By Phil Norris November 28, 2023
You understand electronic mail advertising and marketing is a brilliant efficient technique to nurture leads, flip them into paying clients, and retain current clients.
However reaching your targets requires sending emails persistently and steadily — probably no less than as soon as per week. And arising with that many electronic mail advertising and marketing marketing campaign concepts is powerful.
Possibly you’ve hit a artistic dead-end. Possibly your earlier exercise hasn’t delivered the specified outcomes. Possibly you’re new to electronic mail and simply don’t know the place to begin.
Both method, you’re experiencing a significant case of author’s (or emailer’s) block.
Don’t fear, as a result of we’ve rounded up 18 electronic mail advertising and marketing concepts to encourage your subsequent marketing campaign, backed up with real-world examples and segmented throughout the next frequent targets:
- Producing extra gross sales
- Rising electronic mail open charges
- Getting extra clicks
- Nurturing leads
- Rising sign-ups
- Boosting buyer retention
Chill out, take a deep breath, and let’s get into it…
Objective: Generate extra gross sales
Promote a sale
Earlier than we begin discussing learn how to promote your newest sale via electronic mail advertising and marketing, let’s make one factor clear:
Gross sales aren’t a silver bullet.
Run too many and also you danger devaluing your model. Additionally, shoppers base their shopping for choices on a spread of things, not simply value. The largest motivators are:
- Buyer scores and critiques (cited by 94% of respondents)
- Value of product (91%)
- Free delivery (78%)
- Model choice (65%)
- Good friend/household suggestions (60%)
So there are not any ensures a sale will even transfer the needle.
Nonetheless, used successfully, gross sales can nonetheless be extraordinarily impactful, with a excessive proportion of shoppers throughout age teams saying they watch for reductions earlier than shopping for on-line.
Now, let’s have a look at an actual gross sales promotion electronic mail from inside decor model Bougié, which successfully mixed two of the highest 5 shopping for components we talked about above by:
- Providing a reduction on the product value
- Offering free delivery
In fact, plenty of gross sales span a number of product classes (and even complete web sites), slightly than specializing in a single product like in Bougié’s instance. When you’re planning such a particular promotion, your greatest wager is to focus on clients who’ve proven curiosity in a related product class.
In Bougié’s case, this may very well be individuals who:
- Browsed different espresso tables
- Browsed different Pitch Drop merchandise
- Browsed or lately bought different front room furnishings
Ship cart abandonment emails
An astonishing 70.19% of on-line buying carts find yourself being deserted. It’s a tragedy for ecommerce shops; simply consider all that misplaced income.
However it’s not all unhealthy information, as a result of cart abandonment emails persistently see open charges of 43% or extra.
Not solely that, however these emails convert at a fee of 18.64% — method larger than the common electronic mail conversion fee of round 8%.
One of the best deserted cart emails comprise the next components:
- Order abstract
- Product pricing
- Product imagery
- At the least one CTA to finish the transaction
Let’s have a look at an instance from menswear model Huckberry:
In addition to getting the fundamentals proper, Huckberry goes a step additional by selling “extra great things”, simply in case the recipient isn’t serious about shopping for the merchandise they deserted:
Use this tactic to advocate different merchandise or classes the shopper has beforehand browsed, or simply to level them towards your prime sellers.
Share social proof
Social proof is an enormous supply of shopping for inspiration. As an illustration, three-quarters of shoppers “all the time” or “usually” learn critiques when looking for companies of their space.
However social proof isn’t simply about buyer critiques. Different sorts embrace:
- Testimonials
- Trade awards
- Suggestions from influencers, thought leaders, or trade publications
- Buyer success tales
- Accreditations
In our subsequent instance, furnishings model Retains Dwelling rounded up a few of its most glowing press protection from inside design and shopper evaluation websites:
As you possibly can see, this electronic mail additionally featured a distinguished CTA. So if the e-mail recipient is received over by all these spectacular trade critiques, they will simply click on via and store the Retains vary.
Use shortage and urgency
Need to encourage your viewers to purchase proper now? Attempt including shortage or urgency (or each) to your messaging.
Shortage and urgency are related, however they’re not the identical:
- Urgency is about restricted time. As an illustration, you would possibly inform clients they solely have 24 hours to reap the benefits of a reduction.
- Shortage is about restricted amount. For instance, you possibly can say there are solely 50 areas obtainable in your subsequent course.
In our subsequent instance, Wix created a way of urgency by making it clear the low cost was a limited-time supply, as visualized by the countdown timer beneath the introductory copy:
Wix may have made this electronic mail much more impactful by combining urgency and shortage, similar to limiting the 50% low cost to the primary 100 clients who signed up. That might have created an actual rush to the checkout.
Objective: Improve electronic mail opens
Break up-test electronic mail topic traces
E mail topic traces are your #1 instrument for reinforcing open charges, with virtually half of electronic mail recipients opening emails based mostly on the topic line alone.
So in case you’re making an attempt to extend electronic mail opens, the topic line must be your first port of name. However whereas we will give you dozens of inspirational electronic mail topic line examples, the one dependable method to determine what works for you is to run a split-test.
That’s exactly what the oldsters at on-line advertising and marketing training firm Authority Hacker did. Throughout 78 electronic mail outreach campaigns, they trialed three barely totally different topic traces:
- Query?
- Fast query?
- Query for you?
Related as these choices sound, the three top-performing campaigns when it comes to electronic mail open charges all had the identical topic line:
That’s proper: between Marketing campaign A and Marketing campaign E, they managed to extend their open fee by 12.5%, simply by eradicating the phrase “fast” for the topic line!
Earlier than you begin your personal topic line split-test, bear in mind to not change the opposite components that have an effect on electronic mail open charges (specifically the e-mail preheader and sender title — extra on them later). That method, you could be positive any modifications you see to the open fee are all the way down to the topic line alone.
The electronic mail preheader is a snippet of textual content that seems subsequent to or beneath an electronic mail topic line, relying in your system and inbox supplier. Confusingly, it’s also called the Johnson Field or preview textual content. However no matter you name it, you need to use it to extend your open fee by reinforcing or increasing in your topic line messaging.
For instance, Sensi Graves Swim used the topic line to advertise limited-availability merchandise, then elevated the sensation of shortage with a preheader explaining there have been “just one or two” left in inventory:
Check totally different sender names
We’ve lined topic traces and preheaders, however there’s one other — often-overlooked — component that may have a huge impact on electronic mail open charges: the e-mail sender title.
Do you have to use your model title, like on this instance…
…or select a private title plus your model title to create a extra human really feel?
There’s loads of proof to counsel small modifications to your sender title can yield large impacts, with one group reporting 50% larger open charges after including an actual particular person to its sender names.
However the easy reply is: you received’t know the best method on your model and viewers till you check it your self.
Professional tip: For greatest outcomes, check topic traces, preheaders, and sender names to search out the mixture that delivers the very best open charges.
Objective: Get extra clicks
Construct emails round one CTA
When brainstorming electronic mail advertising and marketing concepts, you must establish one clear “purpose” for every electronic mail you ship. Use that purpose to create a single CTA that prompts readers to take the specified motion.
Add conflicting calls-to-action to an electronic mail and also you danger leaving folks confused — which implies fewer clicks and conversions.
Adobe acquired it proper on this electronic mail, which was solely geared towards driving downloads of a selected piece of content material:
The dearth of “noise” will increase the possibilities of folks clicking and downloading.
Use damaging house in electronic mail design
Some emails make you are feeling such as you’ve acquired a migraine.
I’m not speaking about that out-of-the-blue message out of your boss asking in case you’ve acquired time for a “fast chat”.
As a substitute, I imply these advertising and marketing emails which might be filled with totally different GIFs, colours, fonts, pictures, emojis, and different visible bells and whistles.
In terms of electronic mail design, much less is extra. Create extra impactful emails by utilizing damaging house (also called “white house”): empty areas in an electronic mail that assist different design components to face out.
This instance from Codecademy is an train in electronic mail design restraint, with the wealth of damaging house naturally drawing your eye towards the supply and the CTA button:
Professional tip: Undecided the place to begin with electronic mail design? Don’t fear, as a result of AWeber has a library of 600+ customizable electronic mail templates to encourage your subsequent marketing campaign.
Describe how your product will change the reader’s life
In a world that’s obsessive about audio and visible content material, it’s straightforward to miss the significance of electronic mail copywriting.
However the phrases in your emails play a key function in serving to would-be clients image what their lives can be like after shopping for your services or products. Which, in flip, makes them extra prone to click on via to study extra.
SectionSchool makes use of this tactic in our subsequent instance:
The e-mail copy encourages readers to think about themselves after three months of studying with Part and spells out the advantages they will anticipate. It’s precisely the kind of messaging that will resonate with somebody serious about self-improvement.
Professional tip: As a common rule, your electronic mail copy ought to comprise numerous “you” and “your”, and never a lot “we” or “our”. Keep in mind, it’s all in regards to the buyer, not you.
Objective: Nurture leads
Present customized product suggestions
Client expectations round personalization are rising, with 73% of respondents to a 2022 survey anticipating manufacturers to know their distinctive wants and expectations, up from 66% in 2020.
Which suggests one of the crucial efficient electronic mail advertising and marketing concepts for nurturing leads is to offer customized product suggestions.
Baggage and equipment model Bellroy evidently understands this. On this electronic mail, it rounded up a bunch of related merchandise based mostly on the recipient’s looking and shopping for conduct:
Importantly, Bellroy made it clear that these weren’t generic suggestions by utilizing phrases like:
- Only for you
- Customized to your tastes
- Your picks
- Hand-picked
As a result of why go to all the difficulty of offering dynamic product suggestions in case you’re not going to inform folks about it?
Share related content material
E mail personalization isn’t nearly introducing your viewers to merchandise they could love. It’s additionally about pointing them within the course of content material they’ll discover fascinating or helpful (or, ideally, each).
For instance, think about you’re an HR supervisor seeking to get extra worth out of your group’s studying and improvement spend.
Throughout your analysis, you join Filtered’s electronic mail listing, however you’re not fairly able to request a product demo.
You then obtain this electronic mail:
There’s an excellent likelihood you’d be a part of the webinar to study extra. Which, in flip, makes it extra probably that Filtered can be entrance of thoughts whenever you’re prepared to purchase.
Rejoice milestones
Milestones are a tailored alternative to nurture leads (and perhaps persuade them to buy one thing). There are numerous kinds of milestones, together with:
- Buyer / lead birthdays
- Firm birthdays
- Anniversaries since a selected person motion (similar to subscribing to your publication)
Our subsequent instance, from language studying platform Busuu, demonstrates how milestone emails can be utilized to encourage a result in improve from a freemium product to a paid account:
Busuu primarily makes use of the three-month “anniversary” as an excuse to supply an enormous low cost off its premium plans.
Objective: Improve sign-ups
Ship referral emails
If I let you know to purchase one thing, you’ll in all probability assume: “Why ought to I hearken to this man? I don’t even know him. And the way did he get my telephone quantity?”
But when your mother or your associate or your greatest pal recommends a services or products, there’s an honest likelihood you’ll pay attention. Actually, shoppers belief referrals greater than some other channel:
- Referrals (trusted by 40% of respondents)
- TV adverts (31%)
- Influencer suggestions (1%)
For that cause, referral emails are one of the crucial efficient methods to extend sign-ups for a web based course, occasion, or webinar. But when they’re going to ship the specified outcomes, it’s worthwhile to provide you with incentives for each the referrer and the particular person they’re referring, similar to on-line coaching firm GeeksforGeeks.
The model constructed a easy however efficient referral scheme that rewarded each events:
- The referred buyer acquired a ten% low cost on any GeeksforGeeks course
- The referrer earned a 5% fee on the sale
That’s an actual win-win.
Tease new course content material
Simply as an ecommerce firm would possibly launch a brand new product to spice up gross sales, on-line course sellers can drive sign-ups by introducing and selling new course content material.
In our subsequent instance, the Content material Advertising and marketing Institute teased its new content material advertising and marketing certification, created in partnership with the American Advertising and marketing Affiliation:
Don’t fear in case you don’t fancy studying all that duplicate, as a result of it principally says: this new course is launching quickly, signal as much as get notified when it drops.
Objective: Increase buyer retention
Run win-back campaigns
Between 2013 and 2022, the common ecommerce buyer acquisition price rose by a staggering 222%, so retaining clients has by no means been extra necessary.
Which brings us neatly to win-back campaigns. Also referred to as re-engagement or reactivation campaigns, they can assist you retain maintain of leads or clients who’ve stopped participating together with your emails or shopping for your merchandise.
There are numerous kinds of win-back campaigns, however one of the crucial impactful is the last-chance electronic mail, which principally forces clients to choose again into your advertising and marketing listing. In the event that they don’t, they’ll be unsubscribed, in order that they’ll cease spoiling your electronic mail engagement metrics.
Let’s have a look at a last-chance electronic mail instance from short-term tattoo model Tattly:
Certain, this feels sort of counterintuitive: why would you encourage subscribers to depart your advertising and marketing listing?
However when somebody chooses to remain subscribed, that’s a transparent signal they’re serious about what it’s important to say. And bear in mind: it’s higher to have a smaller pool of engaged clients than an enormous listing full of people that barely bear in mind your title.
Reiterate your worth proposition
The shoppers you’re making an attempt to retain preferred you adequate to purchase from one as soon as upon a time. With a mild reminder of why you’re so superb, they could be persuaded to do it once more.
Magnificence model AILLEA reveals us what that reminder would possibly appear like:
First up, this electronic mail reiterates the model’s worth proposition, which is all about serving to clients develop a extra sustainable, eco-friendly magnificence routine.
AILLEA goes on to ask the recipient two questions which might be immediately associated to its worth proposition:
By doing this, it subtly encourages the recipient to think about why they could wish to store with AILLEA. This messaging is supported by CTAs that immediate clients to browse the model’s collections.
It’s all about persuading folks to take one other have a look at the AILLEA retailer, the place they’ll hopefully discover one thing they love.
Ask for suggestions
There are two methods to determine why a buyer has stopped participating together with your emails, utilizing your product, or shopping for from you:
- Seek the advice of a soothsayer
- Ask them
Personally, I favor choice #2.
Asking for buyer suggestions has a pair massive advantages for manufacturers:
- Prospects like being requested for suggestions (offered you act on it). 4 in 5 shoppers say they really feel extra loyal to manufacturers that reply to and resolve their complaints.
- Even when a buyer leaves, you possibly can study from their expertise. Discover out what put them off about your product or advertising and marketing — and repair it.
Right here’s a textbook buyer survey electronic mail instance from dairy model Tillamook:
Tillamook will get three issues proper on this electronic mail:
- It tells the recipient what’s anticipated of them (i.e. answering three questions)
- It clearly states the aim of the survey (discovering out if recipients discover the model’s emails helpful and fascinating)
- It guarantees some kind of profit (utilizing the suggestions to ship higher content material)
Keep on with this system to get extra responses out of your suggestions emails.
Profitable electronic mail advertising and marketing requires the non-public contact
Whether or not you’re encouraging a brand new electronic mail subscriber to make their first buy, asking current clients to advocate you to their family and friends, or making an attempt to cease a beforehand loyal buyer from leaving, one factor applies:
You stand a much better likelihood of success in case you converse to folks as people.
What are their ache factors? What do they like about your product? What would persuade them to carry out the specified motion proper now?
That kind of customized messaging is unimaginable to ship with out the best electronic mail advertising and marketing platform.
With AWeber, you need to use tags and customized fields to create dynamic segments that replace robotically based mostly on particular person buyer actions like:
- Shopping a product web page
- Making a purchase order
- Opening a selected electronic mail
That method, you possibly can ship the best electronic mail content material to the best particular person precisely after they want it, which might improve your profitability and gross sales.
See for your self by signing up for a free AWeber account.
Get began right here!
