Email marketing is crucial for achieving your ecommerce business goals and a must if you want to establish your online presence. Through email, you can reach your audience, start a relationship with them, and use that connection to promote your products.
It might sound like a no-brainer. Everyone knows how to write an email, right?
However, ecommerce email messaging is a different beast and it’s worth your while to learn the principles of effective ecommerce email marketing and how to apply them to your business.
That way you can engage your readers and convert them into customers without seeming pushy or salesy.
This article will take you step by step through the process of writing a great ecommerce email. Let’s dig in, shall we?
Steps to follow when writing an ecommerce email
- Have a single goal
- Segment and personalize your message
- Stick to your brand
- Write concisely
- Create an irresistible subject line
- Keep it short and sweet
- Ask a question or use an imperative
- Personalize
- Create urgency
- Use FOMO
- Offer a discount code
- Hold a limited-time sale
- Feature favorites and previously browsed items
- Make your CTA clear
- Proofread
- Keep the relationship going
Steps to follow when writing an ecommerce email
Have a single goal
Clarify the purpose of your ecommerce email before you write it. An email needs just one goal, otherwise, the reader will be overwhelmed or stop reading all the way through.
These are some examples of goals your email can have:
- Promote your products
- Announce new releases
- Ask the customer to fill out their profile
- Recover an abandoned cart
- Confirm a purchase
- Welcome new subscribers
- Give a gift or shopping guide
- Offer a discount
- Drive traffic to your blog
- Expose them to testimonials and other forms of social proof
Whatever goal you choose, stick to one and make sure the body of the email contributes to that single purpose.
Here’s an example from Outdoor Voices. The goal of this email is to get the reader to RSVP to their mini-marathon called Turkey Trot.
Subject: You're Invited: Turkey Trot + In-Store Shopping
Segment and personalize your message
No one likes receiving an email that isn’t relevant to them.
When you have a large audience, it’s a good practice to section them into categories and personalize your copy to each group. This increases the chances of your email being opened and will make your audience feel that your emails are made with them in mind.
Segment examples include new subscribers, repeat customers, geography, demographics, and whether they’ve opened your previous email or not.
This is an email coffee brand Fellow sends to shoppers who haven’t checked out their cart.
Subject: Check out with your kettle
Stick to your brand
Always consider your brand voice when creating any kind of marketing material. This applies to email campaigns as well.
Make sure your website, social media, and email communications are cohesive. It should sound like they came from the same person. That way, your emails won’t feel jarring to read and you can bolster your brand image further.
Things to pay attention to are vocabulary, writing style, voice, and tone.
The food brand Allplants always stays on-brand, keeping a casual and friendly tone in their marketing content.
Subject: Choices are hard
Subheading: We’ve made them easy
Write concisely
People don’t have enough time or interest to read long blocks of text so if you want to increase the chances of your email being read and acted on, keep it concise.
It helps to follow step one (have a single goal) and limit your content to that goal.
If you need to write a longer email, give your text some breathing room by dividing it into paragraphs with at most four sentences for each paragraph.
Differentiate each section of the email with visual cues such as lines or images. Make information more scannable by using bullet points and numbered lists.
Put yourself in your readers’ shoes: Will you want to read this email if it dropped into your inbox? Then adjust your content accordingly.
A great example of being brief in writing emails is Bite. They’re promoting their tongue scraper with this short yet effective email.
Subject: Better breath in one step.
Subheading: All about our new Tongue Scraper.
Create an irresistible subject line
The subject line is the most important part of your email, period.
It’s the biggest factor that determines whether your email will be opened or even read. That’s why you should spend as much time crafting a subject line that will bait your audience into opening the email.
How do you write a great, persuasive email subject line? Follow these tips.
Keep it short and sweet
Drive home your point clearly and succinctly.
The subject line is the worst place to inject filler into your copy because space is limited. Remember you’re competing for hundreds of other emails in your subscribers’ inboxes.
Ask a question or use an imperative
Questions trigger curiosity and make the reader more likely to open, if only to have that question answered.
Alternatively, you can use an imperative verb (“Check out our discount code”) to propel the reader into action.
Personalize
A recipient will be more likely to read an email if you address them by name and if the content is personalized to them. Avoid being salesy and impersonal.
Create urgency
Don’t underestimate the power of urgency when writing your subject lines.
Spur readers into action by announcing a limited-time offer. It’s hard to resist a subject line like this because it creates a feeling of scarcity and FOMO.
Take Girlfriend Collective as an inspiration for your subject lines. They use this email to advertise their fleece jackets.
Subject: NO CHILL
Subheading: Find your fleece
Use FOMO (Fear Of Missing Out)
Speaking of FOMO, this technique extends to the rest of the email, not just the subject line.
Motivate your readers to act now by making an urgent and irresistible offer that they won’t want to procrastinate on. Here are some ways to do this.
Offer a discount code
Treat them to a discount code that’s valid only for a few hours or days.
Hold a limited-time sale
Send an email to inform your audience about an upcoming or ongoing sale but tell them it’s only for a few days. Bonus points if you mention that stocks are limited and if you include a countdown.
Feature favorites and previously browsed items
Remind your shoppers about items they’ve browsed or left in their cart.
You’ve already established their interest in the product so following up will help persuade them to purchase.
You can also feature favorite items or bestsellers to tap into FOMO even more.
Have a look at this email from Ritual about their Black Friday limited-time offer. It encourages the readers to check out their sale by creating urgency around the discount.
Subject: The 40% off deal you’ve been waiting for
Make your CTA clear
Subject lines get your emails opened but a CTA will get emails acted upon so it’s important to craft CTAs carefully.
A CTA or call to action is just that, words that direct your reader to take action. For example, you might want them to check out your on-sale products. Your CTA can be “Shop Now” and should lead to the web page where those products are featured.
As shown in the example above, the CTA should be clear and actionable. What do you want your reader to do? Be specific. Instead of “shop our sale”, instead you can say “get 30% off”.
Your CTAs should also be emphasized through the design of the email so it’s easier for the reader to find.
You can never have enough (good) CTAs in an email. Distribute them throughout the email or better yet, have a stack of CTAs that lead your reader to the page they want to be on, as Uncommon Goods does here for their holiday gift guide. They also have a variety of actions to choose from.
Subject: Holiday gift guides are *here*
Subheading: Gifts for everyone. All in one place.
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Proofread
An email that’s ridden with typos and grammatical mistakes is not a good look for your ecommerce brand. It makes you seem unprofessional and like you sent the email without thinking it through.
Before you release your email to your list, make sure you proofread it. There are spellchecker and proofreading tools that will help polish your emails, often for free, so use them.
Keep the relationship going
It doesn’t end there. Keep in touch with your audience and make sure you are top of mind by sending regular emails.
The emails shouldn’t be overtly salesy, even though sales is the ultimate goal for most email campaigns. You should be like a friend that they’re happy to see in their inbox. Be memorable and valuable.
The pet brand Sundays likes keeping in touch with its subscribers through fun emails like the one below. It also encourages readers to visit their website and explore more content.
Subject: What kind of dog parent are you? 🐶
Subheading: Let's find out.͏
Final Thoughts
Writing an effective ecommerce email requires planning and careful execution. These are the basic points you can apply every time you write an ecommerce email.
Define the purpose of your email, craft compelling CTAs, and make your emails easy to read. Use tried and true tools like creating scarcity to drive the actions you want your readers to take. Lastly, proofread and make your email shine.
We hope this guide helps you with your ecommerce marketing efforts. Check our website for more content like this!
