The 4 most essential components of an email

Whether you’re pitching a story, or pitching yourself for a job, the right email can lead to success or complete failure. Here’s the blueprint of a successful email.

Of course, you needn’t read statistics to understand email’s importance—you use it constantly to pitch reporters, apply for jobs, search for new business, and send mom a link to a new recipe.

If you can’t get people to respond to your messages, you’re probably doing something wrong—especially if your mother won’t read your emails.

Here are some tips on how to write the perfect email that gets the results you want.

The subject line

Arguably the most important component of the email, the subject line is the deciding factor in whether your message is read or deleted. Additionally, using a spam tagline or lots of characters such as $$$ (or in the U.K., £££) can send it straight to the junk box.

The subject line needs to be truthful and informative and tempt the reader into wanting to know more about the content. In that case, strive to retain an air of mystery, but remain truthful. If your email has nothing to do with the subject line, the receipt will have a bad impression of you.

The salutation

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