Subscriber's name in a birthday email preheader: +9% opens
Commentary byLiftArchiveOur analysis, not theirsAdding the subscriber's first name to the preheader of a birthday email lifted open rate by 9%.
Apollo Education Group, the parent company of the University of Phoenix, ran this test on emails to its students and alumni, and it was published as a MarketingSherpa case study.
The first run of the test did poorly, and the win came when the team ran it again months later.
- Open rate: +9% for the version with the name in the preheader.
- This was the retest. An earlier run of the same test did not do well, so the result was not consistent across sends.
- Clicks and later actions were not reported for this test.
The change
The variant puts the subscriber's name in the preheader line.
Simplified mockup drawn by LiftArchive from the shared screenshots.
Control
A birthday email to students and alumni with a standard preheader, the short preview line shown next to the subject line in the inbox.
Variant
The same birthday email with the subscriber's name added to the preheader text.
Why it likely won
Our reading of the result, not the practitioner's claim.
- On phones and in webmail inboxes like Gmail and Yahoo, the preheader is one of the few lines people see before opening, so a name there is easy to notice.
- A name makes a goodwill email like a birthday note feel addressed to the reader rather than sent to a list.
- The mixed first result suggests timing, list mix or chance can swing small personalization tests, which is why the team retested.
Caveats: The first run of this test lost and only the retest won, and no sample size or significance was shared. The audience was existing students and alumni, not prospects.
Who ran it
Apollo Education Group ran this test and published the results (MarketingSherpa case study). The numbers are theirs; the summary and commentary on this page are ours.
Read the original case study on Apollo Education Group →
How to run this test on your site
- Hypothesis
- If we add the subscriber's first name to the preheader of a triggered email, then more people will open it because the inbox preview will look personal.
- Primary metric
- Open rate
- Guardrails
- Click-through rate
- Unsubscribe rate
- Spam complaints
- Who should test it
- Schools, membership groups and lead-gen businesses that send triggered or lifecycle emails and have clean first-name data. Skip it if many records have missing or messy names, since a blank or wrong name will hurt more than help.
Questions
What is an email preheader?
It is the short line of preview text shown after the subject line in most inboxes.
On mobile it is often the only extra text people see before deciding to open.
Does putting a name in the preheader always raise opens?
No. In this case the first run did poorly and only a later retest won.
Treat it as something to test on your own list, and retest surprising results.
Should the name go in the subject line or the preheader?
Both are worth testing. The preheader leaves the subject line free for the main message, which some teams prefer.