Essence of Email Weekly - Get ready for the holidays with an email success checklist!

On November 5th, together with Omnisend and Justuno, we will discuss email marketing and how you can make an impact on revenue this holiday season.

We will review five items on our 2020 holiday email success checklist and discuss the best practices that will help you plan and execute your holiday campaigns with ease.

Join in to hear about SMS marketing, campaigns, automations, and much more. Can't make it? Register to receive the recording!

Sign up here.



ECOMMERCE


Boo! Shoppable videos are coming to TikTok



TikTok announced its new global partnership with eCommerce platform Shopify enabling merchants to reach a younger audience and drive sales through "shoppable" video ads.

How will it work?

Merchants will get a chance to create native and shareable content that will speak directly to the community of TikTok users. When they select the products they would like to promote, video ads will automatically be generated and appear in a TikTok user's video feed. The ads will then drive customers to Shopify for checkout.

What's important for the merchants is that they will be able to target their audience based on gender, age, behavior, and preferred video category. And sure enough, the performance and conversations driven by this advertising will be easily trackable with the use of the 'TikTok Pixel' tool. The costs of the campaigns will vary based on the business objectives of each particular merchant.

The new TikTok channel for Shopify merchants is already available in the U.S. and will be rolled out to other markets next year.

+ While we're here

Shopify wasn't the first company to recognize TikTok's potential as a new type of shopping platform. Walmart was in negotiations to buy a 7.5% stake in the social media app.

Walmart CEO, Doug McMillon, told CNBC earlier this month: "If you're watching a TikTok video and somebody's got a piece of apparel or an item on it that you really like, what if you could just quickly purchase that item? It's intriguing to us, and we would like to be part of it." However, the current status is still up in the air due to the ongoing TikTok lawsuit that depends on the outcome of the upcoming presidential election.



EMAIL PERSONALIZATION


Personalize your costumes - and your emails



Personalization has been a buzzword in marketing for a while now, and the report from Bluecore proves that it's still more than relevant.

The reason is clear: "Email is the most powerful channel for any digital retail marketer. Time and again, email has confirmed its ability to help retailers double down on highly personalized, people-based marketing efforts, all while maintaining stringent new privacy standards," said the report authors.

What's new to personalization is that automated, AI-driven workflows are the way to go. New technology helps identify customer behaviors and recognize the products they engage with or are likely to engage with in the future. Combined with a trigger, you can create and automate a hyper-personalized message for a selected audience.

The stats are also cheering for personalized emails: Retailers using personalized emails saw a 142% increase in revenue compared to ones using only static, one-time sends.

Plus, they've also seen a 135% increase in conversions from one-time buyers for retailers who send 10+ personalized emails.

Here are some other findings from the report:

1. High spenders have higher conversion rates, are more likely to engage with emails, and are less likely to unsubscribe.
   
2. It's better to focus on existing customers rather than one-time buyers. For comparison, there's a 53% chance that those who have purchased from a brand six times will purchase again, while for one-time buyers the likelihood of an additional purchase is only 18%.
   
3. Emails with a high sense of urgency have the highest click-through rates (price decrease (10.57%), back in stock (9.32%), and low inventory messaging (7.41%)) and click-to-open rates.

Check out the full Bluecore report for more conclusions and gripping stats (you'll need to fill out a short form to download the report).



EMAIL MARKETING


Unless it's candy, more is not always better



Showing your readers some love doesn't mean you have to create a touchy-feely copy. Sometimes, smart planning and listening to your audience can do the trick. This is what Later, an Instagram marketing platform, implemented in their email marketing strategy.

The backstory: As the pandemic hit earlier this year, Later noticed a significant spike in people opting in for their twice-a-week newsletter. This would be awesome if the unsubscribe rates didn't also go up.

That's when they decided to make some three-step changes to their newsletter.

First, when they found out email fatigue was one of the reasons for the rising number of opt-outs, they reduced their sending frequency to once a week to let their subscribers breathe. The lower frequency gave Later more time to see how different audiences interacted with the template, which then inspired them to redesign their newsletter to provide more value. The final step was segmentation. The content was segmented for the three main audience groups of the newsletter: leads, free, and paid.

The results? Later saw an increase of 78% in the open rate for leads, 127% for free, and 43% for paid. Click rates also skyrocketed for every group with 94%, 211%, and 165% increases respectively.

Showing your subscribers care doesn't have to be through words; you have to listen and anticipate their needs. This is how Naomi West puts it: "It's putting yourself in your users' shoes, acknowledging external circumstance, looking at the data you have and making inferences that will provide value to your users without their explicitly asking for it."

You can learn more about the Later case on MediaPost.



EMAIL DESIGN INSPO


Too serious to spook



Halloween emails don't always have to be spooky or fangtastic (yes, we couldn't resist this pun). Sometimes, Halloween can just be a good reason to talk about some serious stuff in a more relaxed and fun way.

That's exactly what LendingTree did in their email. They intrigued the reader with the subject line then surprised them with a dark, Halloween-themed design and a very to the point and grave copy.

Why we like it: LendingTree didn't go overboard with something that would feel unnatural to their brand. Instead, they kept it serious for their fairly serious topic of debt. Plus, they added a few neatly designed elements and dark background, along with a couple of more relaxed and witty pieces of copy to get their readers' attention.

What can we say, they are definitely creepin' it real!