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I don't know about you, but I get dozens of emails daily with completely blank subject lines. The vast majority contain viruses or spam messages, and due to an overloaded inbox and the impracticality of going through each message individually, I tend to delete these suspects automatically en masse, in the same way that I delete other messages containing subject lines that scream spam.

This practice has in the past cost me sales as occasionally I missed important messages from prospects. If a prospect was taking the time to email me, they were likely to be very interested in purchasing the software - the last thing I wanted to do was miss their message when it arrived. Not only did I miss a possible initial sale, it also left them with a bad impression and they would be likely to steer clear of my products in the future.

Also, existing customers would sometimes send me emails with a blank subject line requesting support - the consequent lack of response at my end because of the blank subject line could lead to requests for refunds that could have been avoided had I seen their email and responded in my usual way. This also led to the loss of potential future sales of other products that they might have otherwise been interested in.

All in all, important missed emails like this can be very costly.

I have therefore since implemented a very simple strategy on my web site to reduce this risk, and help to ensure that these important messages reach me and actually get opened and responded to in my usual quick way.

It involves a simple adjustment of HTML that takes just seconds.

After looking around several other web sites marketing products and services, it's likely that they could benefit from the same easy-to-implement strategy.

Here is what I used to have in place.

On my web site, I include an email address where prospects and customers can reach me. It's a clickable email address, i.e. when the email address link is clicked, it opens an empty email ready to send to me - to achieve this, the anchor tag previously contained the following HTML:

href="mailto:support@popupmaster.com"

The only problem was that prospects, and perhaps customers, would click this link, enter their message, and send the email without ever filling in the subject line.

I have since implemented a very simple change, that makes it a lot easier for them, and helps to ensure that I respond to their message when it arrives in my inbox. All I did was adjust the HTML code for the email link so that an specific subject line is automatically inserted into the email. I can now easily recognize the email when it arrives, and ensure it is filtered correctly.

Here is an example of the replacement code that I now use in my email anchor tags:

href="mailto:support@popupmaster.com?subject=PopUpMaster_question"

This simple adjustment prefills the subject line and ensures there will be little chance I will miss their email when it arrives. Consequently my prospects and customers are happier, and my business gains in strength.

By including a suitable subject in the mailto: links on your web site, you can achieve the same positive effect for your own business.
Copyright 2004 Steve Shaw

About the Author

Steve Shaw develops software and systems for effective e-marketing. His PopUpMaster Pro software at http://popupmaster.com creates popups that beat the popup blockers and which are compatible with Google Adwords.