AMB Interactive

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5 Email Marketing Lessons from Over a Decade in the Trenches

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Introduction

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In the world of digital marketing, trends come and go. With that said, email marketing has remained a steadfast and potent tool for engaging customers. To truly master this craft, you need more than just a catchy subject line. That's where AMB Interactive comes into the picture. 

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I’ve gained all kinds of valuable experience from being brand-side in eCommerce to leading one of the breakout agencies in the industry.  Fast forward to now, as the founder of a Klaviyo Elite Agency, I can confidently say I’ve earned the inside scoop.

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In this blog, I’ll uncover five invaluable email marketing lessons distilled from my decade-long experience, helping you supercharge your email campaigns. 

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1: Deliverability is Paramount

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My journey in email marketing began in 2015 when I joined forces with Klaviyo. Today, AMB Interactive has risen to elite partner status with Klaviyo, a testament to the expertise of our agency. 

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The real learning experience came when I inherited a colossal email list of 16 million subscribers. This massive undertaking exposed every conceivable challenge in email marketing, providing a wealth of knowledge moving forward.

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In email marketing, the mantra is clear: "sales cures all." And unless you’re landing in the inbox, you can’t generate sales.

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While having meticulously designed campaigns is essential, the ultimate test is customer engagement. From this perspective, it's the customer's actions, clicks, and conversions that matter the most. This approach hinges on letting the customer guide content decisions through their actions, revealing what they want and prefer to hear. 

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Avoid Mass Emailing

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Regarding deliverability, this lesson is simple but crucial: avoid mass emailing. Sending emails to your entire list may lead to severe repercussions, including getting trapped in Google's "black box" and experiencing rapid domain hits. 

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There’s a common misconception that more emails equate to more sales. In reality, it’s the power of better segmentation and personalization that ultimately enhances the overall effectiveness of email marketing. Even with an extensive email list, understanding your consumers, their behaviors, and preferences is the path to success.

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2: Conversion-Focused Designs are Critical

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After a decade in the field, I’ve learned that a strong, conversion-focused design is a non-negotiable cornerstone for every email.

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The design of your emails must be a top priority, and it's essential to work closely with your email marketing agency to get it right. The central goal is clear: to inspire clicks. While every brand's email experience is unique, some best practices stand out. For instance, having a call to action prominently displayed above the fold, ensuring your email isn't cluttered with excessive calls to action, making the content easy to read, and establishing a clear font hierarchy — these are all important elements.

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The Two-Second Challenge

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The modern email recipient has an incredibly short attention span. You have a mere two seconds to make a lasting impression. In those brief moments, your email must convey what it's about and why the recipient should keep reading. The advice boils down to this: design your emails with an immediate and unmistakable message that encourages the recipient to continue reading and, ultimately, click.

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In summary, the battleground of email marketing starts with an engaging design that beckons the recipient to take action. Conversion is at the heart of the game, and the design sets the stage. 

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3: Getting the Click Trumps All

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There are many ways to improve your business; however, clicks are the email marketing metric that reigns supreme. While many metrics are essential, I swear by keeping clicks as the primary focus.

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The more clicks an email generates, the more eyes you get on your website, and the more significant the potential for conversions. It's a straightforward equation – more clicks equals more sales.

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Additionally, there also needs to be an emphasis on the collaboration between marketing teams to make those clicks count. Analyzing the customer journey, optimizing landing pages, and ensuring that the path to purchase is as smooth as possible are all integral parts of the process.

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How can you get the audience to enjoy the experience and express interest by visiting the website? Every business should keep this question in mind – it’s a pivotal step toward nurturing leads and conversions. 

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Email marketing success hinges on working effectively together to drive users to the website, where they can learn more and, hopefully, make a purchase. So, when you assess your email marketing efforts, remember that it's not just about sending emails; it's about driving those crucial clicks. 

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4: Segment Your List Using the Right Metrics

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As a leading email marketing agency, it’s essential to keep evolving our strategies and adapting to changes in the digital landscape. As of late, one significant shift is how we now segment our email lists. 

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The traditional approach of segmenting email lists is commonly based on generic engagement metrics like opens; however, this method is now outdated. One of the key disruptors is Apple's Mail Privacy Protection (Apple MPP), which can affect the accuracy of open rates. To adapt to these changes, AMB Interactive has introduced a more granular approach to segmentation.

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Instead of solely focusing on opens and clicks, AMB Interactive employs various metrics to gauge customer engagement. This includes tracking activities beyond email interactions, such as customer visits to your website, product views, and progress in the checkout process. Additionally, the recency of email creation (when the subscriber joined the list) plays a role in determining how willing a customer might be to make a purchase.

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Additionally, when customers have yet to engage with your emails for an extended period, it's crucial to develop personalized strategies to re-engage them. Basic personalization can be effective for those who have previously purchased but need a reminder. Still, a more tailored approach may be necessary to reconnect with less active customers.

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The Bottom Line

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The era of basic engagement segments is behind us, replaced by a more nuanced approach. Modern email marketers need to consider a wide range of metrics to segment their audience and reinvigorate their email marketing strategies effectively. By staying adaptable and open to these changes, we can continue to thrive in the ever-evolving world of email marketing.

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5: Track the Metrics That Move the Needle

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To end our journey of email marketing lessons on a critical note, let’s talk tracking. Track the metrics that truly impact your bottom line. It’s not about getting caught up in the percentage game but rather focusing on the right metrics that enhance the customer experience and drive revenue.

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Here’s a metric that often gets overlooked but can significantly impact your business: the time it takes for a customer to make a second purchase. Reducing the time between orders can lead to higher customer lifetime value (LTV) and, ultimately, higher revenue. This approach enables you to invest more effectively in top-of-funnel strategies.

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Regarding the common obsession with last-click attribution, know that it’s not always your email that gets the final credit for a conversion. Customers often go through multiple touchpoints before making a purchase. The focus should shift toward understanding the overall customer experience and how different channels and touchpoints contribute to the final conversion.

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To better understand your customers and conversions, tracking clicks is pivotal. Sending an email that generates high email-attributable revenue may seem like a success. However, if it had an abysmal click-through rate, it might not have been as effective as it appeared. More clicks generally mean more revenue. This is a straightforward yet effective way to measure the impact of your email campaigns.

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Rather than fixating on percentages, focusing on these crucial metrics ensures your email campaigns genuinely move the needle and contribute to the success of your brand.

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Conclusion

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With these five invaluable email marketing lessons, you now have a better sense of how to enhance your email marketing strategies and drive better results. 

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Want to receive excellent email marketing guidance and expertise straight from the source? Contact AMB Interactive today to set up a consultation.

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In the meantime, stay tuned for more expert insights on digital marketing and strategies that can help your business succeed. 

Minimize Time Between Purchases, Scale Faster, and Create More Satisfied Customers

How to Transform Email/SMS Non-Purchasers into Long-Term, Multi-Purchase Customers

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Do you dream of building a brand that stands completely on its own, steadily and dramatically building revenue while your customer base rises exponentially? 

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The undeniably fastest way to do this is to turn your non-purchasers and one-time purchasers into lasting customers who implicitly trust your brand (and continually buy your products.)

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Through my vast and varied experience working with DTC brands, I’ve found several fail-safe strategies that match the needs of today’s consumers. In this blog, I share the ones I find the most imperative in today’s market, helping you to build your ideal customer base. 

Create a Strategy for How Your Email and SMS Work Together

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If you’re making the mistake of seeing email and SMS as one combined mechanism, you’re essentially pushing away TONS of consumers who would otherwise be interested in your product. 

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I see this error time and time again. Brands will send the same email and SMS at the same time and simply hope for the best. What they should be doing is creating a systematic orchestration that allows email and SMS to work together harmoniously. This balancing act gently piques the interest of a variety of consumers, allowing brands to reach ideal audiences without being abrasive. 

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With this method, the information gained from the first send informs the following steps. For example, if someone has already engaged, they won’t need to receive that same campaign. However, if they didn’t initially click on the SMS, a follow-up email is a sound call.

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Create a dance between email and SMS, and you’ll keep your costs low and revenue high while providing an exceptional customer experience. This allows you to create more opportunities for engagement without overwhelming your customers. 

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Optimize Your Email Campaigns to “Get the Click”

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Before you continue to spend time and money optimizing the wrong elements in your emails, recenter your priorities around the click. 

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Optimizing email designs specifically for clicks is CRUCIAL for DTC brands. However, there’s a delicate challenge at play - your content should remain authentic and free of cheap gimmicks. 

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How do you do this? By providing an exceptional experience to users. For a DTC brand, forming a fantastic experience means minimizing frustration as much as possible. Your customer should immediately be able to move through your email design with ease and interest, clicking through as a means of exploration.

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Focus on the click power of aesthetic elements and personalization options, and you’ll instantly appeal to the users you’re trying to hook. After all, humans are visual creatures. If your email designs are enticing enough to catch the eye, users will be curious enough to click. 

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These days, most consumers expect a curated shopping experience. Give the customers what they want, and you’ll also improve your deliverability rates massively. Plus, you can then use this personalized data to optimize your emails and business even further!

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Hone In On The Post-Click Experience

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Zooming in on initial clicks is an old-school approach. Everything you want to know and can actually use is found in the post-click data. 

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Put yourself in the shoes of your potential customers, asking questions like, “What’s causing people to view products on my site? What prompted them to start the checkout process?” It should go without saying, but truly understanding what leads your customers to purchase is a total game-changer. 

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Consumers buy products with a problem in mind that they want to solve. What problem does your brand solve? How do you meet the needs of your audience? Lean into this thinking. The post-click data will tell you why consumers stay on your site, thus inspiring new ideas on how to secure those taps and improve your click-through rate. 

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The post-click experience is extremely important because it allows people to navigate to where they want to be and drive the experience leading to a purchase. Essentially, this is how you find the “why” behind a purchase.

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Securing sales is great; but, ideally, you want people to come back to your site and become repeat customers. From there, you can quickly and efficiently scale. 

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Use Zero-Party Data to Personalize Your Email and SMS 

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Drive revenue for your DTC store by improving personalization elements in your email and SMS. It can easily be done through zero-party data!

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My first tip for collecting zero-party data is to integrate a pop-up experience on your website. Through a quiz, survey, or different types of personal engagement, you can easily learn what the consumer is most interested in regarding your DTC brand.

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Another improvement can be gained through updating profile information based on purchased products. The instant someone makes a purchase, create a simple automated flow where you only update their data based on what they bought. You’ll then know exactly what they’re looking for moving forward. 

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Emails that allow consumers to shop by size, color, or any other specific category are highly engaging and bring about valuable data, thus allowing for future personalization. The more you learn about the consumer and what they’re interested in, the more opportunities for segmentation and personalized experiences there are. 

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Collecting zero-party data doesn’t have to be expensive or labor-intensive. Put the consumer’s experience at the forefront, and you’ll ultimately drive massive revenue for your business. 

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Build Your Campaign Strategy Around Personalization

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To compound on the above points, consumers crave a personalized experience. For one, it makes them feel valued and appreciated by the brand. Two, it makes their shopping process both easier and more enjoyable. If you aren’t already keyed into the impact of personalization in your campaign strategy, now is the time to kick it into gear. Here’s how!

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Integrations that allow customers to shop by size, color, or another specific category are easy to implement and immediately bring about more clicks. Additionally, this helps customers form a relationship with the brand, as they can see how their own identity is supported within it. 

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As a brand, you need to always center your focus around the value you’re providing or the problem you can solve. Time and attention are limited; it’s imperative to create attention-grabbing emails that spark interest by appealing DIRECTLY to each customer. 

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To provide contrast, here’s what you DON’T want to do in your email campaigns:

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Cast a wide net that forces consumers to find their ideal products on their own. Generic campaigns typically lack interest, value, or appeal. With these, you run the risk of being unhelpful or even annoying to your customers. 

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Remember, consumers want to shop - that’s why they subscribed in the first place. Make it a fun experience full of personalization and discovery, and you’ll soon see improved clicks, massive revenue growth, and a much higher retention rate. 

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What is the #1 Strategy to Improve Retention from the 1st to 2nd Purchase?

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My last point (for now): The biggest thing brands can do to get from purchase #1 to purchase #2 is to have an amazing post-purchase flow. 

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Building a customer base doesn’t only happen through pushing sales; it happens with care, consideration, and smart timing after the purchase. Brands should be as excited about providing an amazing customer experience after the fact as getting that initial buy-in - for several reasons. 

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By prioritizing the overall experience of your customers post-click, you’ll naturally improve your customer retention rate while gaining priceless data about their experience of the product. Get to know your customers post-purchase, and you’ll then understand how to grab their interest in the future and create systems to support this strategy. 

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In today’s digital world, transactional channels are an excellent tool for staying in touch with customers while offering support and gathering data. 

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At AMB Interactive, we use tools like Wonderment to send timely notifications according to when the product was delivered, when a similar product comes back in stock, etc. By creating a transactional channel delivering useful information in perfect timing, customers seamlessly develop a relationship with their purchased product and the brand at large. 

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Case Study: Black Wolf Nation Cuts the Time Between Purchases from 60 Days to 31 Days 

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If you want to minimize the time between purchases, scale faster, and create more satisfied customers, we have a real-life example of how to do exactly that. 

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At AMB Interactive, we were able to cut this period in half for Black Wolf Nation, down from 60 days to 31 days. To achieve this, we focused entirely on the post-purchase experience. By delivering a great post-purchase experience, Black Wolf Nation’s customers immediately felt cared for and supported by the brand, causing them to go from tentative purchasers of one product to long-term fans of the entire collection. 

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To start, we implemented Wonderment into their post-purchase strategy. Through this integration, we were able to immediately know when each customer received their order. From there, we knew when to reach out about how to use the product or cross-sell products that could be useful in their new skincare routine. 

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The other priority we brought into the post-purchase experience was truly showcasing the problem/solution of why they bought that initial product in the first place. With Black Wolf Nation being a skincare company, this was an obvious necessity for us. Customers began to use the product regularly and saw improvement in their skin. 

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The key takeaway: This new post-purchase experience required Black Wolf Nation to stick by its customers during a formative process. It was through this support and consistency that customers started developing loyalty and trusting the brand implicitly. 

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Conclusion

In conclusion, taking your brand to its full potential can be a surprisingly seamless, cost-effective, and fast process with the right strategies. Just by reading this article, you’re already much closer to better business practices and massive brand growth! 

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Want experts by your side during your big shift? AMB Interactive offers the tools and support you need to turn your brand into its absolute best version.