But that may not be good advice for advocacy. The Obama campaign made subject lines teasers rather than headlines: “Something extraordinary”, “A beginning”, “You have to see this”, “Results”, “In his own words”. Of course, there was little chance you’d forget what to expect from their emails, given how many they sent. And Politico has talked about the e-mail subject heading war, with PR staffers writing self-consciously clever lines to get reporters to open their emails.

So what should you use? Simple: whatever gets your organization the best results. Test an informative subject, a teaser, a challenge, something personalized, a question, something forwarded…. Pretty much any email system will let you do A/B testing with a fraction of your list and then send the better-performing email to everyone else. Take advantage – you don’t know what will work best for your audiences until you have actual data from their actions.

According to AdAge, more companies are now realizing that relationships lead to results: More Marketers Want to Get to Know You: CRM Surges as Brands Demand Measurable Results.

Feel-good talk about leveraging CRM — the art of using tools such as database maintenance and customer segmentation — to boost understanding of consumers isn’t anything new. Ask around, though, and industry folks will tell you 2008 is shaping up to be the year in which companies put their money where their mouths are — with a looming recession making brands more sensitive than ever about the returns on their marketing investments. CRM-software-industry global revenue is projected to jump 14.2% this year to $8.9 billion, according to research house Gartner.

Nonprofits that cultivate relationships with their donors and volunteers can offer advice to companies:

• Your customers will help you – if you support them
• Share customer information with other divisions – you’re all working toward the same goals
• Consider implementing CRM in stages rather than all at once – simple and used is better than complete and ignored
• Customers have different goals, so they respond best to different communications
• Invest time in managing the CRM – "it’s just a tool and won’t raise money on its own."
• Make sure your metrics tell you if customers’ involvement with you increases over time
• Plan for your CRM to grow with your company

What else can nonprofits teach?