The vacation season represents a time of heightened anticipation—whether or not you’re a shopper or a marketer. For retailers, November and December account for about 19% of complete annual gross sales. And the Nationwide Retail Federation estimates American companies will earn over $960 billion throughout the 2022 vacation push. In different phrases, the stakes are excessive.
There’s nonetheless time to formulate your electronic mail advertising and marketing marketing campaign plan and get your candy piece of the pie. With the best electronic mail advertising and marketing automation technique, you possibly can relax by the hearth very quickly, sipping cocoa in fuzzy pajamas whereas the techniques you’ve put in place execute your campaigns to success.
Earlier than we soar into this text, learn this piece first in the event you want a primer on what electronic mail automation is—and why you must use it.
3 advantages of electronic mail advertising and marketing automation
Writing and sending particular person emails in a series-long vacation advertising and marketing marketing campaign generally is a tedious, time-consuming course of. Nevertheless, the most effective electronic mail advertising and marketing campaigns are automated, as software program now exists to free you from the mundane execution-related duties.
A few of the important enterprise objectives automating vacation season emails will help with embody boosting top-funnel consciousness, conserving sources, or setting a robust basis for achievement in 2024.
1. Increase model consciousness in a customized manner
Get your model title into shopper inboxes to remain high of thoughts as consumers put together their lists.
Because of its cost-effectiveness and attain, electronic mail stays the first buyer acquisition technique for retailers over the 2022 vacation season—employed by 89% of huge firms and 96% of small firms. And whereas social and textual content advertising and marketing stay common, 70% of customers say electronic mail remains to be their most well-liked channel for communication.
2. Save money and time
With $36 returned for each greenback spent, electronic mail advertising and marketing supplies cost-effective promoting. What’s extra, research present electronic mail automation will increase productiveness by 20%—providing you with much more bang in your buck. With electronic mail campaigns operating within the background, you’ll have extra time to focus your consideration on inventive and strategic work.
3. Construct repeat success
Automated or not, constructing an electronic mail advertising and marketing plan does require effort and time. The excellent news is that your electronic mail advertising and marketing automation technique is reusable. Save templates, course of automations, and deployment schedules to make use of subsequent Black Friday and Cyber Monday—or maybe sooner with Boxing Day, Valentine’s Day, and Presidents’ Day gross sales proper across the nook.
Items that hold giving: 10 automated vacation electronic mail examples
Your electronic mail advertising and marketing marketing campaign plan might embody a single kind of electronic mail or many. Listed below are 10 inspirational vacation electronic mail advertising and marketing concepts to make your vacation season merry and shiny.
1. Arrange deserted cart triggered workflows
Many automated emails are behavior-triggered, which means a system tracks consumer looking, clicking, and shopping for actions throughout your web site and allows you to know when to ship advertising and marketing emails. As an example, you may set your system to ship an deserted cart electronic mail as soon as a number of objects have been sitting within the cart for twenty-four hours.
Customers might abandon their carts for quite a few causes—higher choices elsewhere, a irritating checkout course of, a scarcity of cost choices, or expensive transport, for example. So in your abandonment electronic mail, take into account together with a coupon code or a free transport supply to beat objections.
Plus, the festive vacation season has many customers feeling beneficiant. It’s a super time to achieve out to contacts you haven’t engaged with shortly, as information suggests buyer reactivation tends to extend beginning round Black Friday.
2. Clear up and phase your contact lists
Should you’re always making an attempt to electronic mail invalid or inactive electronic mail addresses, mailbox suppliers might begin sending your correspondence on to spam folders. Because of this, cleansing your contact lists must be a precedence reasonably than an afterthought. After all, handbook cleansing could be tedious and time-consuming work.
Luckily, you possibly can automate:
- Deliverability troubleshooting: With Twilio SendGrid’s deliverability insights, you possibly can automate the e-mail checklist cleansing course of and determine problematic addresses earlier than compromising deliverability.
- Buyer segmentation: With SendGrid’s electronic mail checklist administration, you possibly can import buyer information to realize full image visibility. Then, use these buyer insights to create strategic segments. As an example, you may tag audiences into segments primarily based on demographics, geographic location, matters of curiosity, or reward tier.
- Engagement monitoring: With SendGrid, you possibly can observe outcomes to yield the most effective electronic mail advertising and marketing campaigns, as you’ll know when to ship advertising and marketing emails and which messages are most definitely to resonate.
3. Create a vacation electronic mail calendar and schedule your campaigns
By outlining vacation emails weeks, if not months, upfront, you possibly can arrange your groups and set the tone with customers for a season of promotions, bulletins, and communications.
When to ship advertising and marketing emails is a traditional quandary. Nevertheless, spacing out your messages ends in a well-choreographed marketing campaign you possibly can dazzle and maintain captivation.
As an example, you may create an electronic mail advertising and marketing marketing campaign plan primarily based on huge gross sales days like Black Friday, Small Enterprise Saturday, Cyber Monday, and Boxing Day. Otherwise you may launch a “12 Days of Christmas” promotion sequence that runs every day all through December.
Need assistance planning? Let SendGrid’s electronic mail advertising and marketing calendar be your information. When you determine on a sending schedule, SendGrid supplies 3 methods to advance-schedule your emails, whether or not by Advertising and marketing Campaigns, the SMTP API header, or the API itself.
4. Automate a welcome collection for brand spanking new subscribers
Customized welcome emails boast a median 50% open charge, so take into account this set off a greatest observe in electronic mail advertising and marketing automation technique. Past a thanks, your welcome electronic mail ought to, on the very least, present an attractive nugget of useful data and invite subscribers to browse.
Take into account this easy welcome electronic mail from Harry’s, a shaving equipment model for males:
Otherwise you may determine to sweeten the e-mail additional with useful ideas, how-to tutorials associated to a purchase order, personalised content material suggestions primarily based on looking historical past, or a particular supply. Even an incentive as modest as free transport can encourage seasonal patrons to spend 30% extra. Take a look at Chapter 2 for step-by-step directions on the right way to implement welcome emails with SendGrid.
5. Set up a drip marketing campaign round your vacation present information or e-book
Holidays supply distinctive alternatives to design and write inventive content material that consumers discover helpful. As an example, an unique gated content material obtain is a simple automation set off the place leads enter their contact data to obtain entry to a vacation present information. Do you know present guides yield 48% extra transactions than a typical promotional electronic mail?
Take a look at this present information from Carter’s, which breaks down common buys by class:
After giving customers a day or 2 to digest your present information, you possibly can proceed your electronic mail advertising and marketing marketing campaign plan by sending buyer opinions and testimonials, associated weblog posts, or a particular supply to solidify the sale. See Chapter 4 for step-by-step instructions on the right way to arrange a customized automation primarily based on downloaded content material.
6. Ship a thanks and share a deal
This time of yr, everyone seems to be searching for a deal—and a deal could be the distinction between procuring with you and procuring with a competitor. It’s simple to get wrapped up within the shiny lights—focusing all of your efforts on shiny, new consumers—but bear in mind, present clients spend 67% extra on common than new clients, making them value courting.
Meaning hold tabs in your most frequent clients and massive spenders. Present your appreciation by automating a purchase-triggered electronic mail that makes reward members really feel like VIPs with unique, tier-based promotions and experiences.
Need assistance designing your thanks message? Take a look at SendGrid’s free vacation thanks electronic mail template.
7. Increase engagement in your vacation occasion with a drip marketing campaign
Wish to plan an in-person occasion this yr? You’ll want to develop a enjoyable electronic mail advertising and marketing marketing campaign plan to construct consciousness and attendance. Your message ought to supply a preview of what consumers can browse and what offers they’ll discover. And today, most emails additionally supply on-line procuring options to in-person occasions.
As you possibly can see with the instance above, electronic mail is a wonderful medium for breaking down advanced promotional tiers forward of time to assist consumers plan their methods and alleviate confusion at checkout time. See Chapter 3 for particulars on the right way to arrange your occasion promotion electronic mail collection.
8. Use vacation electronic mail templates with built-in personalization
Make the most of electronic mail advertising and marketing templates to automate the design course of. And inside a couple of minutes, you possibly can have the proper vacation electronic mail able to go, whether or not you’d like to advertise present concepts or supply last-minute reductions.
SendGrid’s electronic mail editor enables you to construct with drag-and-drop instruments, code, or a hybrid. Plus, there are many responsive vacation electronic mail templates to select from, irrespective of your model desire.
9. Gather analytics information to determine top-performing emails
The e-mail advertising and marketing marketing campaign plan is simply a part of automation’s full vary of worth. Automation is about way more than merely scheduling and sending advertising and marketing messages. In truth, a few of the most beneficial automation work occurs behind the scenes as customers open, click on, and browse your vacation advertising and marketing emails. The perfect electronic mail advertising and marketing campaigns are decided by information.
With SendGrid’s electronic mail statistics, you’ll seize useful viewers insights, hold tabs on deliverability, and perceive how emails carry out. To not point out built-in testing permits you to check completely different electronic mail topic strains, gives, and call-to-action buttons, making success repeatable.
10. Observe up after the vacations to encourage connection
It’s simple to think about December 25 because the grand finale of the vacation season—but Google discovered 20% of on-line retailer site visitors in December occurs within the 6 days after Christmas. However earlier than respiration an enormous sigh of reduction, take into account how one can hold the momentum of the height procuring season going.
“Purchase your self the present you didn’t get” promotions could be very profitable, particularly when paired with a particular supply that encourages consumers to deal with themselves or buy for the brand new yr.
See how slippers model mahabis retains the celebration going:
Automate your emails to spice up vacation gross sales with Twilio SendGrid
From design to deliverability, Twilio SendGrid has all the e-mail advertising and marketing automation technique ideas and instruments you have to efficiently navigate the vacation push. Spend a couple of minutes establishing and let our infrastructure deal with your campaigns.
For extra electronic mail advertising and marketing marketing campaign plan suggestions:
With the vacations already underway, there’s no time like the current to get began. SendGrid’s Advertising and marketing Campaigns Free Plan enables you to create a sign-up type, ship single emails, A/B check, and automate as much as 6,000 messages per thirty days—freed from cost. That’s proper, scaling your electronic mail advertising and marketing automation technique is reasonably priced and simple. Contact our Gross sales workforce for particulars.
