5 Fresh Holiday Email Marketing Strategies for E-commerce Businesses
The holiday season is the most beneficial time of the year, and the retail strength of holiday shopping is felt throughout the globe.
According to eMarketer, the e-commerce industry grew 16.7%, reaching up to $123.90 billion in the holiday spending spree in 2018.
This statistic clearly shows that how every year people have been spending more during the holiday season.
Every year, not only the amount of spending is increasing, but also the number of spenders. There were around 1.66 billion global digital buyers in 2017. In 2021, the amount of world population expected to buy online is going to rise to 2.14 billion, which gives e-commerce a huge market.
If email marketing is still worthwhile is a question of many. It is a fact that email generates $38 for every $1 spent. In simple words, it boils down to an ROI of 3800%, which makes email marketing as one of the best options available.
One can easily have an edge by following the below-mentioned ideas regarding email marketing for e-commerce businesses.
1. Promotions, Sales and Product Announcements
One of the most powerful email marketing strategies for e-commerce businesses includes targeting existing customers with special offers and promotions.
You can also try creating a buyer’s guide for your email subscribers. It is a very effective way to introduce relevant details about products, the type of person that the product is perfect for, and any other important nuggets of information. You can promote your buyer’s guide on social media using niche influencers and earn even more subscribers for your brand.
This buyer’s guide acts as a piece of expert advice for your customers, and your company won’t look like a business just willing to spam their customers for increasing sales.
One such example of a buying guide includes the guide made by Wayfair. Wayfair is a company selling different kinds of furniture online, and they created a guide for its customers about five important things to consider when choosing a home office desk.
Mercato, an online grocery store, is an excellent example of a brand sending sales-oriented emails. Recently they sent me an email with a $15 coupon that ends in 24hrs.
This is a great way of creating a sense of urgency and enticing users to purchase during the holiday season.
2. Send gender-specific content and target your customers by geolocation
According to Adage, when people were asked to prioritize one capability that will be most important to marketing in the future, 33% of marketers answered: “personalization.” It is a simple concept but can get great results for an individual. Such personalization can begin with the gender of your customer itself. You should divide your customer list by gender.
91% of consumers are more likely to shop with brands that recognize, remember, and provide relevant offers and product recommendations.
You can send gender-specific content to people, depending on their preferences. Such segmented campaigns have proved to be profitable for various e-commerce businesses.
When you create a segmented campaign and send gender-specific content to different individuals, you create more incentives for them to buy products and services. A neutral category can also be introduced to take into consideration the content for every customer. Thorough research is required to do such a task.
Basic geographic data about your audience helps you to offer location-specific content like events and seasonal offers to each segment. It is essential during holidays because half of your global audience is in the heat of summer, and the other is halfway through winter.
For example, a company dealing with food delivery must always recommend the nearest food joints and best places to eat through email, making the perfect use of geolocation. Similarly, you can also offer incentives to your customers to follow the suggestions.
3. Hyper-Personalization and Product Recommendations
All of you have been recommended products in a shop, or maybe on Amazon. Many times your mind would’ve been distracted, and you tend to believe that this product is also a necessity for us.
There are various types of personalization and you need to figure out which one works best for your ecommerce business.
You can find influencers by category and partner with the ones who have an audience similar to yours. This can help you deliver highly personalized recommendations to them from someone they trust.
For example, many customers who buy shampoo may also buy a conditioner. Similarly, in email marketing, you must try creating a list of your customers who purchased product A and send them an email recommending product B.
Taking the example of Freelancer.com, it regularly sends emails to its prospective users, wherein, it mentions the recommended opportunities based on the user’s skills and past engagements. It is the perfect example of teaching hyper-personalization and product recommendations in your email marketing strategy.
You can create tailored messaging based on each customer’s data by studying the data in the browsing behavior of your customers. According to Barilliance Research, product recommendations account for up to 31% of e-commerce revenues. On average, customers see 12% of their sales attributed to product recommendation products.
Before a customer finalizes the order for delivery, you must recommend products. If they have already bought something, you must keep sending them links to other newly added products which they would most likely purchase.
You can also introduce offers on such suggested products to give a certain incentive to the customer.
Combo offers that come with a discounted rate have also received great popularity. For example, various sellers provide discounted rates for books of the corresponding genre or by the same author giving a certain incentive to the customer to invest a little more money and get them all.
Booksellers provide discounted rates for books of the same genre or by the corresponding author, thus giving a certain incentive to the customer.
4. Target your VIPs
Every brand has certain VIP customers, and these people who pay you something extra must get some extra love. These VIP customers can be given a particular incentive by introducing special offers, early access to new products, or an exclusive holiday discount.
These VIP customers most probably already trust your business and are most likely to spend more on your products and services. A little push through discounts and offers is all they need. You can categorize your VIP list by the amount they spent or by the number of products they bought.
One more important thing to note is to make sure that your mail directly tells your customers what you are offering. Customers are already in search of coupons to get as much discount as they can. Your subject line of the email should make your customers want to read the mail and not think of it as a spam message.
Businesses have received a fantastic response by pampering their VIP customers.
5. Gift ideas for those on a budget
The holiday season feels like you have to buy a gift for everyone. Your kid’s teachers, watchman, bus driver, sports coach, guidance counselor, and best friend’s parents are all on the list. It can make holidays expensive.
Many holiday marketing campaigns focus only on big-ticket items to impress that special someone or for your children. However, it isn’t affordable to get such gifts for everyone you are close to. However, there is a huge market for budget gifts, and one must be prepared with these budget offers before the holiday season begins. People will invest more money when they have to spend less time on such gifts.
You can also suggest gift cards to your customers for enhanced sales. People think so much about such budget gifts, but if your business gets them these ideas directly on their email, you already own a brownie point. Certain boxes of small gifts or some options for impulse purchases are very lucrative.
Final Thoughts
According to eMarketer, “80% of retail professionals indicate that email marketing is their greatest driver of customer retention”.
There might be various visitors on your website every day, but converting these visitors into buyers is the main challenge for every business. Just discounts and offers are not sufficient, adding a personal touch to your customer’s shopping experience is very necessary. Sending personalized emails and following the above tips can be helpful for your business.
Customers need to be treated wonderfully and kept close. They need to feel valued. Ultimately, it is your business that has to go the extra mile. Invest that little bit more time in them than they would expect and surprise them with your efforts. Ultimately, it is all about the details.
