MySpace Misses the Mark
Posted by Dave McCue on September 3rd, 2009
Imagine this scenario: you’re shopping at your favorite grocery store, the same store you’ve been frequenting for years, when another shopper introduces herself as an employee of a different grocery store and tries to convince you to start shopping at her store. For her to have any success converting you, this would require one knockout of a sales pitch, right?
The recently launched MySpace Mail attempted a similarly direct approach, but the execution left me wondering if they were sending the right message. The subject line of the “MySpace BUZZ” newsletter I received on August 26 was “August’s best movies, music and celebs,” but upon opening the message I was very surprised to see that it was being used to promote the company’s attempts to position itself as an email client for its millions of users.
For a company whose recent struggles have been well-documented, the launch of MySpace Mail was expected to deliver some much-needed buzz. With that in mind, I was more than a little confused as to why such a major announcement wouldn’t be the focal point of the message’s subject line. Inside the message, a large headline proclaimed “The New MySpace Mail Has Arrived” and the entire top portion of the message was dedicated to calling out the new features of MySpace Mail.
To MySpace’s credit, the words “The New MySpace Mail Has Arrived” were produced using HTML, and were the first words of the message. So email clients that display pre-header text would have shown that important piece of the message right in the inbox after the subject line. I was using Hotmail, however, so by not seeing that pre-header text I would never have known that MySpace Mail was being promoted had I not inadvertently clicked on the message and opened it.
On that same note, I’ve been using Hotmail for over a decade, and that familiarity would make it a tall order for a new email client to get me to switch over. Did MySpace—anticipating this—intentionally leave mention of MySpace Mail out of the subject line because they thought my preference for Hotmail would lead to me deleting the message? An interesting theory, but I’ll never know…
No matter what you’re selling or who you are selling it to, consider your email subject line the opening of your pitch. Always make it count, or everything that comes after might just be wasted breath.
