Shorten those Subject Lines
Before you hit “send” on that fabulous newsletter remember, email domains often limit the number of subject line characters they display in the inbox*:
Shorter is Better
- AOL, (approximately 22% of the U.S. email market) limits subject lines to roughly 38 characters
- Yahoo!, (with 21% of U.S. email) is at 47 characters
- Hotmail, (14% of the U.S. email market) uses word wrap to display subject lines on multiple lines, but still just 45 characters per line
Bottom line: go for the lowest common denominator (38 characters).
Here’s a wrinkle: Considering the growing reliance on mobile devices, with smaller screens, think even shorter!
If you’re a Twitter-er, you’re probably getting used to truncating…I know I am.
*As reported in MediaPost, 2009
How about a client like Outlook? what does that do to restrict subject line length?
Thanks for reading, Rob. The ISP shortens before a client gets it. I don’t know of any clients that shorten further once the ISPs have made their cuts. Please let us all know if you find out otherwise.