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HomeEmail marketing is by far one of the most effective ways to market to your customers, build brand loyalty and drive sales. It’s very tempting to send as many emails and promotions as you can, but sending the right promotion at the right time is crucial to success.
This guide outlines best practices for various email campaign types - giving you the inspiration and knowledge to create messages that resonate with your audience and help drive sales & engagement.
A welcome email is like an in-person hello - it's likely the first major interaction you’ll have with a customer after they’ve signed up, and it's an opportunity you cannot afford to waste. The key to a welcome email is to strike a healthy balance between being informative, offering value, and being eye-catching enough to grab their attention.
Best practices:
Your welcome email should land in their inbox immediately after sign-up. Time is of the essence here, especially if the customer has signed up in return for an incentive such as a discount code. Your tone should be warm, human and personable - treat it the same you would as an in-person conversation. This is your best chance to introduce the brand, set expectations and establish a relationship. First impressions count!
Including a small incentive works well as a driver to get customers to sign up - something as simple as “10% off your first order” or “free shipping on your first order” can encourage your new subscriber to purchase. Remember - most customers will browse multiple vendors before making their purchase!
In order to maximise your reach and create a multi-channel experience, remember to create consistency across email and our on-site Overlays - ensuring your customers are seeing the same content at every touchpoint in their journey.
It’s also good to inform customers of what they can expect from your emails - make sure they know how often you're likely to email, what sort of content you’ll be sharing and if there are any special perks they get for being a subscriber.
What to avoid:
Information overload - it's tempting to try to include as lot of content in your first email, but it’s too much for customers. Focus on one key message - remember, you can create follow-up campaigns throughout the flow, so break down your messages into easy-to-digest sends.
When sending out an email with a promotion, discount or sale, it's very easy for businesses to fall into the trap of sounding too salesy. The key to an effective promotional email is to make the offer compelling and engaging, without sounding too forceful or making the shopper feel that they’re just another number on your sales target list.
Best practices:
Your subject line needs to be attention-grabbing but also honest and transparent. Something like “20% off - today only” is an effective way to grab a customer's attention. Avoid misleading or ‘clickbait’ subject lines - these are a good way to annoy customers, and in the case of messages to the US, illegal under the CAN-SPAM act.
Your email body should be easy to skim read and focus on the core message. You need to make it immediately obvious why the reader should care; what’s the benefit, what’s the promotion, how much could they save? Is it a bundle offer, or perhaps free shipping? Whatever you’re promoting, make sure the reader knows why they shouldn’t miss out.
Action-driven call to actions (CTAs) are an important part of the email journey - tell customers what to do, and guide them to the next step. Good examples are “Shop the Sale” or “Get Started”.
What to avoid:
Avoid constant promotions - not only is this annoying and spammy but it also dilutes your brand and customers end up relying purely on discounts.
Target your promotions to specific segments. Sending to customers you know are interested in the product you’re promoting are much more likely to engage, improving email results and saving you money when using your send credits.
Treat newsletter content as an ongoing conversation with your customers - this is ‘value add’ content that isn’t focused purely on sales. The best email newsletters are those that focus on rich, engaging and helpful content, that occasionally weaves in promotions- but focuses on building brand authority, trust and relationships with your customers.
Best practices:
An absolute must for email newsletters is consistency - whether you’re choosing to send weekly, fortnightly, or monthly, you need to ensure you set expectations and stick to them. Your tone should be human and personable - treat this as if you’re writing to a friend about a subject that interests you both - rather than sending it to a mass audience.
The second key factor is ‘rich’ content - you need to provide useful, insightful and engaging content for your readers. If you simply focus on promotions, engagement will drop very quickly. Include a mix of industry news, helpful tips, behind the scenes updates and personal insights.
If you do include promotional content, change thisto be an added perk, and not the main focus of the campaign
Don’t send a newsletter for sending’s sake - if you’ve got no valuable content, it’s better to skip a send than send out an email with low-value content and risk disengagement.
An abandoned cart occurs when a shopper adds items to their basket but leaves an eCommerce site without completing the purchase, despite showing clear buying intent. This presents a major missed revenue opportunity for retailers.
Common reasons for abandonment include unexpected costs, a complicated checkout process, limited payment options, and poor user experience. The knock-on effects are significant: lost revenue, decreased conversion rates, missed upselling chances, and reduced customer trust.
Automated abandoned cart programmes can recover lost sales by reminding customers of their intent to buy, often through emails or SMS triggered after leaving the site. These messages, while initially transactional, can be followed by personalised marketing content across channels. Benefits include increased customer retention, stronger marketing ROI, and better insights into shopper behaviour. With mobile abandonment rates as high as 81%, automation helps recapture these opportunities at scale, while also encouraging higher order values through upselling and tailored offers.
