5 Answers To 5 Questions About Personalized Emails

In a time when social media, marketing technology, and project management tools are so dominant, it’s easy to forget about email. But it’s not dead and buried just yet. In fact, if you can master the art of crafting personalized emails, your company can enjoy greater success in nurturing your subscribers through the sales funnel.

Online shoppers want to know more about your brand if they’ve signed up for emails, and for the brand to tailor content to their specific interests. With personalized emails, companies can increase the level of ecommerce personalization on their email list, offering personalized product recommendations and targeted content that ultimately generates higher engagement rates, more traffic, and of course, more conversions.

You can use personalized emails to tackle problems, such as reducing abandoned cart rates, and even pulling distant customers back from the brink. Make no mistake: Email is going nowhere. And personalized emails are the next big thing in ecommerce.

5 Questions about Personalized Emails

It’s safe to say, it’s worth your time getting familiar with this style of email marketing. Here are five crucial points to consider for your next personalized email campaign:

1) Are Personalized Emails Triggered or Automated?

This depends on the model you choose. Perhaps you’d like to line up a series of emails with your marketing automation program. Alternatively, you can set triggers that send welcome emails to new customers. The choice is yours, however, personalization counts for a lot. Today, people are flooded with brand messages, so personalized ones definitely stand out from the pack.

The numbers don’t lie: Personalized emails have a click-through rate (CTR) that is 2.5 times higher than generic emails, and they are six times as likely to drive conversions.

2) Are Personalized Emails Powered By Machine-Learning?

Here’s a quirky reality of machine learning in marketing: We can use machine learning and AI to create a more human experience. With machine learning-based software on your site, widgets recognize visitors, analyze their on-site behavior, browsing history and purchasing habits. All of this forms the foundation of your personalized emails.

These emails are merely an extension of onsite product recommendations, and they are fully customizable, making it easy for companies to tailor email content to each customer. The AI determines which promo will be best suited, and through constant learning, its recommendations will get better over time.

There are plenty of benefits of combining machine learning and email marketing, as you can refine and improve ecommerce personalization on a much deeper level, which allows for more dynamic content. 

3) What Does Dynamic Content Mean?

Speaking of which, dynamic content is something any email marketer will want to get to grips with in order to succeed nowadays. One of the main advantages of using dynamic content is that it enables marketers to determine who can see each section of content in your email. This effectively means companies can display multiple variations of the same email to specific audience groups in each email marketing campaign. So, why is that important today?

Well, with over 200 billion emails sent each year, it’s not easy to get noticed. Open rates for emails in many major industries is somewhat pitiful, hovering around 20-25%. Imagine you’re trying to explain something really exciting to four of your friends, but only one of them is even interested enough to listen, while the others wander off as you’re talking. Ouch.

Dynamic email takes ecommerce personalization to the next level, boosting the chances of engagement. Companies can do this with a marketing automation program, using hyper-targeted emails to hone in on each individual customer’s interests.

Adding dynamic features like special effects, video content and embedded social media feeds can drive engagement levels on your emails, and elicit greater responses to your CTAs. Sure, it’s easier said than done, but when you do it right, your company can reap the benefits of higher open rates, CTRs and conversions.

4) Are My Personalized Email Campaigns’ Success Measurable?

In any email marketing campaign, the two key metrics worth tracking are the clickthrough rate (CTR) and the conversion rate. Studies indicate that 70% of marketers use CTR as the barometer for success on their email campaigns, yet many marketers struggle with low click-through rates. If you want to boost your CTR, consider the following factors in email marketing:

• When you are sending your email. What day? What time?
• Where are your audience? Can you use geo-targeting?
• What devices have you optimized your emails for? Emails that have been optimized for mobile generate 15% higher CTRs.
• Visuals get more engagement. Are you opting for a lot of text? Could you insert images or video?
• CTAs garner more clicks, but the frequency and placement can make all the difference.

5) Should I Use First Names While Creating My Email Campaigns?

There was a time when using the customer’s first name in your email campaign was considered revolutionary. While the concept has since went mainstream, modern marketers now have more advanced tools and data insights to take personalized emails far beyond a simple namedrop.

Email allows for a more conversational tone with your customer base, which means you can speak to them in way they like, using language and humor that they appreciate. Companies that have the most success with conversational emails have also realized the impact of keeping it positive. This style of communication helps foster closer ties between buyers and sellers, paving the way for stronger relationships.

Personalized Emails Must Be Relevant

More than anything else, your emails must be full of relevant content. If it’s not, your email may not even get opened, never mind anything else beyond that. Ecommerce personalization has the power to tweak and tailor everything on your site to cater to each individual customer. Personalized emails are an extension of that, which wield immense potential for your marketing automation. With machine learning backing you up, you can use personalization in email marketing to build a bigger audience, and enjoy much more success with your emails.