Are you a business owner or a marketer, who manually sends all your email campaigns (welcome, onboarding, promotional, rewards & loyalty, etc.) to your subscribers?
If yes, you are simply wasting your valuable time that could be better spent on growing your business. Thinking, why are we saying this?
We understand that it’s important to stay connected with your prospects and customers. But, let’s be real – manually sending out email campaigns each time can be a real drag!
So, why do it manually when there is a much better solution? Yes, its – “email automation” which will help you send personalized and automated emails to the right people at the right time.
Here are some stats that clearly demonstrate the importance and effectiveness of email automation-
- According to Epsilon Email Institute, automated emails have an open rate of 45.7%, compared to non-automated emails, which have an open rate of 18.8%.
- 80% of marketing automation users witnessed improvement in lead generation, and 77% see more conversions.
- Marketing automation tools boost productivity by almost 20%.
- According to Salesforce, businesses that use automation for lead nurturing saw a 451% increase in qualified leads.
Now you must be convinced about the importance of email automation, but if you still have any doubt, read this post till the end to know why it is a significant part of email marketing.
In this guide, we’ll take a deep dive into email automation for eCommerce businesses. We’ll explore the benefits of automating your emails, show you how to set up automated campaigns, and give you the best email marketing practices to optimize your email strategy.
So let’s dive in!
What is email automation?
Email automation is an invaluable email marketing tool that involves the process of sending timely triggered emails to subscribers, based on their behavior, actions, and funnel stage (awareness, interest, consideration, decision, and loyalty. It helps in converting subscribers into paying customers.
With email automation, it becomes possible to send personalized, real-time messages that help to nurture leads and boost customer engagement, retention, and loyalty. Moreover, email automation allows for automated email responses to user activity, such as sending a welcome email when a customer signs up for a mailing list, a confirmation email on completing a transaction, and triggering an abandoned cart email when a user leaves their shopping cart without making a purchase.
Still, wondering why email automation is a crucial part of email marketing strategy? Check below the stats which are pretty convincing.
According to HubSpot Blog Research, 2021, 77% of marketers have seen an increase in email engagement over the last one year. 87% of B2C marketers use automation as an important part of their email marketing strategy.
Start your Email Marketing journey with SendBuzz now & increase your engagement
How does the email automation tool work?
Email automation helps marketers to design automated email workflows for every email marketing campaign. But how does it actually work?
Each email automation tool works differently, but the basic flow can be illustrated in a step-by-step breakdown. Let’s quickly understand-
- Data Collection
First of all, email automation tools collect important data related to user behavior, such as website visits, buying history, and email engagement. This data is used to gain insights into customer preferences, interests, and behaviors.
- Trigger Points
Email automation tools use trigger points to automate campaigns based on specific user actions. These actions include signing up for a mailing list, making a purchase, or abandoning their cart.
- Segmentation
Email automation tools analyze users’ demographics, purchase history, or engagement level and segment email lists accordingly. This helps businesses to target the right audience with the right message, resulting in higher engagement and conversions.
- Personalization
Once the segmented list is prepared, these tools create personalized messages for the specific trigger and segmentation. These include product recommendations, exclusive offers, or other personalized messages which make each email message more relevant and engaging to the user.
- Automated Email Sending
Email automation tools automate the email-sending process. This saves time and resources and ensures that each email is delivered to the right audience at the optimal time.
- Tracking and Analysis
Email automation tools can also track campaign performance metrics such as email open rates, click-through rates, and conversions. It further helps businesses to optimize future campaign performance.
Most popular types of email automation with examples
Certainly, there are numerous ways to use email automation for your email marketing campaign. Let’s take a look at some examples of how email automation can be used for different types of businesses for various purposes.
Welcome email
A welcome email can be an effective way to engage with your website visitors who have shown interest in your services or products. Although they may not be ready to make a purchase quickly, welcome emails are a great way to provide them value and get them interested in your products.
Businesses can take advantage of email automation to send welcome emails to prospects who tend to actively engage with these messages.
Lead nurture series
Lead nurturing drip campaigns can be particularly effective for online stores. By guiding shoppers through each stage of the sales cycle, businesses can drive them toward a purchase.
According to HubSpot research, 96% of visitors to your website are not yet prepared to make a purchase. However, as they have already shown interest in your product or service by visiting your site, they can be great candidates for continued communication to encourage a purchase later on.
By using an email automation tool, you can create a series of lead-nurturing emails or drip campaigns that remind people about your brand on a regular basis.
Cart abandonment emails
According to research, almost 70% of eCommerce shoppers abandon their shopping carts before making a purchase. Customers compare prices and deals across multiple websites before making a final decision and this is the reason for the high drop-off rate.
To improve long-term customer retention and recover potentially lost sales, businesses can utilize abandoned cart emails. This is where email automation can be helpful for businesses to get their almost-lost customers back.
Birthday emails
Automated emails can be set up to send on special occasions such as birthdays and anniversaries of customers. These emails are scheduled to go out on a specific date each year to send personalized greetings and offer to celebrate the occasion.
Follow-up mail after purchase
Sending a post-purchase email is a great way for businesses to express gratitude to their customers and ensure that they are satisfied with their purchase.
This also provides an opportunity for businesses to gather feedback on the customer experience and identify areas for improvement, which can ultimately help them enhance their products or services and build long-term customer loyalty.
Businesses can schedule post-purchase emails to send automatically soon after a customer makes a purchase. This not only saves time but also ensures that the customer receives the email in a timely manner.
Re-engagement emails
People have diverse preferences and opinions that can change frequently. Thus, it’s common for customers to forget about your brand and switch to a competitor.
That’s where re-engagement emails can help in reminding customers of your product’s quality and value proposition, which can reignite their interest and loyalty. Businesses can save time and resources by automating the process of sending re-engagement emails reminders of why they initially chose to purchase from your website and encourage them to return for future purchases.
Reward and loyalty emails
Email automation can be a powerful tool for sending reward and loyalty emails to customers. By leveraging automation, businesses can easily keep track of customer purchases and reward them with targeted offers and personalized messages.
For example, businesses can use automation to send out personalized offers to customers who have reached a certain purchase threshold or have been with the company for a certain period of time.
Revolutionize your marketing: The game-changing benefits of email automation
Running a business involves numerous tasks that demand your attention, and sending emails is among the most time-consuming and exhausting ones. Compiling an email list and crafting individualized messages for hundreds or thousands of clients can be a laborious and prolonged process.
However, email marketing is profitable as each dollar spent on it can generate a substantial return on investment. Automated emails also tend to have higher click-through rates, making them a more efficient marketing strategy.
Email automation allows you to efficiently manage email campaigns and save valuable time and energy. However, the benefits of email automation extend beyond time-saving.
Let’s explore other ways in which your business can increase conversion and revenue.
Personalization
Studies have consistently demonstrated that consumers love personalization in marketing:
- 72% of consumers state that they will only engage with personalized messaging.
- 90% of consumers find tailored marketing content to be very or somewhat appealing.
This is one of the key benefits of email automation that enables businesses to segment their email list based on various criteria such as demographics, behavior, and engagement levels.
You can create personalized email automation in SendBuzz based on users’ purchase history, interests, age, location, gender, and job title. With the help of this incredible email automation tool, you can send more targeted and relevant emails to each segment, resulting in higher engagement rates, increased customer loyalty, and better customer experience.
Improves customer retention
Retaining existing customers is often more efficient and cost-effective than acquiring new ones, and email automation can be a valuable tool for businesses to achieve this goal.
By automating personalized email campaigns, businesses can stay in touch with their customers more effectively and build stronger relationships with them over time.
Businesses can use automated email to engage with their customers at every step of their journey and keep them informed about new products, promotions, and offers that are tailored to their specific interests and preferences.
Let’s understand it with an example-
Let’s say a small cafe wants to improve its customer retention rates using email automation. They set up an automated email campaign that sends a personalized message to customers on their birthday, offering them a free drink on their special day.
This simple but effective email campaign can help keep customers engaged and coming back for more, ultimately driving more revenue for the coffee shop.
Improves team efficiency
Sending manual emails can be a time-consuming process, especially for sales teams who must be in constant contact with their leads.
Email automation can be a game-changer for these teams, enabling them to schedule emails at the right time to maximize the chances of a successful sale. By automating sales emails, your team can focus their energy on closing deals and fostering stronger customer relationships, rather than getting bogged down in the details of email scheduling and tracking. With email automation, your sales team can work smarter, not harder.
Helps in re-engaging lost customers
With email automation, you can set up specific triggers to send targeted messages to those who haven’t opened or engaged with your emails in a while. Maybe they need a reminder to understand the value of the product or service you provide, or perhaps they’re just waiting for the right offer to come along.
Whatever the case may be, automated re-engagement emails can help bring them back into the fold. Use email automation to give them a push and reignite their interest in what your business has to offer.
Cost-effectiveness
Email automation allows businesses to reach a larger audience without having to allocate a massive marketing budget. Email marketing doesn’t require additional costs such as printing or distribution fees. With email automation, you can easily create, customize and send out hundreds of emails to your subscribers with just a few clicks.
Boost ROI
Email automation can help businesses to achieve better ROI by allowing them to send more targeted and personalized messages to their subscribers, which can result in high open and click-through rates.
It helps to automate repetitive tasks, allowing businesses to save time and resources that can be used on other important aspects of their operations. Additionally, email automation can help to increase customer retention and re-engagement which leads to an increased customer lifetime value and improved revenue.
Email automation best practices to maximize your email marketing impact
Email marketing platforms can be a valuable asset for businesses across various industries. Nevertheless, it’s crucial to use email automation best practices to increase open and click-through rates.
Nowadays, consumers are bombarded with numerous commercial messages, so sending irrelevant ones can be unfavorable for your business.
Here are some of the best email automation practices-
Confirmation email
It’s a good practice to send a confirmation or welcome email when someone subscribes to your newsletter or fills out a contact form. A confirmation email lets them know that their signup has been received successfully.
When you send a welcome email to your customers or subscribers, it’ll help to establish a positive and nurturing relationship with them. These initial emails are a great opportunity to introduce your brand’s personality and provide additional value such as links to exclusive content or other useful resources.
Keep the time zones in mind
If you’re a marketer, you must be aware that the majority of emails are opened within the first 24 hours of receipt.
A study by GetResponse found that the highest percentage of email opens occurs within the first hour of delivery, with 23.63% of all opens. After 24 hours, the open rate decreases significantly.
Thus, to ensure your emails are opened, it’s essential to identify the best time to send them. Consider your contacts’ time zones and analytics data to determine the optimal time to send emails to them.
Analyzing research from email automation tools like Sendbuzz to know the effective day and time to send emails can give you a great start to your email marketing campaign and improve results.
Segment contacts
Personalizing emails is a proven practice to enhance open rates, click-through rates (CTR), and overall engagement. This can be better achieved by segmenting contacts based on their geographic location, interests, behavior, purchase history, and other attributes.
By doing this, you can send targeted and personalized emails that are more relevant and valuable to your recipients.
For instance, sending an email about your upcoming event in Sydney only to contacts living in Sydney is more effective than sending it to every contact on your database.
Timing is key!
When planning your email campaigns, it’s crucial to consider the timing of your emails. To maximize your email campaign’s impact, ensure you space them out effectively and send them at the best possible time for your customers.
This holds great importance when sending a series of emails, as each recipient should be given enough time to make an impact before sending the next.
Consider the most relevant and valuable contacts
This is one of the best email automation practices to improve the effectiveness of your email automation in converting leads and driving sales.
When running email automation, focus on relevant and valuable contacts to maintain and improve high open and click-through rates, user engagement, and conversion rates. Instead of adding any contacts to your database, consider implementing a double opt-in process to ensure that you only have contacts who are genuinely interested in hearing from you.
This weeds out contacts who may not be interested or who may have lost interest with time. To maintain an engaged and active database, consider periodically displaying opt-in boxes to unresponsive contacts.
Unsubscribe/opt-out made easy
This is a key aspect of respectful email marketing. Make sure that your subscribers have the freedom to unsubscribe easily whenever they want. It’s essential to respect their time and decisions. When your users no longer want to receive your emails, don’t make it a hassle for them. This way, they don’t mark you as spam to avoid your emails.
Besides, having a high-quality database of contacts is crucial. By targeting only the most interested, high-value, and relevant audiences, you can reduce the risk of losing subscribers and email reputation.
Try to think beyond sales
Email marketing doesn’t have to be solely focused on sales. Flooding your audience with constant sales pitches can come across as pushy and spammy. Instead, focus on providing real value to your email recipients through educational and entertaining content.
While personalizing your email, it’s still important to include a call-to-action, the key objective shouldn’t always be to make a sale or get a download.
By prioritizing the needs and interests of your audience, you can foster stronger relationships and trust with them, ultimately leading to more conversions in the long run.
Testing is essential
If you want error-free automated emails, test them before sending them. By doing so, you’ll be able to identify broken links, images, and tracking tags before the email is sent, which prevents any negative impact on your email’s performance.
Popular email automation tools offer spam testing features that automatically check your email messages against major spam filters and prevent them to be flagged as spam. These tools also give actionable advice on how to rectify them.
What are the different email automation tools?
Mailchimp
It’s a user-friendly email marketing platform that provides a range of tools to design, send, and track email campaigns. Create and automate targeted email campaigns, build landing pages, and manage subscriber lists using this email automation tool.HubSpot Marketing Automation Software
An all-in-one marketing automation software that has everything to manage email marketing, lead generation, social media, and analytics. HubSpot is highly suitable for B2B businesses with high-value leads and a requirement for detailed reporting.ActiveCampaign
A marketing automation platform that combines email marketing, CRM, and sales automation in an all-in-one system. It provides you with more than 135 triggers and actions, which allows users to create highly-effective marketing sequences that incorporate various communication channels such as email, SMS, push notifications, and site messages.SendBuzz : Multichannel Marketing Automation
It is a multichannel outreach tool that offers a range of features to streamline the email sales and marketing process for businesses. With SendBuzz, you can easily create and send targeted email campaigns, automate follow-up emails, and track engagement metrics to measure the effectiveness of your campaigns.Campaign Monitor
Campaign monitor is an email marketing platform that allows you to create and send professional-looking emails, manage subscribers and track email campaign performance. Its drag-and-drop email builder, email automation, and real-time reporting features allow you to improve your email marketing efforts.Constant Contact
Constant Contact offers a range of automation features that make email marketing easier for businesses. The marketing platform simplifies the marketing process by providing triggers for welcome messages and drip email campaigns that are based on customers’ behavior on your website. This enables you to automate and streamline your marketing efforts, sending customized messages that engage your customers and encourage them to take action.Omnisend
Omnisend is a top-rated email automation software that specializes in eCommerce marketing. The platform enables brands to manage their marketing campaigns across multiple channels, including email, SMS, push notifications, and more.SendGrid
SendGrid is a powerful email automation platform that allows you to create and send automated emails to your target audience. With SendGrid, businesses can increase engagement, personalize conversations, and improve conversion rates. Whether you’re looking to welcome new subscribers, promote new products/services, or re-engage with old customers, SendGrid helps to create effective email campaigns that drive results.GetResponse
GetResponse is an all-in-one email automation tool that helps businesses to grow their audience, engage with customers, and increase online sales. With its inclusive suite of tools, GetResponse makes online marketing both easy and effective. From email marketing to landing pages and webinars, this tool provides everything businesses need to streamline their marketing efforts and achieve their goals.AWeber
As one of the top email automation tools available, AWeber offers a comprehensive set of features for creating mailing lists, designing newsletters, automating email marketing, and analyzing campaign statistics. With detailed analytics and reporting tools, businesses can track their email campaign’s success and make data-driven decisions to optimize their marketing strategy.There are numerous email automation tools available in the market beyond the few mentioned here. The question may arise of how to select the optimal one for your needs.
GetResponse is an all-in-one email automation tool that helps businesses to grow their audience, engage with customers, and increase online sales. With its inclusive suite of tools, GetResponse makes online marketing both easy and effective. From email marketing to landing pages and webinars, this tool provides everything businesses need to streamline their marketing efforts and achieve their goals.
How to find the right email automation tool?
With a different and varied email automation tool at your disposal, it can be overwhelming to determine the best fit for your business. However, worry not; we are here to guide you in selecting the ideal email automation tool for your specific requirements.
When it comes to selecting the ideal marketing automation tool for your business, there are several factors to consider. Here are some tips to help you make an informed decision:
Define your needs and goals
Before you start evaluating different marketing automation tools, define what are your needs and what you want to achieve with the tool. Identify the processes and tasks you want to automate and the goals you want to accomplish.
You need to consider the following-
- Is customer segmentation necessary for your marketing campaigns?
- Will you be communicating through multiple channels or solely relying on email?
- Do you require CRM software with email automation functionality as well?
- How many team members will have access to the marketing automation tool?
Once you are clear about your specifications, understand each tool in depth and compile a list of the tools that provide the same.
Consider your budget
It’s important to keep in mind that the most expensive marketing automation tool doesn’t necessarily equate to the best fit for your business. By fixing a budget and considering tools within that range, you can find a solution that not only meets your needs but also fits your financial constraints.
Evaluate features
Look for tools that offer the features and functionality you require. Consider whether you need basic automation or more advanced features like lead scoring, integration with third-party applications, or reporting. By doing so, you can avoid paying for unnecessary features and get a tool that meets your specific requirements.
Check ease of use
Ensure that the automation tool you choose is user-friendly and easy to navigate. You don’t want to invest in a tool that is difficult to use and requires a lot of training.
Browse through product review sites
Checking product review websites can be an excellent strategy to discover the most suitable software for your business needs. These platforms offer insightful customer reviews and opinions from industry professionals, which can assist you in narrowing down your options and making an informed decision.
Check for customer support
Look for tools that offer reliable customer support, such as live chat, phone support, or email support. These resources can be invaluable in helping you resolve issues quickly and efficiently.
Check what other companies are using
Checking which email automation tools other companies are using can be a valuable resource in your search for the right solution. You can reach out to your connections or conduct research to determine what other brands are utilizing.
By asking for their feedback and recommendations, you can gain insights into the effectiveness of various email automation tools.
By considering these factors, you can pick an automation tool that caters to your business needs and helps you achieve your email automation goals efficiently.
How to get started with email automation to rev up your email marketing?
No matter what industry your business operates in, the process of starting with email automation is quite similar. So, let’s dive in and explore how you can kickstart your automated email marketing campaign.
Decide your email marketing goals
Before diving headfirst into email automation, it’s essential to take a moment to define your goals and objectives for your email campaigns. This will determine the types of campaigns you create, your target audience, the content you include, and how you measure success.
Create a list of the target audience
You’ve set your email marketing goals and you’re ready to start sending campaigns. But before you hit that send button, you need to build your email list first! There are various ways to do this, but the approach you choose largely depends on the goals you set in the first step.
One of the easiest ways to build your email list is by importing a list of your existing customers. If your goal is to keep in touch with them, then this is the perfect method for you. Simply import their details into your email marketing tool and you’re good to go!
If you want to communicate with an audience whose email address you might not have yet, then you’ll have to start capturing email addresses and building your list from scratch. You can do it easily using different prospecting and lead generation tools available in the market.
Personalize email subject line, content, and senders
Personalized subject lines, senders and body content increases the open and click-through rate of your email. Here are some tips on how to do it effectively:
Use the recipient’s name in the subject line and greeting – this creates a personalized touch and catches their attention.
Segment your email list and personalize the content to the recipient’s interests, location, or behavior.
Use a conversational tone and avoid generic language – this makes the email feel more personal and engaging.
Use a sender name that is recognizable and relevant to the recipient – this can be a person’s name or the name of the company.
Ask consciously
Be clear and specific about what you’re asking for – avoid being vague or ambiguous. For example, if you’re asking for feedback, provide specific questions to guide the recipient’s response. Offer an incentive or reward for completing the action or providing the information. This could be a discount code, a free resource, or access to exclusive content.
Use a conversational tone and make it easy for the recipient to respond. Include a clear call-to-action button or link, and make sure the recipient knows how to contact you if they have questions or concerns.
Consider the timing of the task – make sure it’s relevant and timely. For example, if you’re asking for feedback on a recent purchase, send the ask email a few days after the product has been delivered.
Personalize the task based on the recipient’s behavior, interests, or past interactions with your brand. Use the recipient’s name and reference specific actions they’ve taken, such as a recent purchase or download.
Create an email sequence
An email sequence is a series of automated emails sent to a specific audience at specific times. It’s an effective way to nurture leads, build relationships with customers, and drive engagement. Here’s an example of an email sequence and what each email might include:
Sequence:
Day 1: Email 1: Introduction and Welcome
Subject: Welcome to [Brand Name]!
This email introduces your brand and welcomes the recipient to your community. It might include a brief overview of what you do, your mission, and what the recipient can expect from being a part of your community.
Day3. Email 2:Informative and Relevant Content
Subject: [Topic] Tips and Tricks
In this email, you provide valuable content related to your brand or industry. For example, if you sell beauty products, you might provide tips for maintaining healthy skin. The aim is to provide value to the recipient and establish your brand as a trusted source of information.
Day5: Email 3: Social Proof/Testimonial
Subject: Why Our Customers Love [Product/Service]
Include testimonials or social proof from satisfied customers. It’ll help to build credibility and trust with the recipient and encourage them to consider purchasing your product or service.
Day 7: Email 4: Offer
Subject: Exclusive [Discount/Deal] Just for You!
Give an exclusive discount, deal, free trial, or a limited-time offer to the recipient in this email. The goal is to incentivize the recipient to make a purchase and drive conversions.
Day 9: Email 5: Follow-up
Subject: Did You Miss Something?
This email serves as a follow-up to the previous emails and gives the final opportunity for the recipient to take action. You can also include a reminder of the offer, a call-to-action to purchase, or a prompt to provide feedback. This’ll encourage the recipient to take action.
Segment your email audience
Segmenting your email audience is a critical step in email marketing. Once a customer has opted-in to your email list, you can categorize them into different groups.
There are various ways to segment your audience, such as based on pages they have visited on your website, their location, actions they have taken (such as cart abandonment or purchased products), and more.
By segmenting your audience, you can tailor your email content to their specific needs and preferences, increasing the chances of conversion. Also, sending targeted and personalized emails are more likely to engage the recipient.
Analyzing and optimizing your results
A/B tests are crucial in the result analysis of your email automation to improve the effectiveness of your email marketing strategy. By carefully examining the data, you can identify room for improvement and make the required adjustments.
If your opt-ins are not performing well, you can experiment with different approaches, such as changing the wording, the style, or the incentives you offer. This can help you decide which approach is most effective in improving the conversion rate.
Similarly, analyzing your email open rates is an essential part of refining your email marketing strategy. You can test out different subject lines to understand which ones work best with your audience. By using this data, you can optimize your approach to enhance engagement and boost the overall success of your email marketing campaigns.
Create behavior-based email automation
By using behavior-based tracking, you can create automated emails that are triggered by specific actions taken by your prospects. Email automation allows you to design workflows that can carry out various actions based on customer behavior, such as opening an email, registering for an event, or engaging on social media.
For instance, if a customer has abandoned their shopping cart, it indicates that they were interested in purchasing your product, but something stopped them from completing the purchase. You can set up email automation to send them a follow-up email with a discount or offer to encourage them to complete the purchase. This can help you to recover potentially lost sales and increase your revenue.
Automating your email marketing and sales campaign based on behavioral triggers ensures that each segment of the campaign is executed at the right time, helping you to effectively engage with your prospects and increase conversions.
Final Thoughts
Have you ever felt like you’re just sending emails into the void? No clicks, no responses, no engagement? It can be disheartening, but don’t worry – email automation is here to help!
Email automation can be a game-changer for businesses of all sizes. Implementing marketing automation tools can help streamline processes, boost efficiency, and ultimately drive stronger email results.
With the ability to send targeted and personalized messages at the ideal time, you can expect to see improved open, click-through, and conversion rates from your email marketing automation campaign.
If you’re new to marketing automation or looking to enhance your current workflows, this email automation guide can help take your emails and revenue to new heights.
Frequently Asked Questions
- Streamline their email marketing processes
- Increase efficiency
- Improve engagement rates
- Greater customer satisfaction and loyalty
- Scalability
- Higher ROI
Email automation uses tools to automatically send emails to subscribers based on predefined triggers, such as a user signing up for a newsletter or abandoning a shopping cart. These automated messages can be personalized to suit individual preferences and sent to target audience segments to enhance the relevance and efficacy of your email marketing campaigns.
By automating your email tasks, email automation eliminates repetitive tasks from your to-do list and frees up your time for other essential tasks, like addressing customer queries and focusing on core business operations.