Email journeys are essential to any business. In fact, email marketing still reigns supreme when it comes to making conversions. Though the term ’email journey’ may be new to you, if you check your inbox, I guarantee it’s full of emails from a specific journey. For example, automated welcome messages, free coupons, subscription messages, and more are all part of email journeys.
Creating an automated message that guides customers through various engagement steps and keeps them connected to your brand increases brand awareness and encourages overall brand engagement. Let’s discuss email automation and how certain email journeys can improve your customer outreach and help grow your business.
What Is Email Automation?
Email automation is an essential part of running a small business. However, it’s physically impossible for anyone to personally send out all customer engagement emails, which is where automation comes into play. Setting up automatic email journeys tied to certain customer triggers and milestones can show a commitment to customer service and keep your customers engaged throughout your sales journey.
Several ways exist to set up email automation; countless services offer these features. Finding the right email automation service comes down to combining the right features for your needs with the best cost ratio for your company. For example, a smaller company may not need the large-scale email features and expanded list size of some higher-paying plans, making it important to find email providers with different package options.
Thankfully, once you choose an email automation service, setting up email journeys is relatively simple as long as you understand the journeys essential to every business. Let’s look at some key email journeys every business needs and how they can drive customer engagement from the ground up.
Key Email Journeys for Your Business
There are three primary email journeys every business needs. These are:
- Welcome emails and incentives
- Abandoned cart reminders
- Post-purchase emails
While other email journeys may fit your business (especially for e-commerce-focused companies), these three options are a great place to start. Covering your sales funnel’s start, middle, and end with automated email journeys keeps your customers engaged throughout the process, ensuring a higher likelihood of follow-through and more satisfied customers.
Let’s look at these three primary forms of email journeys and how they serve your customers and your business.
Welcome Emails and Incentives
Have you ever found yourself signing up for an email list for a free PDF? What about a 10% off coupon or free shipping? These are excellent examples of welcome emails with incentives. They provide a service for your customers in the form of information or savings and welcome them to your brand identity.
Welcoming emails are best kept short and sweet, with a few links here and there to help direct customer attention. Things like links to social media accounts, interesting blog posts, or a sampling of top products or brand offerings can all make for a great welcome email.
With a welcoming email, try not to overwhelm your customers with too much information. Make sure to place the link or discount code somewhere further down the email, including useful information about your company, before offering the incentive.
Remember, your goal is to build brand recognition and connect with your customers, meaning offering just enough incentive to visit your social media accounts or purchase a product is perfect for a welcoming email journey.
Abandoned Cart Reminders
If you’ve ever tried online shopping, you’ve probably added an item to your cart and then forgot about it. This is where abandoned cart reminders come into play. These reminders work to redirect customer attention back to your website and products. Not only can you use them to reintroduce customers to the sales funnel, but you can also offer incentives for them to come back.
A great example of an abandoned cart strategy comes from Etsy. Say you’ve added the perfect set of mugs to your cart but leave the website before purchasing. Or, better yet, add them to your favorite list but have yet to buy them.
Etsy sends out emails with discount opportunities on favorited or cart items, encouraging you to not only make that purchase you were delaying but offering discounts at the same time. They also provide reminders for things that recently restocked or are about to go out of stock, directing customers back to their page for an impulse purchase.
While you don’t have to be as thorough with your abandoned cart messages as Etsy, having a push reminder for abandoned carts with a potential incentive to make the purchase can greatly impact your sales funnel success and lead to more customer engagement. At the very least, emails like these help absent-minded customers complete the checkout process, saving them the headache of realizing they never finished ordering that new item.
Post-Purchase Emails
Think of a post-purchase email as the closing slide of your presentation. This is where you connect with your customers, encourage them to connect with you, and offer them one last glimpse at your products before they leave the sales funnel. In addition, you should take the post-purchase email as a chance to plug social media and leave a positive customer impression before sending them on their way.
Post-purchase emails are a godsend for anxious customers wondering if their order went through. These serve as proof of purchase but can also act as a way to garner customer reviews and advertise products perfect for repeat purchasing.
You don’t have to work hard to create a unique post-purchase email. For example, automated email receipts are a great place to sneak in a link to your review page or add a few examples of products that work alongside the customer’s latest purchase.
A post-purchase email aims to remind customers about your brand and encourage them to share thoughts about the process. Of course, you can always incentivize customers to share their thoughts on social media using a hashtag or even create a giveaway tied to reviews (a strategy Walmart uses on many receipts). If used correctly, a simple 5% off coupon can increase your review count.
If you’re looking for more ways to grow your business, Planted Marketing is here to help. We offer specialized expertise for small- and mid-sized businesses, helping them grow their social media presence, streamline their e-commerce experience, and connect with customers. Contact us today to get started or to learn more about our process.
Planted Marketing is a full-service digital marketing agency that specializes in educational marketing and community building. We are experts at building email automation, email journeys, and writing newsletters that not only get opened but lead to sales! Want more info? Send us a message at info@plantedmarketing.com. Talk soon!
