Right Word - Great Result

Many of us put in much thought and effort into the main message when writing emails. Conversely, however, a lot of people think ending it is the easiest part, giving "warmest regards" and "thanks" without a second thought. Is "best" really best? Apparently not, according to a study by email software provider Boomerang, which found that certain email closings deliver higher response rates. Do you wish for more responses from prospects?

Boomerang’s research of some 350,000 email threads found that the following eight closings are most popular:

1. Thanks
2. Regards
3. Cheers
4. Best regards
5. Thanks in advance
6. Thank you
7. Best
8. Kind Regards

Gratitude works!

The research showed that emails ending with some variation of thanks (“thanks", "thank you", or "thanks in advance”) had the highest percentage of response rates, with an average response rate of 62%.

When compared to emails that closed without some variation of gratitude (words like “regards,” “best,” etc) there was a response rate of just 46%. That means that by changing your email ending to an expression of gratitude, you will have a 36% greater chance of getting a response.

"Best" could be worst

The study found that generic email sign-offs had lower response rates, with  the classic "best" or "best regards" having the lowest average response rate.  Ending an email with “best” had the lowest average response rate when compared to other email sign-offs that appeared 1,000+ times.

Advance-ing it!

The most effective sign-off was actually found to be “thanks in advance”, correlating with the highest response rate of 65.7%. This makes sense as the recipient is being thanked specifically for a response which has yet to be written. It seems that a bit of of posturing works out verywell!

You are expressing gratitude for an event that is yet to happen and this is more likely to convince your target to follow through on what you are thanking him/her for. Adding to Boomerang’s findings, to make your sign-off even more effective, we suggest you could even draw attention to it by specifically referencing your interaction with the recipient of the email.

An example: "Thank you very much for making the time to meet with me." With an even warmer "thank you..." message, there is a greater likelihood that the recipient will have a more positive impression of you and be more receptive to the contents of your email.

More on the research findings can be found here. There are many apps nowadays which can integrate with common email providers like Gmail and provide built-in capabilities suggesting improvements to the way you write for better results, and Boomerang is just one of them. Check out these apps to enhance the effectiveness of your emails.