15 Holiday Email Marketing Tips [Free Guide]

Email marketing tips for the holiday season.

Email marketing is the most effective tactic for increasing sales during the holidays.

Because it’s been proven to influence repeat visitors the most, and it’s much easier to get these repeat, loyal visitors and past customers to purchase (rather than to acquire new customers).

But most still get it wrong.

And they leave A TON of money on the table. Or worse, completely waste their investment and not see anything in return.

But there’s good news…

Using just a few key techniques will help you see QUICK results in the next campaign you send.

So without further ado, let’s dive in.

This is a BIG article with TONS of useful tips, and I don’t want you to miss any of it. So use these links below to navigate and quickly reference at a later date:

Tip #1: Plan Campaigns in Advance

Impatience is one of the worst marketing afflictions there is.

Because by the time you’re strapped for cash and needing more customers… it’s already too late.

Marketing isn’t advertising — and there’s usually no last grasp, game-winning hail mary that will make a significant impact on your business.

The best marketing campaigns are carefully coordinated and in-sync to deliver the maximum results (e.g. sales) with the least investment (e.g. time, money & energy).

For example, if you want to increase sales and engagement over the holidays, don’t flood your social media channels with “Buy my widget now!” updates on Black Friday.

But start creating holiday content that teases and hints at upcoming promotions. Find partners to cross-promote and help you distribute this content. Then run contests to increase engagement and excitement for the upcoming holiday specials. Finally, use lead nurturing and email marketing to consistently follow-up with people when they do — or don’t — show intent to buy.

Investing in a single, well planned and executed holiday campaign will always have a higher ROI than spamming people the day before Christmas.

And with email marketing, there’s no excuse. Because you can schedule everything ahead of time.

So let’s look at some more practical, concrete ways to do this…

Tip #2: Think Series, Not One-Off

Let’s do some quick, easy math.

If you sent one email to 1000 subscribers, with a 20% open rate, you would reach 200 people.

But if you sent three sequential emails to 1000 subscribers, with a 20% open rate, you would probably reach somewhere between 400 – 600 people (with some potential overlap).

The point is, you should send more emails during the holidays (within reason of course). And if you look at the top shopping days for online sales, then you can “chunk” them into three major ranges:

  1. Tuesday, November 26
  2. Thursday, November 28 (Thanksgiving)
  3. Friday, November 29
  1. Monday, December 2 (Cyber Monday)
  2. Wednesday, December 4
  3. Friday, December 6
  1. Monday, December 9 (Green Monday)
  2. Tuesday, December 10
  3. Thursday, December 12
  4. Monday, December 16

So instead of waiting to send one email on Cyber Monday, you should build up to it. For example, over the period of a few days, you can use a sequence like this:

  • Email #1: Hint or Tease at Upcoming Sale
  • Email #2: Announce Sale (Limited Time Only) – to encourage people to take action
  • Email #3: Last Chance – to introduce scarcity and compel people to take advantage
  • Email #4: Missed It, But Here’s What’s Next…

Now that’s a pretty aggressive sequence. If you’ve only been emailing your subscribers once or twice a month then you might see more unsubscribes.

So you might want to pick only one of those date ranges to run this type of email campaign sequence.

But learn from the best. Watch any major online retailer, and they’ll be sending you something very similar.

Tip #3: Engage Early and Often

Engagement with your brand is the missing link between strangers and loyal customers.

Creating customer loyalty is one of the driving reasons behind using email marketing and social media in the first place. You want to stay “top-of-mind”, so when someone is in need of your product or service, you’re the first one they seek out.

One of the best ways to ignite engagement is to use a social media promotion.

Use a simple tool like Wildfire to run a holiday contest prior to your big email campaigns. For example, have people submit pictures of their Holiday decorations, or favorite holiday memories.

As an added bonus, you can also get them to submit their email during entry, so you’ll be able to collect new last minute subscribers to add to your list.

Tip #4: Simple is Elegant (and Effective)

The best email templates, especially “transactional” ones, are simple and clear. Because you want people to ultimately click and take action (not just admire how pretty your design is).

If you have tangible products or services, then be more visual and show — don’t tell.

You can (and should) also use “visual cues” to get people to take action. The Wynn Hotel in Las Vegas does a great job by using an envelope. And what are you supposed to do with an envelope? Open it! (Or click in this case.)

Tip #5: Prioritize Your CTAs

Here’s a simple rule-of-thumb to remember for your emails:

1:3 – One call-to-action, used at least three times.

In most cases, reducing the amount of actions or choices for someone to take actually increases conversions. So try to only focus on one major product, service or offer in each email if you can.

But what if you have A LOT of products or services?

Then prioritize your Call-To-Actions by visually emphasizing (or de-emphasizing) choices. Here’s a good example from Nordstrom:

They use bright, bold colors to grab your attention, large text to focus your attention, and smaller call-to-actions surrounding the main one. This attention to detail helps draw your eyes to the main “Final Clearance” box.

Tip #6: Incentivize the Action You Want

The best way to get people to take action and buy is with an incentive.

However the type of incentive you use depends on your business, products/services, and especially — your customers.

Discounts and two-for-one offers work well for commodities. But not for consultative sales.

Conversely, exclusive content and special access/ convenience work well when you have long sales cycles and complex products or services.

And be careful…

Because if you overuse and rely on the wrong incentive, it will actually hurt your company in the long run.

You’ll attract the wrong type of customer, erode your profit margins, and run your company into the ground.

Tip #7: Always Be Testing

Marketing is part art, part science.

And the truth is that no one really knows what’s going to work best. No one can predict the future.

So you should use the scientific method instead. Come up with a few hypothesis, and then test them.

For example, if you’re going to offer a discount, how do you know what headline or subject line to use? After all, your subject line is one of the most important parts of your email (more on that later).

So should you emphasize: “30% Sale”, or “$60 Off”?

You can run a simple split test on a small percentage of your group, and then send out the offer to the majority of your list with the winning subject line. Moreover, you can brainstorm different lines that work for your email with an AI-based subject line generator, and pilot different versions to kick off your holiday campaign.

Most major email marketing software and bulk email services will allow you to do this. I like (and recommend) Mailchimp, because it’s simply the best service for the price point. And they make this process extremely easy.

Here’s the general process you should use:

  1. Pick what you want to test (here, the Subject Line)
  2. Choose the sample size you want to test (recommend 10 – 20%)
  3. Select the winning criteria (here, the Open Rate)
  4. Choose a time frame (you’ll see a majority of the activity within 24 hours)

And here’s what it looks like:

Tip #8: Appeal to Emotional Triggers

Content is the heart of online marketing.

And you need to incorporate copywriting when it comes to the actual words you use. Because something can be written well, or “technically” correct, and still not inspire action.

That means your marketing messages, headlines, descriptions, and Calls-To-Action all need to focus on one of these two qualities:

  1. Immense value gained
  2. Pain of loss

For example, tests have shown that the word “Subscribe” is one of the worst converting words because it makes people think of commitment or purchasing something.

Instead, try focusing on the benefit someone will receive (e.g. “Get Instant Access”), or the cure for their pain (e.g. “Protect Your Family Today”).

Here’s how you identify those benefits…

Tip #9: Focus on Benefits and Outcomes

Repeat after me: “People don’t care about my company — they only care about themselves”.

This might be obvious, but most companies still struggle with it.

And it’s a huge mistake because your copy (or lack-there-of) has a BIG impact on conversions.

There’s an old phrase that says, “Facts tell, stories sell”. Now apply that philosophy to your own product and service descriptions.

Sure, people want to know what they get. But more importantly, they want to know what it does for them.

For example, how does your product or service:

  • Alleviate some well-known pain?
  • Protect them from common threats?
  • Provide them with a 10X ROI?
  • Improve their self image confidence?
  • Help them to “keep-up with the Jonses”, or better yet –
  • Be an innovator and stay ahead of the pack?

You need to find these emotional triggers that cause people to sit-up, pay attention, and take action.

Because people pay premium dollars for results and outcomes — not widgets and commodities.

Now translate these qualities in your marketing messages. And use them liberally in your email copy.

Think about how much clutter and junk your customers receive every day. Remember that you’re not just competing against direct competition, but also for your customers attention.

Which brings us to the next tip…

Tip #10: Headlines, Headlines, Headlines

Headlines are the Achilles’ Heel of the content you create.

This is especially true for your emails, because people scan the subject lines and make snap-judgments about which emails they’re going to open (and which to delete or hit Spam).

So taking the time to craft a winning headline is one of the best “low-hanging fruits” that will give you quick results.

Because a higher Open Rate means more awareness, which leads to more Click-Throughs, which means more potential revenue.

So… how do you create winning headlines?

Step One: Use the “emotional triggers” we identified in the last tip. What is the ultimate benefit or outcome each email you send is providing them? Remember to make these powerful, because you need to stand out from the competition.

Step Two: Create a few hypothesis and run some tests. We’ve already discussed how to run simple A/B tests for subject lines. But here’s another clue…

Use a URL shortener (like Bitly.com) to give you some click data. Now start testing different headlines with your Facebook or Twitter audience. By shortening links, not only do you present a cleaner, more shareable link, but you also gain the advantage of analyzing click-through rates, geographic data of the audience, and more. This data can further inform your content and headline strategies, ensuring that you’re always aligned with what your audience prefers.

Which ones typically get more clicks, and why?

After some simple experimentation, you’ll quickly identify several different “templates” that you can reuse repeatedly in the future.

Tip #11: Resend to Unopened

The average Open Rate for email marketing hovers somewhere between 15 – 30%.

So how do you reach the other 70 – 85% who didn’t open your email? Send it again!

Because unlike Facebook, you can repeatedly reach your email customers for free.

So copy or duplicate your existing campaign. And maybe try experimenting with different headlines that might catch people’s attention this time.

But one final point…

Open Rates actually aren’t very accurate. Email marketing tools use a tiny image pixel in each email. So if someone has images turned off, then the tracking pixel won’t open, and that person won’t register as an “open”.

So your actual Open Rate is generally under-reported. Which means there might be some overlap of customers when sending out campaigns more than once.

Tip #12: Segment Your Users

Sometimes it’s easier to send one email to everyone on your email list.

But you’ll often see better results if you can segment your subscribers and send them more targeted emails. Because the more you can personalize each email, the better response you’ll see.

This is obvious if you have different customer segments all together, that may be interested in different products and services.

But you can also take it one step further during the holidays.

If you have multiple locations, or your customers are concentrated in different areas, then use geographic segmenting to send personalized offers.

Everyone should also segment their list based on activity or engagement. So you can send different, targeted offers to people based on their engagement. Or you can simply send more to the people who’ve been clicking on your past campaigns.

If you’re sending a series of emails (like Tip #2), and you see that someone is opening and clicking on almost every single one, then you can feel more comfortable sending them follow-ups, or even special “last-chance” emails. Here’s an example using MailChimp again:

Tip #13: Remove Buying Friction

The main goal of your “transactional” emails are to increase sales. That’s it.

So the email itself needs to maximize click-throughs.

And then you need to reduce the friction that might prevent people from purchasing. Maybe that means reducing the number of steps someone needs to take to buy.

But there’s also a few common attributes that are preventing sales.

We already discussed how certain words can (and do) influence sales. Using the word “Subscribe” is bad because it has negative connotations, while using something like “Get Instant Access” will probably increase conversions.

The same holds true for increasing sales. Instead of “Buy Now”, tell your customers to “Get Started Today” or “Grab This ‘Look’ for the Holidays”.

Another hot button is shipping costs.

If you’re selling physical products, then offer free shipping. According to comScore, 47% of consumers said they would abandon a purchase if they found free shipping was not included. And in some cases, consumers actually value free shipping more than a discount.

Tip #14: Incorporate “Viral Hooks”

Contrary to popular belief, you can’t just make things “go viral”.

Sometimes it happens, and other times it doesn’t.

But you CAN try to manufacture virality by incorporating more viral hooks.

One of my favorite examples for tangible products are wishlists. Think about how this works…

You provide users the ability to easily save their favorite products, and then encourage them to share it via social networks or email.

For example, I never buy my wife clothes as a gift. I have a good idea of her style, but don’t feel confident enough to pick out something she would like.

But if she created a wishlist at her favorite store, and emailed it to me, then I probably would buy that because it’s easy and convenient (and men like easy and convenient gifts such as diamond earrings).

How can you incorporate viral hooks into your emails, that actually gives someone the reason to share it?

Figure that out, and you can start turning your customers into marketing ambassadors.

Tip #15: Be Data-Driven

Finally, the best online marketing is data-driven.

Which is refreshing, because you can put aside conventional wisdom, best practices, and political egos. All you have to focus on is what works, and discard what doesn’t.

But how do you know what’s working — or more importantly, why it’s working — if you aren’t tracking? (Or worse, tracking the wrong things.)

So… do you know:

  • Which of your marketing channels are most profitable?
  • Which are your best, most loyal customers?
  • How much you can afford to spend to acquire new customers?

Because tracking Open Rates and Click-Throughs is a good start…

But you also need to have a firm grasp on the things that count — like what’s driving revenue.

For example, if you sell services, then you need to make sure your CRM, Sales, and Email tools integrate seamlessly. Personally, I use FreshBooks for invoicing and accounting because (a) it’s awesome, (b) it’s simple, and (c) it integrates extremely well with other tools. So I can automatically keep track of where my leads are coming from — and how to improve my marketing accordingly.

If you sell products online, then you can use Mailchimp’s tool called eCommerce360. With it, you can track individual visits from email, track order information, and assign values to your subscribers.

Now you know which emails are generating revenue, and which aren’t.

But it doesn’t really matter which tools you use.

What matters is that you’re using simple techniques to accurately track where you’re doing well, where you’re falling short, and how to improve.

Then you can make good, informed marketing decisions that will actually work and pay for themselves in a matter of no time.

Conclusion

Countless studies have shown that email marketing is the best marketing channel for repeat visitors.

But in my personal experience working with clients in a variety of industries, it’s also the most underutilized. That translates into opportunities wasted, and money thrown down the drain.

So use these 15 tips as a guide, and think about how to apply them to each and every email you send this holiday season.

Because if you can master a few of these simple techniques, then you’ll begin to quickly see HUGE improvements.

But at the end of the day, it’s all about taking action. Choose one or two of these tips, set aside one uninterrupted hour, and get down to work. Measure, rinse, and repeat.

Or invest in yourself to get help and accelerate your business growth this holiday season.

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