matthewwoodward.co.uk http://www.matthewwoodward.co.uk/tutorials/email-animated-emoticons-symbols/

Increase Conversion Instantly With Animated Emoticons InYour Emails

Recently, Matt Started using animated emoticons in his email subject lines:

And, it turns out you guys just can’t get enough of them.

Not only are they much more effective. But, Matt’s drowning in messages asking how you can use email icons foryourself.

So, by popular demand, here’s the ultimate guide to using emoticons in your emails…

What You’ll Learn

This is by far the most comprehensive guide on this subject. You’re going to learn:

Why emoticons are an email game changer

How they helped one site boost their open rates 20%

The stupidly easy guide to start using emoticons right now

A complete list of emoticons to use in your emails

ATTENTION: Download My Email Sequence To Use In Your Own Campaigns Here!!

Okay, let’s get stuck in…

Why Emojis Are A Game Changer?

Emoticons are powerful for a few reasons:

They’re processed by the brain 60,000x faster than words are. Meaning that readers can make a quicker, moreinformed decision on whether to read your email.

And research from Flinders University in Australia has shown that people respond to Emoticons in the same waythey would with a human face. That means they’re more personal, and they create more emotion.

That applies to everything.

Whether that’s a:

Simple smiley face

An arrow

Or a love heart

Still not sold? Let’s take a look at a real world example we can all understand:

Dating.

In a study by Match.com, they found users who used Emoticons in their text messages and emails had more s**than those who didn’t. In fact, the more emoticons they used, the more s** they had :

Source: Time Magazine

Which means when people can’t see your face – like when you send an email to your list – emoticons make youmore:

Likeable

Charming

Interesting

Than when you send a standard text-only message. And, when people are more likely to invest time in peoplethey like, this is a powerful weapon in your arsenal.

It’s Not Just The Picture, It’s The Platform

How people open their email is changing.

In 2014 alone, 65% of people used their mobile phone to access their emails.

And, as of this year, 80% of people are using their smartphone to search the internet.

That’s only 11% behind the conventional desktop/laptop platform:

Source: http://www.smartinsights.com/

Which means someone is probably looking at your blog post, landing page or niche site on their phone.

To give you a personal example of this, I opened the email Matt sent me to write this article on my phone. And, Iresearched every piece of content cited in this article for it there too.

Because, well…I forgot to bring my laptop charger to the coffee shop.

But what’s important here is this:

People are used to seeing emoticons on their phone.

Yet they still aren’t used to seeing them in their emails. Which means they’re comfortable for readers, but they’restill able to stand out!

Emoticons still have a powerful impact on a desktop level – as you’ll see next – but as more and more emailusers switch to mobile platform, it’s time to take advantage of that.

Whether that means using them in all your messages, or just a mobile-friendly segment of your list, is up to you.But we’ll cover testing a little later on.

Case Study: Emojis In Action

No, I’m not going to show you people using emoticons to have s**. Behave.

Instead I’m going to show you a site using emoticons to boost their email open rates. Which is the real reasonyou came to the page, right?

Earlier this year, Rene Kulka of Optivo.de, ran an experiment to see whether animated emoticons improved hisopen rates.

He chose a segment of his mailing list who were likely to open his emails on Gmail Desktop and added theemoticons to his subject lines.

And, as a control group, he ran the same experiment with a non-animated emoticon too.

After 70 hours he checked to see how the unique open rate had changed. Here are the results:

1. His unique open rate increased 20%

2. It got his best open rate of 2015

3. When directly linked with a blog post, it created more email responses and blog comments

Not bad for adding a moving emoticon, eh?

But What About Normal Emojis?

Although the guys over at MailChimp are sat on the fence about the use of Emojis . A common trend seems to bethis:

Using a relevant emoticon in your subject line will always boost open rates.

In analysis by eConsultancy , they found that just adding a simple Unicode emoticon to the start of your emailcould improve open rates.

By using a friendly snowman to the start of an email subject, a lot of marketers could see up to 65.75% moreopens than average:

Source: eConsultancy

But the key here – for any marketing campaign using emoticons – is relevance.

That is, the emoticon you use must fit the subject line you’re writing.

For example, here are some highly relevant subject lines:

♥ Save 20% This Valentines Day

2-for-1 on all Pizzas this Friday

Thanks for subscribing! Here’s that free gift I mentioned…

Win a trip to Peru!

Congratulations, you’re a winner…

And, here are some highly irrelevant subject lines:

Save Money On Tennis Gear This Winter

50% Off All Guitar Lessons

Why Eating Gluten Could Make Your Breath Smell…

What It Means When Your Husband Cheats On You

Congratulations! You just won free access to my forum

See the difference?

There’s also an argument to be made for using multiple emoticons in your subject lines. Or, grouping them increative ways, like in this image (click to enlarge):

Source: MailChimp

But there isn’t enough conclusive data for me out there to tell you whether that is, or isn’t, a good strategy rightnow.

Warning: Do Your Research And Test Everything

You’re getting to the actionable bit, I promise. But there’s another subject I need to cover before I do.

That’s this:

Research.

Your mailing list is different to every other mailing list out there. Nobody reading (or writing) this article has thesame mailing list as you. Which means there is no cookie cutter strategy to what emoticons do, and don’t, work.

Which means it’s worth your time to research some important factors on your mailing list:

Which email client do they use? (Gmail, Outlook, Yahoo! etc.)

Do they open on desktop or mobile?

Do you have a segment that does both?

Because in certain inboxes emoticons will look different.

Gmail has a more colourful view:

Source: http://www.emailmarketingtipps.de/

While other inboxes have a much more monotone, but still effective, set of emoticons:

Source: http://www.emailmarketingtipps.de/

That could impact the emoticons you choose. Because, while one may look sleek in Yahoo! It might look terriblein Outlook. Probably not, but it’s worth knowing.

There’s also the case for the mailing list service you use.

For example, MailChimp will let you use emoticons like you’d find on a smartphone. But as they show in thisarticle (link) they may not show up in all inboxes just yet:

Source: MailChimp

But when they do show up, they’re next level good:

Source: MailChimp

Which means that you might have to use copy and paste emoticons, instead of the inbuilt ones.

There is also every chance that your audience could see them as spammy, clickbait, dirty tricks that they hate.

What I’m really saying here is that you need to test everything you do and see how the audience reacts.

Here are some test ideas that are worth starting with:

Which style of emoticon works best – cut and paste, or in-built?

Which type of subject line to they perform well with?

Which is more effective – one, two or three emoticons?

Does it improve open rates if you split your list into desktop and mobile segments, and send differentEmojis?

Which single emoticon does your audience respond to most?

There are hundreds of other variations too. But the way you’re going to find them is by getting into the trenches,sending emails and running the tests.

In order to do that though, you need to know how to get emoticons into your subject line.

That brings me to the smoothest transition to the next section of a blog post, ever…

The Stupidly Easy Guide To Using Emojis In Your Subject Lines

Okay, I’ve bombarded you with theory so far.

But now it’s time to get to the super actionable stuff that you can use to create tasty, clickable, subjectlines.

There are a few ways to do this, and I’ve listed the most effective ones here. And how to do them. Because I’mjust a swell guy.

The Unicode Method ★

Unicode Emoticons are text based and are super easy to copy and paste. They’re basic, but they will show up inany and all inboxes.

Simple head to a Unicode page, like this one. Or Google search Unicode Emoticons and look at their dazzlingdisplay of them:

Then choose the one you like:

And copy and paste it in to your email subject line:

The Animated Method

Not all inboxes support animated emoticons just yet. But as yousaw in the case study before, they’re powerful for the segmentthat can see them in Gmail.

The simplest way to do this is to head to this blog post from Rene, who ran the case study, and look at his list ofanimated emoticons:

Now, this isn’t like this Unicode method. Don’t copy and paste the icon. Instead, copy and paste the littlesquare above it:

It’ll show up as that square in the subject line, like this:

But as soon as you send it, it’s magically transformed into a movingemoticon:

The MailChimp Method

MailChimp is the only email-marketing client that boasts it’s own set of emoticons right now.

But I’m sure with the recent surge in popularity – and success – others wont be far behind. (Note: I’ll update thispost as soon as any others do. And, if I’m wrong, please let me know in the comments).

So if you’re lucky enough to be on MailChimp, here’s how to do it…

Create a new campaign:

Select Regular Campaign:

Then choose from the list of emoticons on offer, under the little smiley face tab:

The (Slightly) More Beautiful Method

There’s one final resource that I love:

Using Twitter Emojis in your subject lines.

Simply head to this link right here, which will bring up this huge display of Emoji’s:

Now, you don’t copy and paste these in the same way as the others. Instead you need to click on the icon youlike, which will bring up this command box:

Copy and paste that in to your email subject line. And, you’re ready to go…

Wrapping It All Up…

Okay, this was a long post about emoticons. But everything in it was on a need to know basis.

Let’s recap the key points, shall we?

Emoticons Are Emotions: People respond to emotions like it’s a human face. No matter what style ofemoticon it is. So, use them to create emotions in people and get a reaction.

Prepare For Mobile: More and more people are opening emails on their phone each day. Use them tocreate comfortable, but stand out, subject lines.

Any Emoji Is A Good Emoji: As long as it’s relevant to the subject, and your audience don’t find themspammy, adding an emoticon is going to give you a boost in open rates.

Test Everything: These are still uncharted territory for a lot of marketers. So do you research and get toknow your list. You could be surprised what you find.

They’re Only A Copy And Paste Away: You can cut and paste all of your emoticons to save time, andwithout having to know any coding at all. You can even add them to your blog posts and twitter, if you’refeeling adventurous.

Perfect!

So, all that’s left to ask now is – how are you going to start using emoticons in your emails?