How to Write a Marketing Email Campaign (With Examples and Tips)

Drive 20-40% of your revenue with Avada

Get Started

Email marketing has solidified its position as a powerful marketing channel for businesses for many years. But despite all the fancy new functionality and software brands are utilizing, a well-written email in plain text can still outperform a highly designed email with glamorous pictures and buttons.

As a matter of fact, no matter how excellent your marketing emails look, your subscribers will not open - and even delete - your messages if they find your writing irrelevant or uninteresting.

So, how do you write a compelling marketing email campaign? It all comes down to some best practices in copywriting that you should apply to your email body and the subject line of your message.

Next time, before you draft a marketing email to nurture leads or inform a new promotion, ask yourself whether your email copy has good enough writing that recipients can not stop reading. After all, we have an attention span that is less of a goldfish now, so your email campaign better has something that can hold the beholders’ gaze.

That is what we will find the solution for in this article: How to write a marketing email campaign that is worth reading all the way through? Let’s get started!

Types of email marketing campaigns

Before you start writing your marketing email, you need a first step just like any other marketing campaign: having a clear goal. Unfocused email campaigns are destined to fail since you can’t know what to write if you don’t know who you are writing to.

These are some questions that you can ask your email marketing team and figure out for your first email campaign:

• What is the primary goal of your email campaign?

• Who is your target audience, and what types of offers, information, and language do they find relevant?

• Is the goal you set measurable? If not, how can you determine the campaign’s failure or success?

• What action do you want prospective recipients to take upon viewing your email?

• How long are you going to run the campaign before taking a look at the results and reevaluating them?

Another important aspect that affects your marketing email’s writing is the type of campaign you are creating. There are several types of marketing email campaigns to deploy at a given time, depending on your business and the goal of the marketing campaign. Let’s see some of the most common types of email campaigns as well as their respectable tones, although there are other types.

• Newsletter: Newsletters are not for all businesses since they tend not to include a call to action (or CTA) that aim directly at the reader. The main goal of a newsletter campaign is to make the brand a source of trusted information for recipients and raise the overall profile of the brand.

• Sale or promotion: A sale or promotional marketing email alerts subscribers of a time-limited offer. Businesses that are seasonal and often run sales during certain times of the year also prefer to use promotional emails.

• Transactional email: For eCommerce businesses, transactional emails are essential. A transactional email also called a behavioral email or a trigger email is an email that triggers based on a customer’s transaction. It may be an order confirmation, a response, or a confirmation of a refund, and an abandoned cart email - which is helpful for online retailers to reduce the number of carts abandoned at checkout.

• Re-engagement email: When an existing subscriber or customer stops interacting with your business, you can deploy an email to re-engage and win them back. Re-engagement emails help increase brand awareness and remind customers of what your brand can do for them.

• Lead nurturing email: Lead nurturing emails are often an attempt to move leads through the funnel and eventually become customers. Many companies use automated lead nurturing emails to both streamline the sales process and ensure consistency.

Each of the types of an email campaign can use different styles of writing to be more compelling to prospective readers. Not only can your emails sound more convincing, but they can also improve the brand experience for recipients. Let’s find out how to do that for all types of marketing emails in the next section.

How to write a good email marketing campaign?

The best marketing email campaign has a clear goal, authentic tone, and relevant information that’s helpful to the recipients. Many variables contribute to your email marketing quality. Only when you combine all of these elements together can you expect to create a marketing email campaign that goes above and beyond readers’ expectations.

Consider the following steps to ensure that your marketing email campaign is worth reading with every single word.

#1. Start with a familiar from name

The “From” field is one of the first displayed elements of your marketing email campaign when it arrives in the subscriber’s inbox.

On most desktop and mobile clients, the email service provider displays the “from” field with larger texts and heavier fonts to help users quickly identify who sent the email.

Given its prominence, it is not surprising that 68% of email recipients say they decide to open an email or not based on the “from” name.

So how can you optimize this critical part of your marketing email campaigns and help boost your email’s open rates? The key is matching up the field with your audience’s expectations. The “from” name should be something that they can instantly recognize, not some unfamiliar names of your staff.

For example, instead of filling your “from” field with only the name of “Daisy”, why not show that you are the sender and announce your name as the company’s name? Better yet, use the name of the person in charge so email recipients think they are talking to a real person. “Daisy from AVADA” sounds much more familiar and like a person that subscribers would expect to receive emails from.

#2. Write a short and sweet marketing email subject line

Part of writing an effective marketing email campaign is nailing the subject line. It is like the gatekeeper of your marketing email: No one can read your stellar email copy if they don’t find the subject line interested enough to open the email in the first place.

People open your emails if they think they can benefit from them, if you present compelling evidence about why they need to open them, and if they’re worried about missing out on a fantastic deal. Use that as the guideline when crafting your marketing email’s subject line and see how you can put recipients into the position you want them to be.

Here are some tips for a short and sweet marketing email’s subject line:

• Consider the length: Although the subject line’s length doesn’t have a huge effect on your open and click-through rates, you should keep them under 30 characters to ensure full display on both desktop and mobile devices.

• Use actionable language: This doesn’t necessarily mean using more verbs, but they certainly can help. The goal here is to use language that makes it clear to the subscribers what they can and should do with the information inside the email if they open it. In other words, make your subject line demonstrate the value for the users.

• Personalize when possible: Personalized emails tend to have a higher performance level, with targeted and segmented emails generating 58% of all revenue. So find a way to make your subject line more personal, not just by inserting the recipient’s name inside it. Each subject line of your marketing email campaign should speak to the radically different needs of different list segments.

• Prioritize clarity: Clarity should always be the first priority for your subject line, then you can think of being catchy. Be extremely clear on what recipients can get by opening your emails, then you can also make it catchy, funny, and entertaining.

• Align it with your email copy: What your email subject line promises, your marketing email should deliver. It’s not just because of the responsibility – it’s also because if recipients don’t get what they’re promised in the subject line, the click-through rate would sink.

Sure, they are a lot to ask from a marketing email subject line, but you can do it. Use an app like AVADA Email Marketing to test different subject lines and see what you can achieve with just better writing.

#3. Write compelling preheader

In a marketing email, the preheader is a short summary text that comes right after the subject line when a recipient views an email in the inbox.

Preheader text is an essential component your recipients use to decide whether or not they should open your marketing email and engage with the content.

The preheader text appears right under the email subject line so the two should work together and tell a cohesive story, rather than be perceived as two separate parts of your marketing email campaign. By making your subject line and preheader work together, you can appeal to a wider number of audiences and increase the open rates of your marketing email.

#4. Write quality body content

After optimizing your “from” name, subject line, as well as preheader text to increase the open rate, it’s time to increase the click-through rates with your marketing email’s body content.

Good writing in the email body isn’t about using any magic words, but more about getting your recipients to understand what you offer and the benefits they can receive in the simplest way possible. After all, realizing the gains is what drives people to purchase.

While your product and industry may be different, there are some formulas that you can use to write great email body content. The formulas such as 4Ps or Before - After are all easy-to-follow frameworks that can help marketers write high-performing marketing emails by positioning your products as the solution to the customer’s pain points.

Also, don’t be boring. There’s no rule for emails from a business to be dry. Use your body content to stir subscribers’ imagination by sharing a new view of your products, customer success stories, or personal anecdotes. When your subscribers can imagine them using your brand products, you’ll start to build a relationship with the recipients.

#5. Optimize the buttons

The buttons you use in your marketing email campaigns are the final step to get someone to click-through from your email campaign and visit your eCommerce website. So the words you choose for buttons can actually play a big part in influencing whether subscribers will click through or not.

The key with marketing email buttons is to use them and reinforce the benefit you promised your recipients throughout the rest of the content.

With AVADA Email Marketing, you can do several A/B tests to compare generic copy to benefit-focused copy and to see how you can increase click-through rates (10% is the number we often see from our users).

Besides using your buttons’ copy to reinforce the benefit, you can also use them to reduce the perceived barriers. Do this by removing friction words - which imply your readers need to do some actions they don’t necessarily want to do yet.

Common friction words are Download, Apply, Submit, or Order. Think about it, you yourself won’t want to spend time downloading or applying for some apps when you simply want the end benefit of downloading or applying the product or service.

Try to reduce your recipients’ perceived effort, replace friction words above with frictionless words like Learn or Get and follow them up with a specific benefit (I.e., “Create your free account”).

#6. Avoid the spam filter

Suppose you’ve had every single step right for your marketing email campaign up to this point; congratulations! But it can all be for nothing if your emails can’t avoid the spam filter. If your emails end up in the spam box, all of your hard work will fly away, never to be seen by readers’ eyes.

To avoid the spam filter, you want to make sure that you avoid overusing any spam-triggering language. This can be such innocent words as “free” or “buy”. Spam filters will notice these words and assume your email is spam.

If you wish to understand more about spam filters, read the top reasons why your emails go to the spam box.

Another way for your marketing email campaign to avoid spam filters is by asking your mailing list to add your email address to their contacts. By becoming a part of their contacts list, your company address will be whitelisted and all emails from you will automatically go through.

#7. Build brand’s loyalty

One thing that the six steps above rely on is your writing ability, but not simply by attention to grammar and vocabulary.

The tone you take in your marketing email campaign’s writing can truly transform your campaign from a marketing tool to becoming an actual correspondence between two good friends. Once you identify the tone you’re going for in your emails, they will be more readable and immersive than ever.

When writing an email that can build loyalty, you want to look at your brand’s characteristics and your target demographic. Taking a funny and joking tone may not quite fit with a medical brand. Nonetheless, use your writing to make any subject compelling and subscribers would trust your brand more.

Once recipients get a sense of your email writing, they’re more likely to check out your future campaigns. You can break the stereotype of marketing email campaigns that are mainly used to shove products in people’s faces.

In addition to nailing the right marketing email tone, consider using A/B testing features in an email marketing app to figure out which writing style works and not.

By putting an emphasis on crafting excellent marketing emails, you’re also letting customers know that you care about every aspect of your brand and marketing campaigns. Your emails aren’t simply something you put out to reach a certain percentage of open and click-through rates, but something with high quality that a lot of thought was put into.

Examples of a well-written email marketing campaign

Now, let’s look at some well-written examples of marketing email campaigns that you can learn from. They perfected every aspect of their email campaigns, from the subject line to the body content, and even the buttons. Let’s check them out.

Marketing Email Example from Nike

If you want to go for a minimal concept of writing with your email campaigns, then Nike email is a good example. The design is simple, the writing is straightforward, and it gets right to the point with as few words as possible.

The CTA buttons prioritize male customers (likely based on the demographic data of the subscribers), but if recipients want to shop for families like boys or girls, the options are presented too. With the sand-like background, the email evokes beach imagery and lets the writing be more visually appealing.

Marketing Email Examples from Postmate

Take a look at how Postmates drafted a short and sweet email encouraging recipients to click through for a limited-time deal.

Postmates gets to the point right away with their marketing email. After a brief and friendly hello, they immediately show the purpose of the email: informing customers about their new promotion of “free lattes on-demand”. After introducing the deal, they offer more essential details, then get right down to the call-to-action.

I love the call-to-action button of Postmate too. With a short copy of “Get It Now”, the company urges recipients to act quickly and take the time-limited offer.

Keeping your email goal on point is the key to writing an excellent marketing email campaign. If you know your marketing email’s action is supposed to drive, you have a much easier time creating succinct email copy that focuses on the one end goal.

Marketing Email Example from Soylent

Remember that company marketing emails don’t have to be boring? Then look at this email from Soylent.

Readers can immediately notice the wry tone in their email writing, which beckons recipients to read more because they want to see just how wry it can get. And the main paragraph stops right at the right spot, making readers dying to know what will come the next day.

Also, recipients can see that the company wants to tell the customers about their next launching product too, they just can’t (as they jokingly say about it). The email writing makes it like a fun relationship between the brand and customers.

Tips for writing marketing email campaigns

So, are there any more tips to help you write a marketing email campaign that will get the audience clicking? Luckily you asked, here are some more awesome tips you should know about writing emails:

• Show relevancy: Just like email subject lines should establish relevance with personalization, so should the body copy in the marketing email message. Reminding recipients about why you are sending an email, why they should keep reading, and how you know about their problems.

• Talk about benefits, not features: You understand the value of your marketing email, but recipients don’t. If your marketing emails only explain the feature they are offering and not the benefit, it would just be confusing. Therefore, use your email writing to explain what the customers can gain from using your product or service.

• Be lovable: Emails don’t have to be boring and they can be delightful as well. Marketing email can be a great chance to let your brand’s personality shine while helping build a meaningful relationship with the people on your email lists. Your marketing email’s writing should provide a lovable experience for recipients to begin and adore how you communicate with them.

• Reward readers: Rewarding readers is an excellent way to get readers to open your email. To do this, you need your marketing email’s copy to show the benefits they get and proof of the benefits. You can include relevant case studies, statistics, or a free extra gift to thank subscribers.

• Test and splits: If you want to boost conversions while writing marketing emails, you will need data. Collect data on your marketing email performance with your email service provider and figure out how to improve the result. Also, use AVADA Email Marketing to test headlines, from name, copy, CTAs, and more to create the best-performing emails.

Final words

Now you know the secrets of writing a marketing email campaign that converts, check out our other email marketing guides on creating your email marketing strategy and more on the AVADA blog. And, if you’re looking for an affordable and new email marketing service, check out AVADA Email Marketing.

If you have any magic words or techniques for writing a fantastic marketing email, feel free to share them in the comment section!