As digital marketers, we’re often focused on the technology platforms and applications that enable our programmes. And we should be, because technology is essential to its success. But understanding the other components that help us to communicate on a 1:You level is also important.
All modern marketers need to leverage data-driven insights to fuel creativity and connect emotionally with customers. It’s the insights on consumers’ behaviors, such as motivations, likes, dislikes and so on, that helps to drive these ideas and create meaningful experiences for consumers.
Consider these best practices as you consider how to add creativity to your email marketing efforts:
1. Design a dynamic email template
Dynamic email templates allow for personalisation of messaging across a variety of data points. Think of the template as a flexible journey where you can change the creative and messaging based on the individual and their previous brand interactions.
This means your email template should be built on a modular framework which in turn will create flexibility for your marketing needs. Building this modular system takes time but there are efficiencies that come into play for developing automation capabilities.
Once your template is developed, your focus can shift to strategic content development, storytelling and visual design.
2. Capitalise on the preview pane
Being able to capture the attention of the consumer without requiring them to scroll down through the email can boost engagement. Think about the preview pane of the email and make sure your branding and call-to-actions are visible within this space. You may also try some A/B testing with different types of content to see what your audience responds to.
3. Be strategic with member dashboards
If you have a member component to your brand, creating a dashboard is an effective way to display a variety of information and data points in an easy to read, visual format. The dashboard can be enhanced with brand iconography and visual elements showing progress towards the next tier.
Leverage the transactional and behavioral data available, including recent spend, recent purchases, point totals, reward redemptions and near tier messaging to publish real-time content within your flexible and dynamic template.
4. Acknowledge prior engagement
Understanding how your users are engaging and interacting with the email campaigns they’ve opened is critical to success.
We encourage brands to leverage their modular templates by including a banner that speaks to the subscribers’ engagement level. For example, feature gratitude messages with a reward component for your highly engaged customers and a ‘we miss you message’ for those you are trying to reengage on a path to purchase.
5. Make personalisation a reality
Lastly, never lose sight of the importance of personalisation within your template. 74% of marketers have stated that targeted personalisation within emails increases their overall customer engagement rates.
In addition, research shows that 80% of consumers are more likely to do business with a company that offers personalised experiences.
Putting it all together
To put it in a brand’s perspective, we recently worked with the NFL to develop a modular template with the ability to bring in dynamic content allowing the fan activity level to determine the badge.
The template includes a very personalised experience based on the fan’s profile, behavior and affinity. Leveraging data that the NFL had on engagement, they were able to seamlessly create a unique email, including subject line and all content, for each individual fan. As a result, they increased online store revenue by over 15%.
When data is used to fuel creative thinking, the results are unstoppable. In fact, MediaPost recognised the NFL’s work and awarded them the 2019 Member’s Choice Award for email marketing creativity.
So, as you’re fine tuning your digital marketing and planning for next year, remember that innovation and creativity are intersecting, which is sparking a new level of creative possibilities for digital marketers.
And remember, creative refreshes come in all sizes, both big and small. Test, learn, and refine with each email campaign you issue to continuously improve upon your marketing programmes.