often go out to thousands, if not hundreds of thousands of people. This can make a small accident feel like a very big deal.

This subject line is gentle, funny, and honest. It uses a popular theme to acknowledge that the Catchafire team sent an email by mistake.

It sets the stage for a quick apology and lets the person on the other end know that they can disregard that email.

While it can be tough to acknowledge an error, it’s often a great way to build a sense of trust with your email list. It can also save the time it would take to draft more individual responses to the email they sent in error.

Pro tip: Exercise caution in cases like this. Minor mistakes can be approached with funny, affable subject lines, but more serious issues should be handled with care. So, read the room.

25. “Your Wednesday evening trip with Uber”

Sender: Uber

Uber sends emails detailing recent trips almost immediately afterward so it’s still fresh in your mind. I like this subject line because it is simple and elegant and includes the who, what, and when of the trip.

Attention-Grabbing Email Subject Line Examples

Attention-grabbing emails subject lines can contain one or more of the following elements: 

• Sense of urgency
• Humor
• Emojis
• Interesting questions
• Engaging language

Here are some examples.

26. “*Don’t Open This Email*”

Sender: Manicube

Ever been told to not do something? Being asked to refrain from something can actually have the opposite effect — you now want to do that thing even more.

That’s the strategy behind Manicube’s subject line. It’s a simple but effective way to make people curious enough to open your email.

Pro tip: Just be sure that the contents of your email have something worthy of that subject line.

27. “Important Weather Advisory”

Sender: RCN

Any time we see a weather-related alert, our ears perk up. In RCN’s case, it isn’t just a way to lure recipients into opening an email.

The subject line above is RCN’s way of updating its customers about potential power outages and driving attention to the brand that provides them with cable and Wi-Fi — even during inclement weather.

Pro tip: If you can hitch your email marketing campaign to an event you know people pay attention to, and have something helpful to offer in response, you’ll see your email open rate soar.

28. “What Can You Afford?”

Sender: Zillow

Imagine getting this subject line in your inbox from a website showing apartments for rent. It’s both exciting and encouraging (“Here are a bunch of apartments right in your budget. Yay!”), but also kind of competitive — pitting your cash against what the market offers.

Would you click it? I certainly would.

Personalizing emails to cater to your audience’s emotions — for which there’s a broad spectrum when it comes to real estate — is key to getting people to open your emails.

You don’t have to be a psychologist to know how to take advantage of them, either. In addition to principles like urgency, crafting an email subject line that implies scarcity is another great way to increase your conversion rates.

What I like: This email appeals to the concerns of its recipients. 

29. “As You Wish”

Sender: UncommonGoods

When writing emails, you should also think about the recognizable names and references that make people tick.

For example, take this subject line from UncommonGoods forwarded to us from HubSpot’s Content Director, Corey Wainwright, who happens to be a die-hard fan of The Princess Bride.

Apparently, “As You Wish” is a pretty big reference to that movie, so when she saw this subject line in her inbox, she just HAD to click.

Even though she knew the email was part of a larger-scale send, it almost seemed like it was tailored for her personally — after all, why else would it include a reference to Princess Bride in the title?

UncommonGoods knows its buyer persona like the back of its metaphorical hand.

What I like: While it may not send emails to individual subscribers with references to their favorite movies in the title, it does have a general understanding of its subscribers and their interests.

30. “Not Cool, Guys”

Sender: BuzzFeed

I love BuzzFeed. If nothing else, its staff knows how to write great copy — and that sentiment includes an exceptional email marketing team.

Many of my colleagues have signed up for BuzzFeed’s daily emails, and pretty much any day of the week, it wins for best subject line in their inboxes.

While there are a few of BuzzFeed’s subject lines here and there that aren’t anything to write home about, it’s the combination of subject lines and the preview text that is golden. They’re friendly, conversational, and, above all, snarky.

Here’s the text that followed the subject line above: “Okay, WHO left the passive-aggressive sticky note on my fridge. Honestly, who acts like this?”

That conversational tone and snark pull us in over and over again — and it’s the preview text that completes the experience for me.

We’re not all equipped to be snarky writers, but most email platforms have the preview text easily available to edit. How can you use that little extra space to delight your customers (oh, and probably improve your email metrics)?

Maybe you could use the subject line as a question, and the preview text area as the answer. Or maybe it’s a dialogue: The subject line is one person, and the preview text is another.

You get the idea. By using that space, you have more opportunities to attract new subscribers.

What I like: The subject line reads like an email from a friend who has an issue that needs to be addressed. And who wouldn’t read an email from a concerend friend?

31. “DO NOT Commit These Instagram Atrocities”

Sender: Thrillist

No matter how humble people are, most don’t like to do things wrong. So why not play on that natural human tendency in an email subject line, especially if you’re in the business of helping clients (or prospective clients) succeed?

Thrillist certainly does in the subject line above, and it makes the language even more vibrant by using do not — a great takeaway for B2B marketers.

Instead of using the typical contraction “don’t,” Thrillist spells it out and adds the all-caps for effect. That way, you’ll notice the subject line in your inbox, and then find it harder to resist clicking on it.

Pro tip: Think about how going negative in your marketing emails might be a good thing. For example, many of us have anxiety about looking silly, so figure out how you can play to those emotions in subject lines.

Of course, it’s important to back up that subject line with encouraging, helpful content, so that you’re not just ranting at people all day.

Getting negative can get your subscribers’ attention — this subject line certainly caught mine.

32. “Everything you wanted to know about email copy but were too afraid to ask”

Sender: Copy Hackers

Here’s another great example of leveraging your audience’s full plate to your email marketing advantage. Who hasn’t refrained from asking a question out of fear of looking foolish or out of the loop? Excuse me while I sheepishly raise my hand.

” … but were too afraid to ask” is one of those phrases that, to us, probably won’t go out of style for a long time.

People seek insights from Copy Hackers — an organization dedicated to helping marketers and other professionals write better copy, as the name suggests — because, well, they have questions.

They want to improve. And when that audience is too afraid to ask those questions, here’s Copy Hackers, ready to come to the rescue with answers.

Pro tip: What does your audience want to know, but might be too embarrassed to ask? Use that information to craft your content — including your email subject lines.

33. “Abra-cord-abra! Yeah, we said it.”

Sender: Quircky

This punny email subject line from Quirky is plain fun. We’re suckers for puns in the right situation.

What I like most is the second part: “Yeah, we said it.”

The pun in the beginning is great and all — it refers to a new invention featured on Quirky’s site to help everyday consumers detangle their numerous plugs and cords — but the second sentence is conversational and self-referential.

That’s exactly what many of us would say after making a really cheesy joke in real life.

Many brands could stand to be more conversational and goofy in their emails. While it may not be appropriate to go as far as Quirky’s subject line, being goofy might just be the way to delight your email recipients.

Pro tip: Remember to have fun with your emails. A little personality and quirkiness never hurt anyone. 

34. “🔥 Hot freebie alert! 15 free gifts, you pick 5.”

Sender: Shutterfly

Shutterfly, a company that allows you to print your photos on interesting products or other frames, gets visual with its subject lines by occasionally using an emoji.

Due to the company’s nature and creative audience, the fire emoji in this subject line draws the eye without feeling desperate.

The email subject line also pops because it has a lot of buzzwords, including “hot,” “freebie,” “gifts,” and “alert.” In just one line, it can give the potential reader a good reason to open it, especially if they love using Shutterfly.

What I like: The content inside the email aligns perfectly with the subject line by announcing a freebie promotion. This strong alignment between the subject line and message keeps people from skimming the email.

35. “From chaos to calm ✨🏡”

Sender: Open Spaces

If you’ve ever had a cluttered home, you know how chaotic it can feel. Open Spaces takes advantage of that by suggesting how you’ll feel after you use the company’s products.

Its emoji choices also indicate how your home will look and feel: Sparkling clean. I’m not a huge fan of cleaning, but Open Spaces promises to make it easy in the simplicity of their subject line.

The brand also proves that it knows its target customer exceedingly well — if you want to create “open spaces,” you likely won’t tolerate chaos in your home.

In the same way, try to allude to the feelings that your target customers want to feel, as well as their goals and inner desires.

Pro tip: You can also let emojis speak for you. For instance, if Open Spaces had used the subject line “From chaos to calm: Get a sparkling clean home,” the focus would be off of the “from chaos to calm” piece, which is what readers most care about.

36. “Welcome Gift! Offer Inside 👀…”

Sender: EyeBuyDirect

When you subscribe to a business you’re new to, you’d hope you can get a perk before your first purchase. EyeBuyDirect makes its statement in a subject line that makes the prospect feel like subscribing was a good choice, and strikes curiosity.

What I like: Without specifying what the offer is, the customer has no choice but to click and see what they can take advantage of.

37. “Colorful things for colorful homes”

Sender: Baggu

I can’t speak for you but I’m a sucker for all things bright in color. And what makes this an attention-grabbing email subject line is that this brand is known for making reusable bags (hence the name).

What I like: This email makes its customers imagine a new type of product they could be revealing, and when I clicked, I was surprised to see all new items like towels, bedsheets, and more.

Now that we’ve covered the best subject lines in general, let’s dive into the best newsletter subject lines.

Newsletter Subject Lines

Newsletter subject lines must work harder to get the recipient’s attention because they allude to information only. In contrast, a subject line offering a discount will automatically make the recipient want to click.

Newsletter subject lines must hook the reader and get them to click. The examples below do an excellent job of it.

38. “China Falls, Sleepy Unicorns, And The Deals Aren’t Bigger In Texas”

Sender: Crunchbase

The Crunchbase Insights email has an interesting way of wrapping details about all the stories it will present to you in one subject line.

This is eye-catching because it seems like an odd mashup of words, but gets to the point about three complicated stories at the same time.

When it comes to email, Crunchbase is known for its longer, text-based emails. They all read like a more conversational letter to the email recipient and casually discuss and hyperlink Crunchbase’s top stories.

While the subject lines feel interesting and eye-catching, the emails often report deeper business news that cut right to the chase.

What I like: This subject line shows how you can be punchy, but also fun and creative when trying to pull in your audience.

39. “Watch Out for This Amazon Phishing Scam.”

Sender: WIRED

In this subject line, WIRED includes Amazon, a large company name.

Including the name of a big brand can be a great way to boost open rates because people who enjoy or use products from big brands might click into a subject line that discusses them.

Additionally, when a brand name is combined with negative words like “phishing” or “scam,” people might open the email much more urgently so they can learn how to avoid running into the issue being discussed.

WIRED also lists the story last in its newsletter. This is an interesting way to get your readers to scroll through the entire email and see the other stories before they get to the story that led them to click into it.

Pro tip: Experiment with having the subject hihglight the punchiest part of your newsletter, but keeping the content it’s referring to further toward the bottom. This may not work in every scenerio but there’s a strong chance it can improve your click through rate. 

40. “Buffer has been hacked — here is what’s going on”

Sender: Buffer

Next is a subject line from Buffer. A few years ago, Buffer got hacked — every tech company’s worst nightmare. But Buffer handled it exceptionally well, especially on the email front.

What I admire about the subject line is that it’s concise and direct. In a crisis, it’s better to steer clear of puns, snarky comments, and emojis. People want to see that you’re taking the situation seriously and be reassured that the world isn’t ending.

What I like: Because of the way the subject line is worded and formatted, you feel like Buffer is calm and collected about the issue, and is considering your personal safety. That’s pretty hard to do in just a few words.

41. “Google sees smartphone heroics in Oreo. It’s The Daily Crunch.”

Sender: TechCrunch

If you’re subscribed to a newsletter from a publication like TechCrunch, chances are, you signed up because you’re either interested in or want to learn more about technology.

To reflect that, the media outlet crafts its daily email roundups (“The Daily Crunch”) with a subject line that reflects one of the latest, most compelling news items in the industry.

Here’s the thing: Staying on the cutting edge is hard, especially with something that evolves as quickly as technology.

So, by writing email subject lines that reflect something recent and relevant, TechCrunch is signaling to email recipients that opening the message will help them stay informed and up-to-date on the latest industry news.

Pro tip: Think about the things that your audience struggles to keep up with — then, craft an email roundup and matching subject line that reflects the latest news in that category.

42. “Black Friday shoppers are the worst customers”

Sender: LinkedIn

This subject line is likely the boldest of the Black Friday emails you’d see in your inbox in the days before Thanksgiving.

Yes, it’s a bit judgmental, but it actually came in a LinkedIn Pulse newsletter, promoting an article one of its users wrote on the topic of holiday marketing.

And there’s no doubt the title resonates with how some people feel during the most hectic holiday shopping day of the year.

Pro tip: LinkedIn has nothing to sell on Black Friday, so the subject line above does little harm to its business. Nonetheless, commenting on a popular cultural observation can show your confidence and help you relate to your community.

43. “New recipe alert 🚨”

Sender: Hello Fresh

While Hello Fresh is a food service that delivers meal packages to its customers, it also provides customers with home kitchen tips and tricks in email newsletters.

These extra resources encourage home cooks to try new things, and being offered new recipe ideas is an exciting opportunity.

What I like: Using an emoji here is simple and draws the customer’s attention, while the offer itself can only be viewed in full when clicked — an easy way to draw in more aspiring home cooks.

44. “Tips to increase remote collaboration”

Sender: Asana

This simple subject line from Asana, a project management platform, gets straight to the point: If you open the email, you’ll find remote work tips and beyond.

The subject line also effectively capitalizes on an increasingly common trend that rose during and after the COVID-19 pandemic. Its simplicity and trendiness ensure that you’ll want to open the email.

And chances are that if you’re using Asana, you’re likely using it to collaborate with colleagues whom you might not see every day, even if you’re not fully remote.

What I like: Asana effectively appeals to a wide range of potential users and buyers with this subject line.

45. “I got Botox — & THIS is what it looked like”

Sender: Refinery29

Okay, so maybe your business doesn’t involve Botox. But still — are you intrigued? I am, and despite my better judgment, I clicked.

That’s the power of leading your emails with a story: It sparks curiosity, which works in two ways. There are times when our natural curiosity can pique our interest without context, such as the example above.

But in this case, the subject line implies that there’s an intriguing story ahead. Why the heck did this person get Botox? And what did it look like? As the saying goes, “Inquiring minds want to know.”

Pro tip: Think of the stories behind your industry, then find ways to include them in email newsletters and frame them within the subject line in a way that piques your recipients’ collective curiosity.

46. “Improve Your Website from Concept to Code 💻”

Sender: Namecheap

Want people to open your newsletter? Tell them how they’ll benefit straight away like in this newsletter subject line by Namecheap.

It used this subject line for Inspire, its monthly newsletter, and like in the WIRED example, it left the subject line story last so users would scroll through the entire email.

What I like: Like many examples on this list, it uses an emoji to draw the eye and keeps the tone of the conversation more casual and fun. In contrast, the subject line “Improve Your Website from Concept to Code” feels much more wooden and unfriendly.

47. “The best options for grocery delivery”

Sender: Wirecutter

Simple, right? But effective. This newsletter’s subject line from Wirecutter gets straight to the point and solves one of the biggest challenges we faced during the pandemic: How to get groceries while social distancing.

If you’d never used grocery delivery services up until that point, you’d likely be at a loss for what services to use.

Wirecutter realizes that and immediately invites you to open the email with a simple and actionable subject line.

What I like: Think of a challenge your consumers are likley facing and present your subject line as an introduciton to your solution. 

48. “Mark your calendar for these key dates!”

Sender: Omaze

Omaze is known for raising money for charities across the globe in the form of raffling once-in-a-lifetime opportunities with each donation. Contributors love to learn more about the charities at hand, and the sweet prizes they could win along with them on a monthly basis.

What I like: By announcing its upcoming opportunities, it can help people choose which causes they’ll want to give toward, and be excited to contribute when the time comes.

49. “‘I didn’t realize architecture was so dangerous’”

Sender: Dezeen

Dezeen is an architecture and design publication whose newsletter subject lines always feature a comment from a user. Only one comment is chosen every week.

This approach is brilliant for various reasons:

1. It makes you wonder why the user made that comment and will make you click through.
2. It makes you want to comment on the publication’s posts to potentially get featured.
3. It takes the work out of writing a subject line. Indeed, Dezeen doesn’t have to write a subject line at all, because its readers do it for them.

Here are a few comments that have been featured of late:

• “Absolute garbage”
• “The cardboard box aesthetic”
• “Meet The Flintstones”
• “Does it come with a smoke machine?”

Pro tip: If you have a publication that’s often commented upon, consider using one of the comments as your subject line.

HubSpot Email Marketers’ Favorite Subject Lines

Above are some of the best subject lines we’ve gathered, but I asked both former and current marketers on our team to give some additional favorites and what makes them so good:

50. “Hmm…No writing activity last week?”

Sender: Grammarly

“If or when you turn their plugin off, Grammarly’s retention strategy is great. They reach out with subject lines like these that immediately drive me to click through and turn their plugin back on. Very well done.”

— Jordan Pritikin

51. “Drooling over email designs 🤤”

Sender: Really Good Emails

“Emojis always catch my eye amongst the 100+ emails I receive daily. As an email geek myself, this subject line matched my interests and piqued my curiosity.”

— Ashley Riordan

52. “Can you help me name this dance, [First Name]?”

Sender: Marie Forleo

“It’s personalized and piques my interest because A) I’m being asked for input and B) I want to be in the know about this mysterious dance (#fomo).”

— Christina Perricone

53. “Who you gonna call?”

“If you can make a pun, include a social reference, or even just a familiar phrase, it’ll catch people’s attention.”

— Clint Fontanella

54. “Shoes You Can Wear All Damn Day”

Sender: Everlane

“Swearing is controversial in email marketing, but I think it worked really well in this email from Everlane. Not only was it a clever and concise way to introduce their new line of footwear called ‘The Day Collection,’ but it also aligned with the brand voice they use in other emails and across their website.”

— Anna Fitzgerald

55. “You were on point last week 🎯”

Sender: Grammarly

“Grammarly is so good about rewarding you and making you feel good about your writing.”

— Jordan Pritikin

56. “Show them what you’re made of”

Sender: Canva

“Using empowering, positive, and defiant language to leverage the use of Canva tools — love it.”

— Lucy Reddan

57. “‘Not intended for swimming’”

Sender: Dezeen

“I’m a sucker for architecture, and Dezeen’s weekly newsletter tells me the top new projects that come up, as well as their reader’s responses to them. My question is: What’s not intended for swimming? And if it’s not intended for swimming, why did the architect build it? Boom, you’ve got my interest. And my click.”

— Ivelisse Rodriguez

58. “Our #1 most asked question…”

Sender: Supergoop

“What an easy way to get me to click — by trailing off and leaving the rest of the content in the email. Nicely done, Supergoop.”

— Ivelisse Rodriguez

59. “[First Name]! You’re One of HubSpot’s Top Blog Readers 🎉”

Sender: HubSpot

“No one actually likes taking feedback surveys. Not unless you earn money, and not many of them offer that. When I received the above email from our very own HubSpot blog, I clicked straight through, and voila! There it was: A feedback request. Turns out, flattery does work.”

— Ivelisse Rodriguez

60. “[Artist’s Name] made you something special.”

Sender: Spotify

“Sometimes bands and artists will release exclusive merch or vinyls that are only available to Spotify listeners. When this happens, Spotify will notify fans that the artist ‘made you something special.’ It works because I only get an email if it’s an artist I listen to frequently, and I’m silly enough to think the artist knows who I am.”

The best email subject lines are simple and on-brand.

When writing subject lines for your emails, keep it engaging, simple, and on-brand.

Don’t forget to appeal to the emotions and needs of your target buyers, and most importantly, have fun — include emojis, puns, or references to pop culture. Your emails will get opened, guaranteed.

Editor’s note: This post was originally published in November 2013 and has been updated for comprehensiveness.

Buying or selling a home is an important financial (and emotional) decision, and your clients want an agent they trust to protect their interests and help them navigate the complexities of the process.

That’s where real estate social media marketing comes in. When applied correctly, it can be a great way to start conversations, share advice, and grow an ongoing relationship with buyers, sellers, and renters.

So, I’m diving into the value of using social media as a real estate agent, a list of tips and trends, and examples of social media posts you can incorporate into your real estate marketing strategy.

Table of Contents

• 15 Social Media Strategies for Real Estate Agents
• The Power of Real Estate Social Media Marketing
• Post-Pandemic Social Media Real-Estate Trends
• Social Media Marketing Platforms for Realtors
• Real Estate Social Media Content Ideas

The Power of Real Estate Social Media Marketing

A social media presence helps you build brand awareness and generate trust with your audience.

They may not be ready to make a purchase yet or even reach out to begin a conversion. But if they see you’re consistently active on your platforms or they come across one of your advertisements, they may make a mental note of what you offer and come back to you when they’re prepared to begin their process.

Not convinced? Here are a few stats to help you understand the power of social media marketing to grow your real estate business:

• 87% of realtors use Facebook, 62% use Instagram, 25% use YouTube, and 15% use TikTok.
• Real estate agents say social media is the best source of high-quality leads (CRMs and local MLS rank #2 and #3).
• 100% of homebuyers use the internet in their home search, and 76% use a phone or tablet.
• 41% of buyers looked online as the first step.
• 60% of Instagram’s 2+ billion monthly active users are between 18 and 60.
• 56% of adults aged 18 to 34 use TikTok.
• 27% of buyers say they would use social media to find their next real estate agent, including 32% of first-time buyers and 22% of repeat buyers.
• There are more than 5.17 billion social media users globally.
• The average person spends close to 2 ½ hours using social media every single day.

So, statistically speaking, your audience is already on social media — why not meet them where they are? What’s more, outside of the organic strategies I’m sharing here, social media also offers targeted advertising options tailored to audiences in specific locations.

Ready to put it into action? Let’s dive into some of the top strategies to build your real estate social network.

1. Promote the town, not just the house.

Homebuyers want to know the good, bad, and ugly of each town to which they’re considering a move. Yet, most real estate blogs simply give buyers basic demographic statistics and perhaps some flowery language about the area.

Instead, use your social media channels to provide potential clients a far richer understanding of the markets you serve, letting them know the pros and cons of each neighborhood.

Many cities have a “@CityOf …” social media handle, which you can mention directly in your posts. Use these handles to promote properties you have listed in that city. City accounts tend to be receptive to these shout-outs and might repost you — increasing your post’s reach to their followers.

Instagram Business accounts are also prime real estate (pun absolutely intended) for you to post beautiful photos of the town in which your properties are listed.

2. Be yourself.

I‘ve heard of many realtors who pay a ghostwriter to write their marketing copy, yet this approach has its shortcomings. The copy simply doesn’t ring true; it fails to give clients a sense of who you really are.

Studies show that consumers want to make a personal connection with those whom they do business with, and there’s no shortcut to writing your own authentic social media content that resembles who you are as a real estate agency.

Let your personality shine through across each social network you‘re on. It’s a great way to open a dialogue with a client before they ever pick up the phone. I love this TikTok example of two realtors showing off their personalities.

@indianahomegirls Our newest listing in Fishers has space for all the things! Comment STEP CLASS for more info 😂
#stepbrothers
#funnyvideos
#realestatetiktok
#listingvideo
#indianarealtor
#fishersindiana
#lipsync
♬ original sound – Amazon Prime Video Australia – Prime Video AU & NZ

3. Educate your buyers.

Some of the most trying days as a real estate agent prove to be great lessons we can share with our clients.

Talking about common real estate pitfalls makes your buyers smarter, giving them a smoother browsing experience and qualifying them to work with you.

Social media is the perfect outlet for this. If you have a blog, consider writing articles about home-buying tips. You can then use social media to promote them.

Perhaps you can tweet a “Real Estate Fact of the Day,” hashtagging #realestate while you’re at it.

4. Chat with your followers.

Home buyers today expect instant responses to their questions, but where they ask those questions has changed.

Home buyers are calling real estate agents much less than they used to with questions about a property or neighborhood.

They’re going online, using Facebook’s Recommendations feature, and tweeting at real estate offices on Twitter.

Be ready for this outreach, answer them, and use these questions as an opportunity to start dialogue with followers who might be in the early stages of the buying process.

5. Respond to comments, good and bad.

Respond promptly and courteously to engage readers who post comments on your social media sites. One caveat: Don’t feel compelled to respond to those who post abusive comments.

Social media does lure its share of online bullies, and not every remark aimed at you is worth your breath.

Resist the temptation to get into battle with your harshest critics, and acknowledge those who praise your service.

A lot of people who reach out to you are simply looking for more information about a listing — or a listing they might’ve thought was still available, but has been sold or rented.

Absorb their frustration and use their comment as an opportunity to pivot their interest to other properties.

6. Capture attention with hooks.

People’s attention spans are shorter than ever, which means to catch the attention of your target audience, you need to get them to stop scrolling for long enough to consume your content and (hopefully) take action.

The key here is to hook your audience with something that makes them stand up and say, “Heck, yeah, I want to know more about that.”

This video does a great job of sharing some great hooks (especially in video format):

@onbrandbysarah Hook examples for Realtors! This was hughly requested and there are tons of ways to make your videos more personal and compelling!!! Try it out ❤️
#hookexamples
#videohooks
#socialmediamarketing
#realtors
#realtoroftiktok
#contentstrategy
#businessmentor
♬ original sound – Sarah | Business Mentor 🪩

7. Be playful.

What’s something other real estate agents do that makes you giggle or roll your eyes? Play with it. This video is real and fun:

@stevenkimhomes ✨magic✨ real estate hack!
#realtor
#realtoroftiktok
#realtorhumor
#funny
#forsale
#magic
#toronto
#richmondhill
#realestate
♬ The Reason – Hoobastank

8. Don’t just shout about your home listings.

It‘s fine to let people know about the homes you’re marketing, but don‘t make the house itself the primary topic of your conversation.

Think about common questions home buyers and sellers ask you, and turn these into posts. Provide valuable content and you’ll keep people coming back.

9. Be sure to use video.

There are more than 1 billion daily video views on TikTok.

It’s tempting to skip the expense of shooting and editing a video, but online video is an important element of home marketing.

Think about it: Home buyers are visual buyers, and if done well, a video creates an emotional connection with them that they might not have from just a photo-based listing.

YouTube videos also improve your website’s ranking in search engines like Google — a common place where home buyers and renters start their search for a new home.

10. Remember, you’re not only connecting with first-time buyers.

According to a recent report by the National Association of Realtors (NAR), 24% of home buyers in America are 41-50 years old or younger.

Just 26% of them are first-time buyers. If you think you’re only talking to first-time home buyers on social media, think again.

Social networks like Facebook are great places to engage “fans” and learn what they‘re looking for from their agent, but keep in mind, they’re not all new to the buying process.

Have content suited for all levels of home-buying experience ready to serve up to your fans and followers — you never know whom you’ll be connecting with.

11. Focus on your audience.

A post, link, photo, or tweet on your profile might look nice to you, but it means very little if it doesn’t resonate with the people who are following your page.

Social media is more about listening than about talking. Pay attention to what people are saying about you and your brand.

Solicit and gather feedback through informal polls to your audience or via free survey services like Survey Monkey or Google Forms.

This will ensure each and every piece of content you share on social media reflects the interests of your customers.

12. Remember your existing clients.

Invite your previous buyers and sellers to join you on social media — they’re one of the most important parts of your real estate social networks.

That way, your sites become richer communities of shared experiences and objective advice from those who recently completed the home buying/selling journey.

13. Prioritize connections and relationships over going viral.

While going viral can feel good, it doesn’t mean you’re connecting with people who are actually potential clients.

After all, going viral likely means you’re getting views from people with little to no local interests, and in real estate, local is everything.

Instead, focus on creating meaningful connections with people who live in your area and help them get to know you. Sure, you can share your listings, but focus on why they’d hire you.

This could mean creating content that empathizes with their pain points and sharing behind-the-scenes photos and videos.

However, it also means going into forums and engaging with posts, responding to comments and questions, and being generally helpful.

14. Don’t go all in on one type of post.

Variety is the spice of life and of your real estate social media marketing plan. Or it should be.

Play around with different types of content and change things up periodically to continue building your audience and connecting with what they want. One way to do this is to pay attention to big trends and find ways to capitalize on them.

Test video, still images, humor, and different ways to highlight what your audience can expect when working with you.

15. Repurpose your content.

Shooting a video? Think about whether you can post clips to other platforms.

You may not want to share the same content exactly since different platforms have different audiences (and expectations), but you don’t have to create something new every single day.

You may be able to get a lot of mileage out of a single video or conversation and create dozens of posts from one original recording.

Post-Pandemic Social Media Real-Estate Trends

While social media has always been a valuable tool for realtors to leverage, COVID-19 restrictions led to trends that have continued to take center stage years after the pandemic ended.

Virtual Showings

Some agencies reserved virtual viewings for specific circumstances or luxury homes, but it has now become a common practice: “We used to keep our virtual tours for our luxury homes, but we’ve found it adds to the home buying experience for our clients,” says Lisa Alexander, president of Del-Co Realty.

Video Walkthroughs

When I sold a house in 2020 and bought one in a new city, beautiful photography and videography was a must for understanding the layout.

After that experience, I wouldn’t consider working with a realtor who wasn’t actively planning to use those resources to sell my home.

While these existed pre-pandemic, they’re now elevated to a must. After all, in addition to helping buyers get a sense of the home, video performs really well on social media.

3D House Tours

My favorite feature as a buyer was when realtors created 3D home tours on Zillow that could be shared everywhere, including other listing sites and social media. It gets 60% more views and 79% more saves, which means that many more interested eyes are on your listing.

While the pandemic is in the rear-view mirror (thank goodness!), it had a lasting impact on real estate social media marketing — which comes in incredibly handy for buyers who need to move quickly in highly competitive markets and potentially buy homes sight-unseen and for sellers who want their homes to sell for top dollar.

Social Media Marketing Platforms for Realtors

Not sure what platform you should use?

The short answer is to go where your buyers are — and the longer answer is to also use a platform you’re comfortable with.

With that said, here’s a quick rundown of the top platforms for real estate social networking.

Facebook

Facebook is an excellent tool for real estate professionals, especially when it comes to advertising.

It offers various high-quality options: targeted ads for local listings, Facebook Messenger for conversations with clients, and the ability to share multiple forms of multimedia: images, videos, and even live video.

Instagram

On Instagram, Realtors can create a business account and include contact CTA buttons so those who land on your profile can send you a message on the platform, an email about a property image they saw that intrigued them, or other personalized options.

The platform is great for sharing high-quality image and video content, and the image below is an example of a new property announcement.

Image Source

TikTok

I fully admit to being obsessed with TikTok. I’ve shared several examples of how you can use it to connect with your audience.

One of the best reasons is that you can build a following by being real without investing in high-quality or professional-grade content.

This is especially true considering that TikTokers favor behind-the-scenes type content, which is exactly what house walkthroughs are (the video below is an example).

Real Estate Social Media Content Ideas

Now that you’ve got your platform, what should you share? Here are a few ideas.

Go live for open houses and virtual showings.

Realtors can do this on Instagram, Facebook, and TikTok, and a benefit to going live is that the videos can be saved and later shared to your profile, acting as an additional form of content.

Answer audience questions.

All social media platforms are a great place to answer audience questions, as you can engage with your audience and develop a rapport that leads to a working relationship.

Another benefit to answering questions publicly is that it’s public, and everyone can see your responses. This can help interested buyers approach you with qualified, further-down-the-funnel questions.

Share customer testimonials and success stories.

All platforms are a great place to share customer testimonials, helping you use user-generated content to establish legitimacy and credibility with your audience. The Facebook post below is an example of a client testimonial.

Image Source

Share property photos, videos, and tours.

I touched on the virtual tours and videos above, but don’t forget to share them to social!

Property photos are a must for realtors on social media, especially on Instagram and Facebook. You can give clients a sneak peek of what to expect from the property and entice them to reach out to you to learn more through a virtual or in-person tour.

Here’s an example of high-quality property photos on Instagram:

You can share property photos on TikTok as still images, but the platform is better suited for video. Check out this example:

@the608angelica Girly has so much potenial💕 @Dom Murray . . .
#housetour
#realestate
#oldhouse
#victorianhome
#wisconsin
#historichome
#hgtv
#homedecor
#home
♬ Sunshine – WIRA

And here’s an example from Instagram:

Share your realtor bio.

Relationships between agents and clients are important, as they trust you to take to heart the things that they care about and point them in the right direction.

As a result, using social media to share realtor bios is worth considering. Your audience can learn more about what you offer and reach out if it feels like a good match.

Have fun!

There’s a place for polished content, but you can also have fun with it, like this video that always makes me smile:

@nmccaslin I cant believe this home hasn’t sold… but I’m not giving up yet 😝
#realbroker
#dancingrealtor
#27goingon65
#sobertok
#soberfun
#realestate
#owensboroky
#realtortok
#givemethemusic
#persistant
#treatyoself
#marketyourself
#workout
♬ everybody dance now танцуют все – 💫РЕТРОЛЁТ💫

Social media is (part of) the future of real estate.

One thing is clear to me — unless there’s a major change in our future, social media is a big piece of the puzzle for real estate marketing.

If you take the time to create a social media presence that includes high-quality photos of the properties you sell, you interact with clients, and you follow a consistent schedule, you’ll likely find yourself generating new clients and closing on more homes.

What’s more, at the end of the day, your followers may prove themselves to be your strongest property advocates.

This guest post was written by Leslie Mann, a real estate agent with Gibson Sotheby’s International Realty of Weston, MA.

Editor’s note: This post was originally published in September 2021 and has been updated for comprehensiveness.

The Fall is always busy.

As soon as the calendar flips to September, the easy, breezy days of Summer yield to the formal, often frantic, days of Fall.

In the B2B world, Fall means conference season is upon us.

For NetLine, Fall 2024 means three individual events on two distant coasts talking about one particularly wonderful workbook.

We’ve completed two of these events now and I’d like to share our experiences and takeaways.

A Growing Appetite for Actionable Insights

INBOUND24 and Content Marketing World 2024 gave us a front-row seat to something clear—marketers today are actively searching for frameworks and strategies that can create real, measurable impact.

Each event underscored the frustration many marketers feel with generic advice and limited solutions. Attendees came ready to learn, ask questions, and take home tools (like our 2024 Marketing Mastery Workbook) they could immediately apply to their businesses.

September: INBOUND24 | Boston, MA

2024 marked the first time NetLine not only attended but also sponsored and hosted a session at INBOUND. 

While we arrived with big aspirations, the overwhelming response exceeded all expectations.  

The feedback from our 90-minute “Marketing Mastery Workshop: ICPs, Content, and Engagement” reinforced this need for practical solutions, not pitches. Attendees expressed genuine gratitude for the depth of detail we provided, with many calling it their favorite session of the event.

Here are a few pieces of feedback that stood out:  

• “One of the most detailed and valuable sessions I have been to over multiple INBOUNDs.”
• “Such an informative session. Even though I am with a B2C business, I got so much value out of what I learned in this session. I’ve never quite attended a session that breaks down the Buyer’s Journey so well and provides actualized examples of what it looks like in application. Definitely thankful I attended this session.”
• “Excellent session with frameworks I can’t wait to share with my team and use! The presenters were fun and kept us engaged for a longer session. Thank you!”

One attendee, brand new to her role, quite wanted a hard copy of the workbook. She shared how helpful the workbook is as a new marketing leader, as she figures out their tech stack, processes, and what she wants to implement.

This feedback reinforces the heart of our democratized mission: empowering today’s B2B marketers to make smarter, more informed decisions that drive both pipeline success and career growth. 

October: Content Marketing World 2024 | San Diego, CA

Right after INBOUND24, we took the Marketing Mastery Workbook on the road again—this time to Content Marketing World 2024 in sunny San Diego.

We hosted two jam-packed workshops based on the information found in the workbook, and the response was off the charts.  

Coming off of the success at INBOUND, we expected demand for the Workbook to be rather high. What resulted was unreal. As soon as the session wrapped, attendees made a B-line for our booth to grab physical copies.

Our team was swarmed by more than 40 attendees in a five minute span.

Some even pulled me aside in a panic, worried about going back empty-handed:  

“If I don’t bring this back for my team, I might not make it through Monday!”

And—believe it or not—two people literally smacked hands trying to grab the same copy at the booth! 

Who knew marketing workbooks could spark such competition?  

It was inspiring to see so many passionate marketers not just attending, but actively seeking out tools to level up their game.  

The Power of Human Connection

The real highlight of these events wasn’t just the demand for workbooks or strategies—it was the connections we made along the way.

What’s crystal clear is that marketers are craving more than insights—they want authentic engagement with peers and solution providers.

Throughout both events, our team experienced honest, meaningful conversations with professionals who are looking for better ways to connect—not just with customers but with each other. These conversations are shaping the future of marketing, where the focus is less on pitches and more on collaboration and connection.

Since May 2023, the common thread across the four conferences I’ve attended hasn’t been AI—it’s the collective desire to shift “back” to humanity.

This is simply a need at the core.

People are starving for direction and connection.

Yes, it’s fantastic that tools like ChatGPT can churn through data in seconds. But with this, the need for meaningful, human-centered content and connection feels more important than ever.

This longing for closeness and belonging has existed forever. COVID altered how we perceived connection; now, nearly four years post-pandemic, we’re coming to terms with just how necessary human interaction is.

Granted, this doesn’t mean brands should go all in on in-person events (though they’re clearly very much in vogue) or that IRL is exclusively the answer.

Rather, I expect to see a return to humanity across all of marketing. 

 And how it is applied matters.

“Much of this sentiment really confirms that people still do business with people,” David Fortino said while discussing these collective observations. “The most innovative technologies cannot replace human emotions, relationship development, conservation over cocktails or coffee.”

When I asked if he anticipated a return to physical marketing as a response to AI and this very human desire to connect, he responded immediately. “100%.”

Ann Handley wasn’t as sold.

“I don’t know,” she said. “I’ve never been great at predicting the future. But I think AI invites us to ask some important questions: If gen AI can help us create and iterate faster… do we ALWAYS want to CREATE and ITERATE faster? Or is this another way? Are there moments when speed isn’t the goal? Is there value in efficiency? We use technology to take shortcuts. But we need to be strategic in which shortcuts we take.”

The last line is one that should bring reflection. There is absolutely value in efficiency and all of the “Sloments” Ann talked about during CMWorld keynote. 

Talking with her after the event, Ann agreed with my perspectives on the desired shift back to human-centric marketing. 

In fact, I think she wholeheartedly believes we need it. “Yes. 100%,” she said.

How to Be a More Human Marketing Operation

People are seeking deeper connection rather than the way in which we may have been attempting so previously. 

Social media was once supposed to be the great connector of our time. While that ship has seemingly sailed (if not sank), there are ways we can prepare ourselves and our teams to be human-centered in our marketing.

Be Patient

Rome wasn’t built in a day—and neither are the customer relationships that truly matter. While it’s essential to act swiftly when the need arises, most of the time, your pace can be slower and more intentional. Embrace the tortoise’s pace, and be fully present with each interaction. Patience here is an asset, not a setback.

Be Vulnerable

Perfection isn’t a prerequisite for connection. You won’t have all the answers, nor will your teammates, managers, or clients.

Extend grace when things are unclear, and be comfortable sharing your unique perspectives and opinions—those are what shape you as a professional. You don’t need a stage to express your take on a given topic; trust that there’s value in your insights, and people want to hear them.

Be Prepared

Whatever it is you do, be ready and willing to speak to it. Preparation doesn’t mean broadcasting expertise at every moment, but when the time is right, it means you’re ready. With your groundwork in place, you’ll find that connection becomes frictionless, even when opportunities arise unexpectedly.

Use Intent Data Thoughtfully

Intent data doesn’t just tell you who to connect with—it highlights the what, where, and when of people’s needs and interests. Listening deeply to these signals lets you address those needs in ways that feel authentic.

While personalization often conjures up visions of 1:1 connection, human-centered marketing can also come from studying patterns within a group, allowing you to identify when a previously successful approach no longer resonates with your ICP.

I am certain there are a dozen additional ways to address such an endeavor, but these seem like a good starting point

Gratitude for the Team Behind the Success

None of this would have been possible without the efforts of our outstanding team.  

• INBOUND24 Team: Josh Baez, Marissa Wolfgang, Jon Steiert, Allison Mooney, Megan Ebersole, Andrew Gioia, and Janine Johnson.  

• CMWorld Team: Josh Baez, Marissa Wolfgang, Jon Steiert, Allison Mooney, and Lauren Calvert—thank you for your creativity, energy, and passion. 

These events were all you.

We are so proud of what you all accomplished at these events.

Looking Forward

Both INBOUND24 and Content Marketing World 2024 were more than just events for NetLine—they were opportunities to connect, share insights, and engage in meaningful conversations with the marketing community. We’re grateful for every attendee who spent time with us, every piece of feedback we received, and the chance to make a real impact.  

With the momentum from these incredible events, we’re excited about what’s next: which just so happens to be MarketingProfs’ B2B Forum, November 13 – 14, also taking place in Boston!

We look forward to building on these connections, deepening conversations, and continuing to empower marketers with insights and solutions that help them succeed.  

Get More Insights and Resources

We’re thrilled to continue providing you with resources and actionable frameworks. Here’s how you can explore more from NetLine:  

• 143-Page Marketing Mastery Workbook  
  • Couldn’t get a physical copy at either event? 
  • Get your digital copy
• B2B Targeting and Segmentation Webinar  
  • Explore new ways to identify and engage your ideal customers.
  • Register
• Exploring the B2B Buyer’s Journey Webinar  
  • Align your strategies with the buyer’s journey and create meaningful engagement.  
  • Register

If you rely on SEO and information-based content to grow your audience, it’s time to rethink your approach with personality content.

Informational content used to be the go-to method for building brand awareness and driving growth. And it was a pretty simple process: rank for key search terms, attract web traffic, and convert leads.

But with AI’s growing capabilities, this category of content has become commoditized — easily generated, widely distributed, and harder to distinguish from the competition. As a result, it’s increasingly difficult for brands to maintain a unique voice and stand out in an oversaturated market.

This is where personality-led content comes in. By tapping into storytelling and the human experience, it connects with audiences in ways that AI simply can’t. But what exactly is personality content, and how can you add it to your marketing playbook?

In a recent episode of Marketing Against the Grain, Kieran and I explore the shift from informational content to a personality-led approach. We also cover five practical tips to help brands regain control of their narratives and create content that stands out from AI-generated material. Let’s dive in.

Informational vs. Personality Content: What’s the Difference?

Information-led content — also referred to as ‘educational’ content — is all about delivering facts, data, and answers to specific questions. Think of assets like how-to guides, tutorials, or product comparisons. But with AI tools now able to generate those answers in seconds (and with even more precision than Google), this type of content has become less valuable and much harder to rank for in search results.

Personality-led content, on the other hand, connects with audiences through storytelling and real-life experiences. This could look like behind-the-scenes videos that give a peek into your brand’s culture, opinion pieces from industry thought leaders, or influencer-driven stories that build trust by featuring familiar faces.

Especially as attention spans shrink and the competition for audience engagement grows, personality-driven content gives businesses a strategic advantage by fostering authentic, emotionally-driven connections and making them more memorable.

Practical Tips to Build a Personality Content Strategy

Interested in implementing a personality-led content strategy? Kieran and I have identified five key tactics to help your brand thrive — even as AI-generated content continues to grow.

1. Revamp your hiring strategy.

One of the best ways to jumpstart your personality-driven content strategy is by rethinking how you structure and hire for your marketing team.

Take Mohak Nahta, for example, a founder in the travel industry. He realized that SEO-driven content that addressed common travel questions — like visa applications and logistics — was losing its impact, as AI could easily churn out that kind of information.

Instead of continuing with the same approach, he pivoted to a personality-led strategy and hired in-house influencers to share their personal travel experiences on the company’s marketing channels.

This not only made the content harder for AI to replicate but also helped the brand grow its audience on community-driven platforms like TikTok.

2. Incentivize your creators and influencers.

Creators and influencers are among the most trusted voices today, but working with them can be challenging.

Many prefer to build their own platforms rather than fully commit to a brand, especially if they have the skills to grow their own channels. As a result, influencers who are willing to collaborate with brands are often either early in their careers or less established. To bridge this gap, offering the right incentives is crucial.

One approach is to hire aspiring influencers as in-house content creators and invest in their development. The better they perform, the more training and opportunities they receive.

Alternatively, you can attract established influencers by offering incentives like revenue-sharing models, exclusive brand deals, or access to premium experiences that align with their personal brand.

Whichever route you choose, the key is to align their success with your brand’s goals, ensuring a win-win for both parties.

3. Differentiate in key areas.

Instead of trying to compete for web traffic everywhere, zoom in on one or two places where you can truly win. This means obsessing over a few key areas — whether that’s one platform or a specific content style — and becoming the best in those spaces.

As Kieran points out during the episode, the market is even more saturated because you’re not just competing with brands anymore — you’re up against individual influencers, too. So you have to really know: where am I unique? Where’s the differentiation?

By narrowing your focus, you can develop content that stands out from the competition and resonates with your audience in a way that AI-generated content can’t.

4. Own your content infrastructure.

Modern B2B creator marketing should be structured like the Marvel Universe. For example, just like Marvel owns the IP, the characters, and the storyline, companies need to own their most valuable assets — social accounts and platforms, strategic playbooks, content libraries.

The creators themselves, much like actors, can come and go. You might have different people playing the role, depending on the project or the message, but the core infrastructure and brand identity remain consistent.

5. Go deep on expertise.

Deep expertise is what separates truly valuable content from the rest. At HubSpot, for example, we’ve taken all of our informational content, sorted it into categories, and identified the pieces that are the most defensible.

From there, we go deeper, adding unique value to those posts in ways AI can’t easily replicate — video, customer statistics, interactive features — which ensures that our content remains highly specialized and unique to our brand.

Personality content is the future of content marketing.

Personality-led content is the key to surviving and thriving in the face of AI. By focusing on authenticity, differentiation, and strategic use of creators, marketing executives can protect their brands and keep control over their narrative.

To learn more about personality content, check out the full episode of Marketing Against the Grain below:

This blog series is in partnership with Marketing Against the Grain, the video podcast. It digs deeper into ideas shared by marketing leaders Kipp Bodnar (HubSpot’s CMO) and Kieran Flanagan (SVP, Marketing at HubSpot) as they unpack growth strategies and learn from standout founders and peers.

Welcome to Creator Columns, where we bring expert HubSpot Creator voices to the Blogs that inspire and help you grow better.

For the past ten years, I’ve been using Hollywood screenwriting techniques to help companies create powerful marketing stories. I’ve seen firsthand how powerful storytelling can be in transforming a company’s messaging.

Before we keep going though, spoiler alert, I need you to know that may just ruin movies for you. On the other hand, if you keep reading, I also may just show you how to make your marketing story even more irresistible.

The Power of the Problem in Screenwriting

For a moment, let’s take off our marketing hats and put on our screenwriting hats.

In the world of screenwriting, master storytellers know that to create a gripping narrative, you need to write a powerful problem for a hero to overcome. If there is no problem in the story, there is no story.

Can you imagine Liam Neeson getting the phone call that his daughter is kidnapped (again), but this time, just as he’s about to go off on the terrorist on the other end, his daughter hops on the call and tells him it’s all just a prank. Her friends took her to New York to check out colleges and she’d like him to join her.

Then the rest of the movie is about them just walking around New York enjoying a fall day. That is not an interesting movie. You would walk out.

There has to be a problem for the hero to overcome. A bomb has to be about to go off. A meteor has to be hurling towards earth. A Death Star has to be about to destroy another planet.

The bigger the problem the hero has to overcome, the more the audience pays attention and waits to see if the hero can eventually overcome the problem.

However, there is more to writing an interesting story than just establishing a big problem.

The Three Levels of Problem

So obviously, for a movie to truly grip the audience, the hero has to encounter a big problem. There is something that has to get in the way of what the hero wants. This is called an External Problem.

External Problem

The External Problem is the visible, tangible obstacle or challenge that the main character faces. It’s the surface-level issue that is easily identifiable. In the Hunger Games, Katniss has to win the Hunger Games. In Star Wars, Luke has to destroy a Death Star. Pretty simple to understand.

Here is where I’m going to start ruining movies for you. In order to relate to the audience, screenwriters have to dig deeper than the External Problem. After all, how many of us have had to compete in the Hunger Games or destroy a Death Star? Very few. So how can we relate to the main characters if we’ve never experienced their experience?

Storytellers have learned to hook audiences by introducing two more layers to the problem: Internal Problem and Philosophical Problem.

Internal Problem

Beneath the surface of every External Problem lies an internal struggle. In a movie, the hero has to disarm a bomb (External Problem), but maybe the last time he tried to disarm a bomb, he cut the wrong wire and people died. Now, he is not sure he has what it takes. That is his Internal Problem. How many of us have ever wondered if we have what it takes? Pretty much everyone.

The story is no longer just about destroying a bomb, but it is about the hero’s desire to prove he has what it takes. The Internal Problem becomes the heart of the story and makes the story more relatable to the audience.

Philosophical Problem

The next layer of problem screenwriters use is called the Philosophical Problem.

This is the deepest level, addressing why the problem matters in a larger context or on a moral level. It often relates to what’s right or wrong, fair or unfair. The movie will make an argument that good should triumph over evil or true love should win out over arranged marriages.

By incorporating all three levels, storytellers can create more compelling narratives that deeply resonate with their audience. When the hero overcomes all three levels of problems, the hero wins.

So what does this mean for you as a marketer?

In your marketing, your customer is the hero of your story. One of the most crucial elements in crafting a compelling story for your brand is understanding your customer‘s problem. But here’s the thing — most businesses only scratch the surface when it comes to defining their customer’s issues.

External Problem: The Visible Obstacle

The external problem is what most businesses focus on. It‘s the tangible, visible issue that your customer is facing. For example, if you’re selling lawn care, the external problem might be a weed-filled lawn. It’s easy to identify and straightforward to address. Most marketers get this right.

However, if you stop here, you’re missing out on the real power of storytelling. This is where many companies fall short, failing to connect with their audience on a deeper level.

Internal Problem: The Emotional Struggle

Customers are often more motivated to buy solutions to their internal problems than their external ones. For instance, a homeowner with a weed-filled lawn (External Problem) is not going to hire someone to care for their lawn unless they feel frustrated and embarrassed (Internal Problem).

The Internal Problem is where the real story begins to take shape. It’s what drives the character (or in our case, the customer) to seek a solution. By addressing this level, you show your audience that you truly understand their struggles and make your marketing more interesting.

Philosophical Problem: The Big “Why”

The third and deepest level of problem is philosophical. This is the big picture, the reason why the problem matters in the grand scheme of things. It’s often framed as a question of right and wrong or fairness.

In our lawn care example, the philosophical problem might be, “People should spend more time enjoying their lawn than working on it.” This level adds weight and significance to the customer’s problem, making your product or service feel more important and impactful.

Implementing the Three-Level Problem In Your Marketing

Now, let’s look at how to implement all three levels of problem in your marketing.

1. Identify the External Problem.

Start by clearly defining the tangible issue your product or service solves. Be specific and use language your customers would use themselves. For example: “Our software helps small businesses manage their finances more efficiently.”

2. Uncover the Internal Problem.

Dig deeper to understand the emotional impact of the external problem. What feelings or internal struggles does it create? For our financial software example: “Small business owners feel overwhelmed and stressed about managing their finances, worried they might be making costly mistakes.”

3. Articulate the Philosophical Problem.

Consider the bigger picture. Why is this problem unfair or wrong on a broader scale? For our example: “Hardworking entrepreneurs shouldn’t have to become accounting experts just to run their businesses successfully.”

4. Put all three levels into your messaging.

Once you‘ve identified all three levels, make sure they are in your marketing materials. Here’s how it might look for our financial software: “Managing your small business finances can feel like a full-time job.

Our easy-to-use software streamlines your bookkeeping, giving you peace of mind and more time to focus on what you do best. Because you started a business to pursue your passion, not to become an accountant.”

This message addresses the External Problem (inefficient financial management), the Internal Problem (stress and overwhelm), and the Philosophical Problem (entrepreneurs should be free to focus on what they love).

Making Your Marketing Irresistible With These Screenwriting Techniques

By clearly defining your customer‘s problem at all three levels — external, internal, and philosophical — you create a message that’s not just clear, but deeply resonant and motivating.

Remember, most companies are missing two of these crucial levels in their marketing. By implementing this screenwriting technique, you‘re not just selling a product or service; you’re inviting your customer into a compelling story where they‘re the hero, and you’re the guide they’ve been looking for.

In the paid acquisition world, clicks on your ads can seem like the holy grail. But you need a better way to measure your content’s converting capabilities than just clicks — enter, cost per acquisition.

If you really think about it, clicks only tell you if people arrive at your content. And as much as I wish my clicks could spell out the whole picture for me, they can’t.

Instead, I’ve found the cost per acquisition (or CPA) is a better metric to determine whether my content is engaging enough to persuade my audience to stay and, ultimately, buy into my product or service.

Read on to learn more about what exactly CPA is, the formula for calculating it, how its bidding process works, and some principles for crafting creative and convincing ad copy.

Table of Contents

• Cost Per Acquisition (CPA)
• Cost Per Acquisition Bidding
• Cost Per Acquisition Formula
• Why is cost per acquisition important?
• What is a good cost per acquisition?
• How to Lower Cost Per Acquisition (CPA) Costs

Many marketers prefer the cost-per-acquisition pricing model because they can define an acquisition before they start advertising and only pay when their desired acquisition or action occurs.

I like this model because it allows you to stretch your advertising budget just a bit farther. (Check out these free templates to help you manage your budget!)

This pricing model is used in a handful of paid marketing mediums, including:

• PPC
• Display
• Social media
• Affiliate
• Email marketing
• Content marketing

Now let’s take a closer look at cost acquisition biddings.

AdRank is calculated by multiplying your maximum cost per acquisition bid with the quality score of your ad. Your quality score ad is impacted by your page’s relevance to the keyword, user experience, and click-through-rate.

This means organizations can’t acquire the top ranking for any keyword they want just because they have the biggest ad budgets, which is a relief for smaller marketers like me. Their content has to be engaging, and because of that, you and I can fairly compete with them.

In other words, Google wants to discourage bad advertisers from advertising bad content, so those with low quality scores will usually only acquire a high ad position if they pay a huge cost per acquisition bid.

If they want to pay a lower cost per acquisition bid, they’ll have to settle with stooping at the bottom of the ad rankings.

Target CPA Bidding

To generate as many conversions as possible within the limits of your advertising budget, consider using Google’s target CPA bidding.

Target CPA bidding leverages machine learning to analyze your campaign’s historical conversion data, recommend an optimal average target CPA, and automatically optimize all your eligible bids to meet the average target CPA you set for all your campaigns.

If you use target CPA bidding, some of your conversions may cost more than others because your quality score or the competition in your ad auction might fluctuate, but Google will try its hardest to keep your cost per acquisition as close to your average target CPA as possible.

Cost Per Acquisition Formula

You’ll want to keep up with your cost per acquisition costs to track in your monthly marketing reports.

To calculate your advertising campaign’s CPA, take your total advertising spend and divide it by the number of acquisitions generated.

Let’s take a moment to play with some numbers to get an idea of how to calculate a CPA. Let’s say you have an advertising budget of $5,000. However, you only spend $2,500 and generate 1,200 conversions.

Your math will look something like this:

CPA= 2,500/1,200

This gives you a CPA of $2.08. In other words, each conversion costs around two dollars of your advertising budget.

(Alternatively, you can use the Return on Ad Spend calculator to quickly crunch these numbers and a few other important metrics!)

Why is cost per acquisition important?

If you’re considering pay-per-click advertising, you need to understand CPA. It’s an important metric to help you plan your advertising strategy.

To help you better understand why, I thought it would be useful to share insights from marketing and advertising specialists.

Here’s what they said when I asked, “Why is cost per acquisition important?”

1. Plan your marketing budget.

Ross Kernez, CEO of SEO Meetup, told me that your CPA can help you better plan your multi-channel marketing strategy, including PPC, social media, and content marketing.

Kernez said, “Knowing your CPA enables better allocation of marketing budgets. It helps marketers identify which channels are more cost-effective in delivering results, allowing them to focus resources on high-performing campaigns while cutting back on underperforming ones.”

2. Improve your advertising’s conversions.

Just like using CPA to plan your budget, you can also use it to improve your advertising efforts.

Cristina Muchi, CEO of Upway Marketing, put it like this, “CPA is the yardstick for measuring how efficiently the marketing dollars are working for the brand. Whether the company is using Facebook ads, Google search, or email marketing, every platform and campaign incurs a cost. CPA shows us which strategies are truly delivering conversions without burning through the budget.”

3. Easily scale your efforts.

Alfred Goldberg, Chief Brand Strategist of Absolute Marketing Solutions, told me that calculating your CPA helps eliminate guesswork in marketing and makes it easier to scale your efforts.

Goldberg said, “You can confidently scale your campaigns when you know your CPA is profitable. If you‘re spending $10 to get a customer who spends $50, why wouldn’t you increase your ad budget? CPA lets you grow without the guesswork.”

What is a good cost per acquisition?

Now that we know why CPA is important for your advertising efforts, let’s discuss the question everyone is asking: what is a good cost per acquisition?

I’m going to let you in on a secret: a “good” cost per acquisition varies by industry. So, while a $5 CPA might be perfect for one industry, it might be entirely too high for another.

I like what Randall Yates, Co-Founder of VA Loan Network, said about it. Yates said, “If you can keep your CPA low, you’re in a position to thrive because every dollar spent brings in more value. It’s like a well-oiled machine — you’re reaching your ideal customers efficiently, and that’s how you scale a business.”

On the flip side, a high CPA is a huge red flag, Yates says.

“It means your marketing efforts aren’t hitting the mark, and you’re throwing money at a problem without getting the returns. I’ve seen businesses struggle and fail because they couldn’t get their CPA under control. So, for me, lowering CPA isn’t just important — it’s make or break,” says Yates.

If you’re worried you’re spending too much on advertising, a good rule of thumb is to maintain a 3 to 1 ratio. In other words, for every three dollars you spend, you can expect one conversion.

It’s helpful to reach out to other marketers in your industry to compare notes. This way, you can get a better understanding of your CPA and if it’s too high or too low for your industry.

How to Lower Cost Per Acquisition (CPA) Costs

Adjusting your cost per acquisition is a starting point for lowering it. However, there are more factors at work that determine the effectiveness of your advertising.

Let’s take a moment to go over how you can lower your CPA costs and maximize your ad spending just by making a few tweaks to your marketing strategies.

1. Optimize your ad copy.

Since your quality score, which measures how positive and relevant of an experience your content provides, is the most influential determinant in securing a top ad ranking, the best way to optimize your cost per acquisition costs is crafting compelling ad copy.

When you sit down to write an ad or landing page copy, your goal should be to write something so captivating that it can grab the attention of a distracted millennial slouched in front of the TV, with their smartphone in one hand and a slice of pizza in the other.

One way to do this is by selling a feeling, not a product. Psychology tells us that emotions drive our behavior, while logic justifies our actions after the fact. Marketing confirms this theory — humans associate the same personality traits with brands as they do with people.

This is also the reason why pitching a product’s features is a lousy attempt at persuasion. Features only appeal to the logical part of your brain, which science suggests doesn’t drive action nearly as well as appealing to the emotional part of your brain does. So don’t just get creative with your copy — get emotional too.

Pro tip: Avoid selling the features and focus on the benefits. For example, don’t just say, “This computer has twelve hours of battery life.” Consider making a more compelling statement like, “With 12 hours of uninterrupted power, you can create, work, or explore the web all day, at your desk or on the go.”

2. Focus on customer retention as a strategy.

To state the obvious, acquiring new customers is often more costly than retaining existing customers. So, by focusing on customer retention, you can leverage the investment you’ve already made in acquiring your existing customers, reducing the need for additional acquisition spending. This ultimately leads to a lower CPA.

On top of that, repeat customers tend to generate more revenue over their lifetime compared to one-time purchasers. By focusing on customer retention, you can increase the customer lifetime value (CLV) of your customer base.

Pro tip: Checking in with your customers, providing targeted support, and focusing on building a solid relationship with them are some of the best ways to increase customer retention.

3. Enhance your landing pages.

Just because you’ve grabbed someone’s attention with your ad doesn’t mean your work is done. You still need to design a compelling landing page that clearly conveys the value of our offer.

In order to do this, consider piquing your audience’s curiosity with an intriguing headline and subheading, and scrapping any external links from your landing page so visitors can only leave your paid acquisition funnel if they exit or convert.

You could also test out video, which can explain the value of your offer in a more engaging way than text can.

If you want to learn how HubSpot creates landing pages that convert at 35% rate, check out this blog post.

Pro tip: Check out HubSpot’s Marketing Software to help drive revenue and optimize your landing pages.

4. Leverage your CRM to prioritize leads.

According to HubSpot research, 44% of marketers say using a customer relationship management software (CRM) to streamline their sales cycle is an effective strategy for lowering CPA costs.

The power of a CRM lies in its ability to centralize and manage your leads. Then, by organizing leads based on their stage in the sales cycle, you can prioritize your efforts on those with the highest potential to convert.

As a result, you can avoid wasteful spending on leads that are less likely to result in conversions, leading to a lower CPA.

Pro tip: Spend some time analyzing how your leads interact with your sales funnel and CRM. This can help you identify sticky points that might lead to customer loss.

5. Conduct market research regularly.

How can you speak to your audience if you don’t know who they are?

Of marketers surveyed by HubSpot, 43.5% say conducting market research to better understand their target audience is an effective strategy for lowering CPA costs. Market research helps you gain insights into the needs, preferences, and behaviors of your target audience.

Ultimately, targeted messaging increases the relevance of your ads and content, resulting in higher engagement, click-through rates, and conversions.

Plus, market research provides valuable demographic, psychographic, and behavioral data about your target audience. This information enables you to advertise on the right platforms and refine your targeting parameters.

Pro tip: Social media platforms, like Reddit forums, are great places to learn about your target audience. Spend some time reading Reddit posts to learn more about their wants, needs, and pain points.

Back to You

Marketers will chase vanity metrics until the end of time, and, if you’re like me, you might feel pressured to do the same, especially when your peers clamor on about their astronomical growth in views or clicks.

As I’ve learned, ad clicks are great, but it only counts if you convert a lead to a sale. So if you ever feel tempted to jump on that train of vanity metrics, remember, the goal in marketing is to persuade someone to take your desired action.

So incentivize your brand to resonate with your audience — that’s the thing that actually keeps people on your content and prompts them to act. And make conversions, not clicks, your carrot.

Editor’s note: This post was originally published in May 2019 and has been updated for comprehensiveness.

Despite my tendency to let my email inbox bloat with unanswered emails (I just got a warning from Gmail that my inbox is 90% full), I’m actually pretty well-versed in email marketing.

I used to manage the email newsletter at a TV station as a journalist, and I most recently managed the HubSpot Daily Newsletter before it morphed into the Masters in Marketing newsletter, which you should subscribe to if you haven’t already.

Though the marketing landscape is constantly changing, email marketing remains an effective way for businesses to generate leads and convert more leads. That’s why local TV stations use them, your favorite brand likely has one, and HubSpot has a few!

According to our 2024 State of Marketing and Trends Report, about a third of marketers (33%) use email as a channel to connect to their audience. This makes email the second most used channel behind social media.

Email marketing isn’t going away soon, so you should incorporate it into your marketing strategy. Here are some best practices I live by that will help you get the most out of your email marketing strategy.

Table of Contents

• 3 Email Automation Best Practices
• 9 Email Campaign Best Practices
• 10 Email Content Best Practices

3 Email Automation Best Practices

1. Implement AI wherever helpful.

You can’t spell “automation” without AI. I know the use of AI has garnered as much criticism as praise, but believe me when I tell you that all email marketers should be leveraging AI in their campaigns.

AI can streamline your workflows and processes, freeing time to focus on other tasks while ensuring your audience receives timely and engaging content.

In fact, our most recent newsletter survey found that 42% of email marketers saved between 30 minutes and two hours of work each week by using AI.

If that notion alone isn’t enough to convince you to implement AI, remember that while you may not be using AI, your competitors certainly are.

Our survey also found that almost a third of respondents (31%) use AI to edit newsletter content.

28% use AI to generate newsletter headlines or format content and 22% use it to get suggestions for short-form newsletter content such as headlines and preview descriptions.

So, if you want to stay competitive and efficiently generate newsletter content your audience will read, you should look into ways to leverage AI to automate certain processes, such as ideation or segmentation.

2. Look over, fact-check, and edit AI-generated content.

If you‘re using AI to draft any sort of copy for your emails, always double-check for accuracy and legibility. AI can streamline processes and boost efficiency but also make mistakes.

You also want to ensure the copy doesn’t read as being too robotic or impersonal.

3. Create automated emails for opt-ins.

Be prepared for your readers to forget they opted in.

Set up an automated email flow that reminds people they opted into your email database. The auto-responder should be sent out one day, five days, and 10 days after the person subscribes.

Each automated email should also include additional content or bonus material to reward the reader for opting into the newsletter. Otherwise, your readers might not feel they have enough incentive to actually stay on your list.

9 Email Campaign Best Practices

1. Don’t purchase contact lists.

This first tip should be no surprise, but given the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), it bears repeating.

Email campaigns depend on a healthy open rate. If you’re contacting people whose information you bought rather than earned from a previous interaction, your emails’ performance will quickly drop.

It also could turn off potential customers if they know you bought their information from another party.

For example, a couple of years ago, I made a big cross-country move and contacted a moving company for a quote on their services.

About a day after contacting them, I was bombarded with emails from other moving companies and services and added to newsletters I had never signed up for.

So, I unsubscribed and blocked many of those businesses that seemed to have received my information from the initial company I contacted. I also blocked that company.

Moral of the story? Don’t buy your contacts, add people to lists without their permission, or share their information without their consent. It’s one way to leave a bad impression on potential consumers.

Remember that the GDPR also requires each European recipient’s consent before contacting them. Purchased email lists usually do not come with that consent.

To help reach your target audience, consider Versium Reach — a platform for B2B marketers that allows you to own data on your target audience across multiple marketing channels.

2. Avoid using ‘No-Reply’ in the sender’s email address.

Have you heard of CAN-SPAM? This long-standing legislation is a popular and important guideline for all email marketers in the U.S.

One major rule in CAN-SPAM is to never use the words “no reply “ or a similar phrase as the email sender’s name (for example, ”[email protected]”).

“No reply” in an email message prevents recipients from responding and even opting out of further emails, which CAN-SPAM protects their right to do so at any time.

Instead, have your automated emails come from a first name ([email protected]). Your customers are much more likely to open emails if they know a human being wrote them, and this keeps you compliant with email regulations.

3. Clean your mailing list regularly.

Listen, I get it. When I managed the HubSpot Daily Email, I absolutely loved seeing thousands of people on our lists who would receive our emails. However, I eventually learned that the quantity of my email list wasn’t nearly as important as the quality.

Some of our email contacts may not have opted out of our email campaign but would still never open our emails. And those types of contacts simply were not helpful to our campaign goals.

People who never open emails make your campaign look worse since you‘re not analyzing the campaign’s quality against your most loyal recipients.

That’s why I strongly suggest you review your list of subscribers who have not engaged with your emails over a certain period and remove them regularly.

This will give you a more accurate email open rate and keep your email campaign clean of people who are no longer interested in hearing from you.

You can also implement a workflow in which they’re gradually moved to a less frequent email list based on activity.

For instance, say you have a daily newsletter. You could implement a workflow in which subscribers who do not open your email in two consecutive weeks are moved to the weekly email.

Then, if subscribers don’t open four consecutive emails, they could be moved to the monthly newsletter, and so on.

It prevents you from bombarding your subscribers with emails they’re not interested in while keeping your list clean.

4. Allow recipients to subscribe to your newsletter.

I know what you’re thinking: “Wait, if they received the email, to begin with, shouldn’t they have already subscribed?”

Usually, yes. Therefore, adding a “Subscribe” button to your email doesn’t help those who’ve already agreed to receive your emails.

But great content is shareable content, and if your current subscribers are forwarding your emails to their friends and colleagues, you’ll want to help them subscribe, too.

I‘m pretty much the queen of newsletters, which is partially why my inbox is so full. I’m always forwarding newsletters to my friends when I think they might interest them. And oftentimes, they end up subscribing, too.

So, add a small but visible CTA that allows the recipient to subscribe to the newsletter if they received this email from someone else.

This email newsletter called Contentment is a great example of how to include a sign-up CTA in your email without distracting from the rest of the content:

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But remember, because your newsletter should already be driving another action, such as downloading an ebook or signing up for a webinar, make sure this “Subscribe” button doesn’t distract or confuse users, weakening your main campaign goal in the process.

5. Include a clear CTA.

Speaking of CTAs, let‘s get into their value. I’ve never sent out a newsletter without ensuring I’ve included a clear CTA. Your CTA directs the receiver to make another move.

When adding a CTA, consider what you want the receiver to do next. Should they set up a call or book a demo?

I‘m subscribed to a newsletter by one of my favorite local music venues to keep current on all the artists and musicians coming through my city. The venue’s newsletter always has a CTA button directing me to Buy Tickets or use a code to get a discount or early bird special.

Do you see how the CTA is clear and simple? Sometimes, a little can go a long way for a quality CTA.

6. Make it personal.

Sending an outbound email isn’t too different from sending a marketing email. You should still be personal, but even more so when you know your email is only being read by the receiver.

Start by letting them know how you know them. Have you already connected on Twitter or in a Slack group? Is this a completely cold email? As my friends like to tell me (though not about emails), “Define the relationship!”

Figure out where you stand so you can personalize the greeting and message.

7. Closely tie emails to landing pages.

If you’re promoting a specific landing page in your email, the landing page should match the email in terms of headline, copy, and content. I’ll even suggest that the color schemes be the same or similar.

The look and feel of your landing page should match the email to help create consistency, which goes a long way toward earning a customer’s trust. Also, make sure you‘re using tracking tools to see which emails and landing pages performed the best so you can keep sending what’s working.

8. Conduct a five-second test.

Send a copy of the email to a friend or colleague. Can they quickly tell what your CTA is? If so, you’re ready to hit send. If not, figure out how you can tweak your subject line. Or, if there’s a different landing page, you should link to it.

9. Follow up.

Follow up when necessary, but don’t bombard the receiver with a million follow-up emails.

Be aware of the typical response time from people in your industry or people you contact. Two days to one week is a reasonable amount of time between sending your first email and sending a follow-up.

10 Email Content Best Practices

1. Stick to fewer than three typefaces.

The less clutter you have in your email, the more conversions you’ll get.

Don’t clutter your message with more than two fonts or typefaces; this can distract readers and ruin your email’s visual appeal.

In the email example below from recruiting SaaS company Greenhouse, the company sticks to just two fonts.

This makes the email easy to read, and readers can focus on the context rather than get distracted by the styling.

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In addition, use web-safe fonts with sizes between 10 and 12 points. This ensures your email will be legible on all readers and devices.

2. Optimize the email’s preview text.

You’ve probably seen emails like the one below with preview texts that say something like, “Email not displaying properly? Click here.”

And, yeah, that‘s helpful, but I have a couple of gripes about it. For one, you should optimize your emails to display properly across various devices, but that’s a conversation for later in this post.

My other issue is that the message in the preview header doesn’t tell your recipients what the email is even about. This lack of information and optimization can negatively affect your open rate.

Your preview text should supplement your subject line by adding details to capture your audience’s attention and encourage them to open. By default, preview text pulls in the first several words of the email body and displays it next to the subject line before the person opens it.

The problem is that custom email templates often include conditional statements like “Can’t see images?” or “Not displaying correctly?” at the top banner, allowing the message to slip right into the preview when it goes out.

As a rule of thumb, always write a custom preheader that teases what your email will offer.

(If you’re having trouble writing your preview text or emails as a whole, this video can help you harness the power of AI for the purpose of email creation.)

Pro tip: HubSpot users can fix this problem by customizing the preview text themselves in the backend of their email marketing newsletter.

3. Include an email signature.

Even if your newsletter is technically being sent to your contacts on behalf of the company rather than an individual, the email should include the signature of a specific person.

Considering that every email sent on behalf of your company is another branding opportunity, it makes sense to include a signature.

Your email signature should include a CTA, whether a link to your website, social media, or a specific landing page.

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Another reason you should include your email signature is because it’s a touch of personalization.

People are naturally more inclined to read an email if they know it came from a human being, not just a collective marketing team. Your email signature is your ticket to their attention.

Want a quick way to make a beautiful email signature? Use HubSpot’s Email Signature Generator. We also have an Out-of-Office Email Generator to make your response to incoming messages just as delightful.

4. Keep the main message and call-to-action above the fold.

Above the fold refers to the information visible to the reader before they scroll down.

Even though recent research suggests that consumers scroll more than they used to because of social media and vertical timelines, above-the-fold content still gets the most attention, considering that people don’t have long attention spans.

According to a recent report from Litmus, people spend an average of nine seconds looking at an email.

With this in mind, place your main message and CTA above the fold. It’s the first thing your recipients will see once they open your email, increasing your conversion rate.

You can also run an A/B test first to validate the hypothesis and see if it works for your emails.

5. Personalize the email greeting.

How often do you read emails that begin with “Dear Member?”

You might segment your email audiences by their customer type (member, subscriber, user, etc.), but it shouldn’t be the first thing recipients see in your company messages.

Personalizing the greeting of your emails with your contacts‘ first names grabs each reader’s attention. For HubSpot users, this is called a personalization token, and creating one looks like this:

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Then, the address line of your email would automatically produce the contact‘s first name by fetching this personalization token in the email’s HTML, like this: Hi, !

Don‘t worry; personalizing an email’s greeting line with 50 recipients‘ names doesn’t mean you’ll have to manually write and send 50 different emails from now on.

Many email marketing tools today allow you to configure the greeting of your email campaign so that it automatically sends with the name of the people on your contact list — so everyone is getting a personal version of the same message.

6. Keep your email around 500 to 650 pixels wide.

If your email template is wider than 650 pixels, it will not show up correctly and will require users to scroll horizontally to read the full message.

This is a pain, to say the least, and will likely affect your conversion, especially when many users read emails on mobile.

One of our most recent email newsletter surveys found that the majority of newsletter subscribers (61%) read them via mobile devices.

Having your template fit within the standard format will make for easier readability, better conversions, and an overall better user experience.

7. A/B your subject lines and calls to action.

If you can‘t seem to increase your email’s open and click-through rates, a couple of things might be wrong: You‘re not emailing the right people (if you’re buying your contact list, see the first tip at the top of this blog post), or the content needs to be improved.

A/B tests can be used to improve almost any of your digital marketing content.

This test splits your recipients into two groups in an email. Group A receives the regular newsletter, while Group B receives the newsletter with a specific variation. The variation can be anything from a different subject to another CTA.

This variation tests whether your audience would be more or less likely to take action based on that element.

HubSpot Marketing Hub users can conduct email A/B tests on everything from the subject line to the call-to-action (CTA) inside the email.

For example, you might change the color of your CTA from red to green to see if your email‘s clickthrough rate increases. If it does, the test indicates that you should change all of your emails’ CTA color to green from now on.

8. Include your logo.

Logos are essential in emails. The average person receives about 121 emails daily, so it‘s easy for recipients to skip over an email, even if it’s from a newsletter they’re happily subscribed to.

One of the best ways to help your email stand out and keep your brand top of mind is to include your logo. One of my favorite newsletters is Bad Brain from music and pop-culture journalist Ashley Reese.

As I said, I tend to let my emails pile up and go unread, but I always stop to read one when I see the bright orange Bad Brain font at the top of the message.

9. Name the offer in your subject line.

If you’re running a promotion, use incentive-focused subject lines like “Free shipping when you spend $25 or more” or “Receive a free iPad with a demo.”

Here’s an example of an email with an enticing subject line and a warm, welcoming body copy. The subject line for this email from Elementor says, “Up to 50% off when upgrading!”

However, do not overwhelm your readers with savings- or product-related emails.

Customer loyalty starts with casual industry insights — only after nurturing should you start introducing offers.

10. Write compelling (but concise) subject lines.

As I said, most email newsletter subscribers read them on mobile devices, so I suggest keeping your subject lines to fewer than 50 characters.

Your email subject line should also create a sense of urgency while giving readers some indication of what to expect once they open the email.

Notice some of the subject lines pulled from my own inbox below. Each subject line is condensed enough to display fully on my iPhone, telling me exactly why I should read more.

And there you have it! 22 email best practices I live by, and that will help your email marketing campaign generate more leads. As I said earlier, email marketing is a tried and true method that isn’t going anywhere any time soon. 

So, it’s important to follow these best practices to set your next campaign up for success.

Editor’s Note: This post was originally published in June 2019 and has been updated for comprehensiveness.

Mid-June, 2024. A full page of indecipherable glyphs runs in The Seattle Times, with the only clue a typewritten-style note at the bottom: “Printed at the request of LONGLEGS.”

A week later, a user named Mr_Downstairs leaves strings of glyphs in the comments on Letterboxd.

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Billboards pop up; a partially obscured face peers down at drivers. In large red type, there’s nothing more than a phone number and a date. 458.666.4355. 7.12.

It was all part of an eerily good marketing campaign from indie film distributor Neon, and it racked up a respectable $22 million for Longlegs’ opening weekend in July. Arguably — don’t come for me — the campaign itself was more provocative than Nicolas Cage’s madman serial killer.

I asked our spookiest HubSpot marketers: What made Neon’s campaign so effective, and what tactics can we bring to our (hopefully) less macabre marketing efforts?

1. Build a continuous journey for your audience.

“The Longlegs campaign brilliantly invited people to step into the narrative, transforming them into active participants rather than a passive audience. By threading suspense and curiosity throughout its progression, the campaign ensures a dedicated and engaged audience eager for what’s to come.

“For marketers, this approach offers a clear lesson: Aim for more than just a single peak of interest — build a continuous journey that keeps your audience engaged and eagerly anticipating what’s next. By nurturing ongoing interest and curiosity, you create a dynamic relationship that leads to deeper connections and greater loyalty over time.”

—Carly CHILL-iams, director, media monetization

 

 

2. Build community and shared experiences.

“What’s so sharp about the Longlegs campaign is that it applies pressure from two angles. People don’t like unanswered questions but, on the flip side, they LOVE being a part of something.

“When the Longlegs audience tries to answer those unanswered questions, SURPRISE, they’re now part of a mystery game.

“That may be harder to apply if you’re marketing, say, drain plugs, but there are some lessons here that everyone can benefit from.

• Give your audience something to answer for themselves. Maybe that‘s plugging their details into a quote creator. Maybe it’s finding a coupon code somewhere on your site. Even mundane industries can enjoy a little mystery.
• Welcome them into being a part of something bigger. Maybe that’s a social community, a Slack channel, or a product forum. Even just giving a name to your audience can be a powerful way to create that sense of ‘something bigger.’ (Think of Swifties, the Bills Mafia, or Browncoats.)”

—Curt del PRINCE of DARKNESS, senior marketing manager

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“I love that I immediately want to share the experience. I want to send this phone number to my sister and wait for her totally weirded-out reply. It feels so special when a marketing campaign evokes a desire to pull more people in.

“As marketers, we think a lot about how to cut through today’s noisy marketplace. But sometimes we forget that creating an experience our audience wants to share with others is a great way to expand reach (and get our audience to do a bit of the heavy lifting).”

—Meg PraterGEIST, managing editor, blogs

 

 

3. Cultivate suspense.

“At Los Angeles’ BeyondFest this fall, programmers spliced the trailer for the American remake of Speak No Evil into pre-show entertainment, a cinephile joke poking fun at how often the various cuts of the trailer — which gave away much of the film — appeared in movie theaters leading up to its debut.

“Longlegs took an opposite tactic, reveling in minimalism. It never gave too much away in its trailers, leaving viewers to wonder when and how Nicolas Cage, its biggest star, would show up.

“Neon instead invited audiences into its mystery through a series of cryptic codes and phone numbers, building the same sense of dread and intrigue that Maika Monroe’s character — a young FBI agent — experiences in the film.

“Additionally, the marketing built an accessible, interactive alternative reality game (ARG) that could be freely enjoyed by fans everywhere, maintaining interest in the movie without spoiling it or exhausting potential customers.”

—GHOUL-iet Bennett Rylah, senior writer, The Hustle

“I think the marketing was effective because it cultivated a sense of suspense by planting breadcrumbs. Neon lets its target audience fill in the rest with their imagination, which can be the most powerful tool in both horror and marketing.

“Unfortunately, I was disappointed by the actual film — as were a ton of other folks I talked to online and IRL — so the marketing built up too much anticipation for me. The more the campaign let my imagination go wild, the higher my expectations were — and the bigger the discrepancy between my expectations and my experience.

“My takeaways:

• Know when to leave a meaningful blank. What’s left unsaid and unshown gives your audience space to imagine.
• Plant breadcrumbs. Marketers can encourage people to actively engage in your marketing campaign without them even realizing it. Give new information with each iteration of your campaign, and you’ll have your audience yearning for more.
• Use multisensory marketing. The phone number, audio clip, music, etc. contribute to the atmospheric success of this campaign, which the film did deliver on.
• Repurpose your content. A two-hour movie can spin out hundreds of mini content types, whether it‘s a still image, a number, a clip, or a series of puzzle pieces. You don’t even need to create new stuff — just make a meaty product and use the product itself to create marketing assets.”

—DYIN’ Zhong, senior marketing manager

 

 

4. Unite analog and digital marketing strategies.

“Neon did movie marketing, especially horror movie marketing, right.

“Movie promos are notorious for showing all the good parts, but Longlegs beautifully captured the suspense audiences would get in the movie and piqued curiosity without giving anything away.

“I love how the film’s marketing united the analog and digital worlds. People could see the billboard with its eerie imagery and move along, but if they called the phone number, they could actually experience it.

“This strategy brought them into the movie in a way, and made its value more of a reality. It’s not difficult for marketers from all backgrounds to mimic this with the use of URLs and QR codes.

“Plus, Neon’s trailers used behind-the-scenes footage and actual recordings of lead actress Maika Monroe’s heart rate the first time she saw Nic Cage as Longlegs.

“It makes the terror that much more tangible. They didn’t just tell viewers the movie was scary in their marketing, they proved it.”

—Ra-MOAN-a Sukhraj, principal marketing writer

 

 

5. Lean into imagination and interactivity.

“I’m a huge horror fan, and I was really impressed at how Neon took an entirely fictitious threat (Nicolas Cage’s Longlegs) and brought it into our dimension. (The nonfiction threat of Nic Cage himself predates the movie industry.) It’s a creative and immersive way to gain fan attention and build curiosity for moviegoers.

“Smile 2 did something similar, breaking the fourth wall in its marketing campaign by placing odd smiling people in random sports events or news broadcasts to draw attention to the movie.

“In that movie, the sinister smile portends a murderous threat. Bringing elements of it into our world adds legitimacy and makes the movie feel all the more plausible. That strategy also played into word-of-mouth marketing, as regular social media users would post the different smiling people they’d see on TV, igniting even more interest.

“What I take away from these frightful marketing campaigns is that the more imaginative and immersive your marketing team gets, the more you stand to gain from letting your viewers unravel the mystery or story.”

“Tap into their curiosity, use enigmatic symbols or details, and provide interactive elements that encourage investigation and sharing among friends — and you can transform a paid marketing campaign into a real hot topic.”

—Tristen Tay-LORD of the UNDERWORLD, Service Blog editor and marketing manager

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“What made this campaign so effective is that people were given a lot to work with — ciphers to decode, numbers to call, backstories to explore — but none of it gave people what they really wanted: a face reveal of the titular villian. You could only get that by watching the movie, which made people eager to show up.

“My favorite element was the audio of Maika Monroe’s heart rate when she first laid eyes on Longlegs. I expected him to be so agonizingly grotesque and off-putting that I was almost relieved when he was mostly just ugly. Since he wasn’t as hideous as I expected him to be, it made the true horror of the movie (which was also hidden from the trailers) hit even harder.

“Longlegs’ marketing is a lesson in the importance of interactivity. Giving your audience something to do that relates to your product or service makes them want to engage. And pre-engagement makes a product reveal, launch, etc., all the more exciting.”

—GORY Needle, senior marketing manager

6. Trust your audience.

“Longlegs’ minimalist drip marketing is an exercise in restraint. A few lines of glyphs here, a phone number there. It’s straight out of the scream queen playbook: The more that’s left to your imagination, the more horrifying it is.

“But for that to work, you have to trust your audience. That’s not always the easiest thing to accomplish, especially if you’ve been elbow-deep in marketing copy for days or weeks on end. But remember that your audience is made up of real human people, not numbers — the payoff can be tremendous.

—Laura M. DROWNING

Before I start writing a memo, I take some time to hype myself up. This bit of internal communication will be read by my peers, my boss, and likely my boss’s boss. Getting the language right is essential, and every word counts.

Unlike an email, memos typically go out to your entire department or everyone at the company, so knowing how to format a memo is just as important as what you write. No pressure. (Well, maybe some pressure.)

In this post, I’ll share my experience writing memos, tips from my HubSpot peers, and best practices for using AI throughout the process. From there, I’ll showcase stellar memo examples and a template to help you create your own.

Table of Contents

• Memo Definition, Types, and Parts
• When and How to Write a Memo
• Best Practices for Formatting a Memo
• Memo Examples and Templates

Memos are versatile. Businesses can use memos to relay information involving newly updated policies, changes in procedure, important milestones, or necessary employee actions, such as attending an upcoming meeting or convention.

On the other hand, communities can use memos to tell people within it about public safety guidelines, promote various events, and raise awareness on subjects that affect their lives.

I often find myself writing memos when there are significant changes to my program at HubSpot. Perhaps we’re implementing a new workflow, reorganizing the structure of our team, or sharing insights from a project we just completed. 

Memos denote importance, so I only write them when I have important updates to share that impact multiple stakeholders.

Types of Memos

When I do have those important updates to share, I like to consider the type of memo I’m writing before I get started. For your reference, here are four of the most common types of memos:

1. Informative Memo

Also known as announcement memos, these make up the bulk of most memos I’ve seen. The goal is to communicate new information to your audience.

Sample use cases: To state changes in policy, company news, and new processes or to welcome new staff members

2. Request Memo

Request memos are designed to make a request and get a positive response. When writing request memos, I’d focus on using persuasive language and include stats or numbers to highlight why a ‘yes’ is the right answer.

Sample use cases: To request a new purchase from your company or to authorize professional learning or volunteer opportunities

3. Confirmation Memo

I think of confirmation memos as a paper trail to make sure key stakeholders have a record of discussions. When writing confirmation memos, specificity and clarity should be your number one goal.

Sample use cases: To document conversations or clarify ambiguity to avoid misunderstanding down the road

4. Directive Memo

If I need to communicate how to do something to my audience, I’d write a directive memo offering detailed instructions that are easy to follow.

Sample use cases: To share how to implement a new process, comply with new requirements, or complete necessary tasks

The main difference between all of these memo types is the purpose behind the writing. However, regardless of purpose, every memo is usually made up of the same component parts.

Parts of a Memo

What are those parts, you ask? Here’s what I include in just about every memo I write: 

• Heading: This section specifies who the memo is to (your audience) and from (you or your department), and it includes the date and a subject to describe what it’s about.
• Introduction: This is your opening paragraph that highlights the purpose of the memo and provides an overview on what the memo is about.
• Background: Here, you want to provide clear, specific context around the problem you’re aiming to solve.
• Recommendations: This is where you’ll list the specific tasks or milestones you plan to complete in order to address the problem you’ve identified.
• Discussion: This is the meat of your memo sandwich — it’s where you’ll justify your recommendations with supporting details that map back to your problem statement.
• Closing: This section creates space for a call to action for your readers. What do you want them to do after reading your memo? State that here.
• Necessary attachments: This is where you can include any supporting documents to back up your research and recommendations.

I’ll show you how I build out each of these elements in our how-to shortly. In the meantime, here’s more on memos from the HubSpot marketing team:

When to Write a Memo

I default to writing a memo when I need to communicate new information in a way that’s more formal than an email.

However, memo purposes stretch far and wide.

“Memos serve a variety of purposes, but generally speaking, they either pitch or propose something new, consolidate information into one place for the sake of alignment, or explain or clarify information about a project or program,” says Hesterberg.

You might write a memo in the following scenarios:

• You have a new policy, and you need to explain it to your audience.
• Sharing important company updates and information.
• Announcing new staff members or promotions.
• Confirming details of a discussion to get everyone on the same page and create a paper trail.
• Teach or tell people how to do something.
• Requesting something and justifying why it matters.

There are lots of possibilities out there. In a nutshell, if you have something you need to share, a memo might be the answer.

Onto the how-to.

You can put together a memo in a few short steps, and you can even use AI to help.

To give you an idea of how each step is formatted, I’ll write an example memo, break it down for each step, and include tips for incorporating AI along the way. 

My example memo will be an internal announcement for a writing training session.

1. Start with your heading.

No matter what kind of memo I’m writing, I always include a heading. In this section, I note who the memo is to, who it’s from, the delivery date, and the subject of the memo.

I’d recommend starting off all of your memos with this formatting:

TO:

FROM:

DATE:

SUBJECT:

Your subject line should be short, attention-grabbing, and give readers a general idea of what the memo is about.

“The headings you use should be descriptive enough that your readers can infer what they’ll get in each section,” suggests Kaitlin Milliken, senior program manager at HubSpot. “Cut the cute language and keep your headings very tactical.”

I always make sure the tone of my subject matches the seriousness of the subject matter and my organization’s communication style. I love a witty opener, but it won’t be right for every memo.

Testing It Out

Here’s how this would look for my example memo about a writing training session:

Simple and to the point.

2. Write your introduction.

Remember, you want your memo to be brief and information-packed. Your introduction should be an efficient use of space. 

Here, I highlight the main issue or problem that your memo aims to resolve along with the intended solution.

“The beginning of any memo should state a clear purpose of what the memo will cover,” says Karla Hesterberg, director of content marketing at HubSpot. “Depending on the subject, this could be as simple as an overview of a statement that establishes the need for a new investment. The more simple and straightforward, the better.”

This is actually a reality that I personally struggle with. As a writer, I want to include those eloquent phrases and thoughtful transitions that sound great when read aloud. 

However, I need to take a different approach to writing memos. I try to remind myself that my introduction should just summarize the purpose of the memo in two to three sentences.

Testing It Out

Using Hesterberg’s tip, here’s how I’d write the introduction for my memo:

You can also use generative AI tools like ChatGPT to help summarize the purpose of your memo. In fact, this is one of my favorite ways to use AI — to condense and recap information.

Here’s an example.

Prompt I used: I’m writing a memo to announce a new training session for writers on my team. The training session is on how to use AI in your writing process without losing the human touch. Write an introduction to summarize this announcement and highlight the importance of this training. Keep the summary brief, around 2-3 sentences, and keep it conversational.

Output:

While I like my original version better, this would be helpful to use as a starting point — especially if I was in a time crunch.

3. Provide background on the issue.

Remember, memos go out to a wide group of employees. Not everyone reading your memo will have the same background that you do as the writer.

You’ll need a section to explain any necessary context that folks need to know before going forward.

So, what do you put in? I asked Basha Coleman, one of the best memo writers on my team. Coleman is a principal marketing manager on HubSpot’s audience development team.

Coleman says she includes a section at the top of her memos that cover the following:

• The situation
• The impact of the situation
• Recommended solutions

“This gives stakeholders the need-to-know info right away in case they don’t have time to read the whole memo at once,” Coleman says.

Beyond that, I like to link to other important documents that provide context on a topic.

That could be a related memo from a different team with more information, a news article that you’re directly responding to, or a relevant dashboard that showcases the issue.

You don’t want this section to be long. However, if folks are interested in learning more, you’ve just given them the power to do so.

Testing It Out

Based on Coleman’s recommendation, here’s how the background I’d include as context for the new training:

Could AI help here? Alana Chinn, Marketing Blog editor at HubSpot, shared her thoughts on using AI in this section:

“Since I have the most context about the situation and impact, I probably wouldn’t use AI in the background section,” she says.

“Tools like ChatGPT probably aren’t going to know which information is the most important to highlight for my audience. But if I did, I’d use AI to organize, summarize, or provide structure around my thoughts.”

Bouncing off of this and following Coleman’s format, I’d suggest outlining the situation, the impact of the situation, and your recommended solutions and asking ChatGPT to summarize those details into a few short paragraphs.

4. Outline action items and timeline.

Depending on the purpose of your memo, you may have action items for employees to complete or provide a timeline of when changes will take place.

For example, they may need to complete a task or provide information by a certain deadline.

Of course, if no action is needed on the employee’s behalf, you can leave this section out. But when action is required, here’s what I’m including in this section:

• When employees can expect changes to go into effect
• What changes have already been made and what to expect in the future
• Deadlines they need to adhere to

Pro tip: Whenever I’m developing a timeline, I avoid just creating a paragraph with dates interspersed throughout. It’s harder to read that way.

“Don’t be afraid to use visual cues in your memo, like tables, heading colors to display hierarchy of information, charts, and graphs. These can keep a memo brief and skimmable,” suggests Coleman.

Milliken agrees. In a recent memo on building a thought leadership program, she included tables that laid out each step her team would take, more details about what was needed, and when it would occur.

“I also included an infographic of a pipeline to show the stages of the project and how long each would take proportionally,” she says. “This makes it easier to visualize a timetable than just skimming chunks of text.”

Testing It Out

Here’s a sample table I created to demonstrate.

In terms of using AI for this section, I’d ask my favorite generative AI robot to help me brainstorm appropriate tasks and map action items to a timeline.

Here’s an example.

Prompt I used: Give me 2-3 action items for attendees of a quarterly writing training session that highlights how to use AI tools in writing, and map them to a 6-week timeline.

Output:

I would then take this output, customize it for my team, and add any relevant details based on our internal workflow.

5. Justify your reasoning.

Whenever I have to communicate a request or anything new that could ruffle some feathers, I always try to make my case by offering a rationale as to why it’s so important.

“Think about your target audience and try to anticipate areas where they might ask questions, have concerns, or need more clarity,” says Hesterberg. “Try to re-read as someone who doesn’t have all the context you have to identify areas you need to build up.”

Remember, as the memo writer, you’re an expert on the subject. You may need to ask a manager or a peer to review your memo with a skeptical eye. Where do they have questions? What needs additional justification?

From there, you can strengthen your case. For me, this often includes featuring statistics as to why it’s critical and urgent to make a change.

“Keep in mind that data is super powerful but must be presented in a way that enhances the narrative rather than confusing it,” says Amanda Sellers, a blog strategy manager at HubSpot.

For example, the phrase “58.97% met the benchmark and 10.26% far exceeded the benchmark” is clunky. Instead, Sellers suggests writing,”Our strategy is working nearly 70% of the time.”

The first example is unwieldy, Sellers notes, referring to a methodology that a broader audience is less likely to care about.

Meanwhile, “the second audience demonstrates the more important thing: why that methodology was important and what you can take from it,” Sellers explains.

Testing It Out

To justify the importance of the quarterly writing training session, especially in conjunction with AI tools, I’d add this data point in my memo:

Tools like ChatGPT can also be great for pulling external data to justify your approach or the reasoning behind your memo.

Here’s an example.

Prompt I used: Provide 2-3 data points about the importance of a quarterly writing training on AI tools.

Output:

Big time saver if you let AI do some of the digging for you.

6. Soften any blows.

Sometimes you’re making a big change that could be seen as controversial or making bold statements where people might feel slighted. In instances like these, I like to soften things with a well-placed caveat.

For example, with the rise of AI, you might be communicating a new company policy related to using AI.

You could soften the blow by sharing that it hasn’t been an issue for most people, but it’s important to have a clear policy in place for handling it.

Testing It Out

Let’s say my memo took a different position regarding AI for writing. Here’s how I’d format my memo to soften the blow:

AI can also help here if you’re not sure how to mitigate concerns about a particular issue presented in your memo.

Here’s an example.

Prompt I used: Provide language to address concerns that writers may have about using AI in their writing. Note that we have a strict AI policy in place to help guide this new process. Keep it brief, 2-3 sentences.

Output:

Not bad.

7. Communicate urgency.

Any time my memo pitches something new or timely, I make sure I explain why the change is urgent and why it’s important that we move now.

“The best way to do this is to explain what we’re at risk of losing if we don’t take action here,” says Hesterberg.

For pitch memos, Hesterberg suggests telling readers why this problem is important and why people should care. For explanatory memos, she recommends explaining what the information in the memo will be used for.

Testing It Out

Here’s how I’d add urgency to my memo about the training session:

This is relatively straightforward, so I won’t tap AI in for this.

8. Include a closing statement.

When crafting my closing statement I think about the information I really want to reinforce. For example, are there any specific contacts readers should reach out to for questions? If so, I’ll include them here.

“A conclusion that just reiterates your main points is boring and likely to be skipped,” Milliken says. “End on your most compelling points. You can either reassert urgency or discuss the resources you need to be successful.”

Milliken often closes on the support her team requires to find success. That could be additional financial resources, a champion within leadership, or more time to establish the change.

Testing It Out

Here’s how I’d wrap up my memo with Milliken’s suggestions in mind:

And from the AI perspective, I’d recommend using a prompt similar to the one we used for the introduction to close things out.

9. Review and proofread before sending.

This step may seem like a no-brainer, but it‘s important to review your document before sending it out. Memos are meant to inform readers of upcoming changes and relay important information.

As a writer, I know I don’t want to risk causing confusion with a typo or misstatement.

“Memos often have a broad audience, so you’ll want to craft a narrative that is easily understood no matter who is reading it,” says Sellers. “That means telling a persuasive story, getting to the point quickly, anticipating questions, and cutting jargon to find the simplest way of saying something.”

Testing It Out

I usually ask a coworker to review my memo or use an editing tool like Grammarly or Hemingway to review and proofread.

Here’s an example of Grammarly editing my memo and making suggestions for improvement:

Chinn also says, “I love using AI to proofread my work. As a writer, this is one of the use cases I tap AI for the most. Asking ChatGPT to provide a grammar or tone check, to look for spelling errors or other inconsistencies, or to simplify complex ideas are all quick and easy ways to finalize my content.”

I mean, who says you can’t use AI as your personal peer editor?

10. Create audio or video aids.

Once the memo is written, I like to give it one last pass. What would make the message even more clear? Should I work with the creative team to build an infographic? Should I amplify the document over our email channels?

Now that I’ve invested the time, I want to make sure my message is heard.

Coleman often creates a recording with a deck, highlighting the most important points in the document.

“Including video summaries of my memos with Loom is helpful for accessibility and busy stakeholders who like to listen to updates while working on other tasks,” she notes.

Testing It Out

For the sake of time, I won’t create any visuals for my fictional memo.

But another easy way to do this would be to present the memo to your team or relevant stakeholders, record that presentation via Zoom or Microsoft Teams (if remote), and circulate it as a visual learning aid for the future.

Two birds, one stone kind of deal.

Best Practices for Formatting a Memo

Now that you know what types of memos there are, what elements to include in your memo, and how to write one, I have a few overarching formatting best practices for you.

Cater to your audience.

Before you start writing your memo, consider who your audience is. Understanding who will read your memo will help you tailor your message, tone, and CTA for that audience.

Pamela Bump, head of content growth at HubSpot, suggests considering the following questions.

“Are the leaders you’re writing for busy executives who want a quick one-pager focused on the most need-to-know information?” she says. “Or are the readers more inquisitive and interested in soaking in all the information they can get?”

Make it skimmable.

Milliken recalls a time when she wrote a memo that wasn’t skimmable.

“When I was asked to write my first memo, I created a document with huge walls of text,” she says.

“My manager gave me great feedback, encouraging me to use charts and graphs throughout the document. That makes total sense to me now. No one wants to read a huge string of lengthy paragraphs, but they’ll definitely skim a table.”

To make your memo easier to read, use headings and separate paragraphs to break up new thoughts or talking points. You can also add tables and graphs to create a visual break when it makes sense.

Milliken adds, “Bullet points are your friend. They create breaking points throughout your document and keep information easy to digest.”

Be mindful of length.

The length of your memo depends on the type you’re writing. Generally speaking, a memo is one or two paragraphs long. But the length can vary if you’re writing an informative memo versus a request memo.

If your audience is interested in learning, an informative memo can provide more detail, while a request memo should be brief and to the point.

“If you’re unsure, go for a shorter 1-2 page document, but link it to another page or dashboard with further data, context, or information that they can dig into if they choose,” Bump suggests.

Don’t shy away from AI.

Jessica Shee, tech editor & marketing manager at M3datarecovery.com says, “Memo writing can be streamlined by using AI tools like ChatGPT to help with content development, particularly for sections that are routine or involve a lot of data.”

Shee continues, “I would use it to jot down basic concepts, clarify important details, and make sure formal language is understood. AI is also useful for recommending structural changes, enhancing grammar, and proofreading.”

And I agree. AI is a great memo writing tool for time-consuming sections or simple tasks like proofreading and editing. I wouldn’t use it to write an entire memo, and Vaibhav Kamble, CEO at CloudOptimo echoes that sentiment:

“While AI can significantly enhance the efficiency and quality of memo writing, it’s important to remember that human judgment is crucial for adding personal insights and ensuring the memo aligns with organizational goals and values,” Kamble says.

“The combination of AI assistance and human oversight leads to more polished and effective communications.”

Memo Examples

Different industries or situations will require slightly different memos. My memos are going to look a lot different than the memos coming out of a law office, for example.

Pro tip: Certain memos will need to be longer or shorter, others may not have a timeline, and some will have extensive background info. You should always change the format of your memo to fit the message you want your employees to receive.

I pulled together three examples of what that might look like.

Launch Delay Memo

The objective of this memo is to announce that the launch of a product will be delayed. The introduction includes the new date, so a timeline or long overview isn’t necessary.

This format of this memo could be applied to other situations where a simple, but important, change is occurring.

What I like: The launch memo provides readers with insight into product launch delays, which can alleviate some frustration that customers or employees may otherwise feel if they were not informed.

Other date changes, promotions, milestones, or product announcements could also utilize this format.

Building Update Memo

There are logistical aspects of a business that concern your employees but don’t necessarily involve their work. This memo depicts an example of a kitchen remodel in the office. It’s a bit of an inconvenience but not one of a large magnitude.

What I like: This memo demonstrates a business’s understanding of the impact that renovations can have on employees and shows respect and consideration for their needs.

This memo format could be applied to other building updates, work-from-home days, or other widespread but minor announcements.

Community Memo

Celebrations, events, theme days, or other fun things for your employees can also be communicated through memos.

Community memos like this example are generally shorter because they don’t require much background information or many details.

What I like: This memo has clear directions on where to find the event taking place, something which would’ve been less effective if it only included the floor number.

Memos of this nature should include a summary, date, and location at a minimum.

Business Memo Template

If you’re writing a business memo, take it from me — HubSpot’s free business memo templates are a fantastic way to help you streamline your work.

The document gives you a framework that sorts your memorandum into subtopics to help employees better digest the information and understand what’s expected of them after reading it.

Download This Template

And here’s another business memo template I use for times when I want to provide a quick write-up — via email, for example.

MEMORANDUM

TO:

FROM:

DATE:

SUBJECT:

I’m writing to inform you that [reason for writing the memo].

As our company continues to grow … [evidence or reason to support your opening paragraph].

Please let me know if you have any questions. In the meantime, I’d appreciate your cooperation as [official business information] takes place.

Let’s walk through the business memo format in more detail.

Business Memo Template Format

The standard business memo template format is designed to effectively communicate your message. A memo should disseminate the necessary information in a way that is easy for a mass number of employees to digest.

An accurate subject line will alert them that this memo is relevant to them specifically. And beginning with an executive summary allows recipients to understand the general message before they dive deeper into the details.

The background information offers context to the message, and the overview and timeline should answer questions that are likely to come up.

Header

In your header, you‘ll want to clearly label your content “Memorandum” so your readers know exactly what they’re receiving. As previously mentioned, you‘ll want to include “TO”, “FROM”, “DATE”, and “SUBJECT.”

This information is relevant for providing content, like who you’re addressing and why.

Paragraph One

In the first paragraph, you‘ll want to quickly and clearly state the purpose of your memo. You might begin your sentence with the phrase, “I’m writing to inform you … “ or ”I’m writing to request … ”

A memo is meant to be short, clear, and to the point. You’ll want to deliver your most critical information upfront and then use subsequent paragraphs as opportunities to dive into more detail.

Paragraph Two

In the second paragraph, you‘ll want to provide context or supporting evidence. For instance, let’s say your memo informs the company of an internal reorganization.

If this is the case, paragraph two should say something like, “As our company continues to grow, we’ve decided it makes more sense to separate our video production team from our content team.

This way, those teams can focus more on their individual goals.”

Paragraph Three

In the third paragraph, you‘ll want to include your specific request of each employee — if you’re planning a team outing, this is the space you’d include, “Please RSVP with dietary restrictions,” or “Please email me with questions.”

On the contrary, if you‘re informing staff of upcoming construction to the building, you might say, “I’d appreciate your cooperation during this time.”

Even if you don‘t expect any specific action from employees, it’s helpful to include how you hope they’ll handle the news and whether you expect them to do something in response to the memo.

Boom. I think I’ve hit all the memo-related points, so I’ll take us home.

Write your memos to the point.

I’d argue the main difference between a memo and just an email is not the level of complexity. It’s the size of the audience.

A memo can be simple or intricate as long as it effectively communicates your message and is relevant to the receiving group of employees. And, the message itself should be clear and concise, no matter which memo format you use.

Editor’s note: This post was originally published in October 2018 and has been updated for comprehensiveness.