Email marketing is an easy way to communicate with your customers that has a high return on investment. Email marketing has an ROI of 400%, meaning you can make $40 for every dollar you spend.
In Omnisend’s Ecommerce Statistics Research, email marketing, including manual one-off campaigns and automated emails, had conversion rates ranging from 6.82% to 52.92%. In other words, more than half of all recipients of welcome messages purchased something after receiving the message.
Today, we’re sharing 16 of our favorite email marketing examples. We’ll also explain why we love them and how to use them yourself.
First, let’s define email marketing.
Email marketing campaigns are sequences of emails sent from a business to its customers or prospects. The purpose of email marketing campaigns is to attract new customers, retain existing customers, build brand awareness, nurture leads, and win (back) sales.
You can generate sales and customers through an email marketing campaign that gets recipients to act, just like these:
1. Netflix
Streaming channels are subscribed to by more than half of US households. Netflix’s emails have become more targeted as several platforms compete for our attention.
The Netflix email provides a curated list of new shows based on the customer’s watch history. There is plenty of visual support for the new releases and a CTA that encourages viewers to watch the trailers.
What Makes It Work
Users are enticed to head over to Netflix to check out the new content through the CTAs in this email.
2. Tory Burch
Tory Burch makes you look twice, with ever so subtle motion in their email. What a cool idea, huh? In their inboxes, Tory Burch’s email stands out from all the immobile emails from their competitors. Thanks to this small bit of animation, Tory Burch’s email stands out from the rest. By framing the promotion as a “private” sale, they also leverage exclusivity. This type of positioning often makes the recipient feel special, which encourages them to take advantage of the special opportunity.
What Makes It Work
There is nothing worse than receiving a boring, impersonal email. In this email, those expectations are subverted without going overboard.
3. UncommonGoods
Your calls to action should create a sense of urgency (and a few thousand of those may have come from us). Leads take action when they see that, right? Through its emphasis on acting now, UncommonGoods successfully creates a sense of urgency.
What Makes It Work
This email asks, “Don’t you think Mom would’ve liked a faster delivery?” Yes, she would. Without sounding too hard-sell and sales-y, it creates a sense of urgency to act right now. I appreciate you reminding me before it’s too late – I don’t want my gift to arrive after Mother’s Day and get into trouble.
4. JetBlue
JetBlue kills the email marketing game, every time. With this cheeky email campaign, they continue to deliver their distinct marketing style. It’s funny, clever, and fresh. What’s not to love? It’s a lovable campaign that’s promotional without being pushy, thanks to the header, the clever points, and the actionable, contrasting CTA.
What Makes It Work
The copy is full of friendly personality and airline jokes. It reads as if it came from a friend, which will help earn a positive response.
5. Rip Curl
Rip Curl opens this email with bold, powerful words: JOIN THE REVOLUTION. With a headline that jumps off the page, Rip Curl, an Australian surf sportswear retailer, combines urgency with our psychological need to belong. In this positioning, people are led to believe that there is a “revolution” taking place, and it’s time for them to join in.
What Makes It Work
This email aims to motivate people to purchase this sleek watch as a way to be part of something bigger than themselves.
6. Charity water
Most people forget to mention transactional emails when they talk about email marketing. You receive these emails after taking a certain action on a website. You might receive an update on the status of your order after filling out a form or purchasing a product. These are usually plain text emails that marketers set and forget.
Charity: water took an alternative route. An individual’s donation to a charity: water project travels a long way. The majority of charities don’t let donors know how their money is making an impact over time – charity: water does. With the project timeline and accompanying table, you don’t even have to read the email – you know right away where you stand.
What Makes It Work
In an effort to stay top-of-mind and increase future participation, it keeps the audience engaged and demonstrates the impact of their actions.
7. Uber
Uber’s emails are beautiful because they are simple. Subscribers receive emails such as the one below alerting them to deals and promotions. It’s perfect for subscribers who are skimming the email quickly because the description is brief and the CTA is clear.
These are followed by a more detailed yet still simple explanation of how the deal works.
Uber’s emails also have a consistent design with its brand. Emails are decorated with bright colors and geometric patterns, just like the app, website, social media photos, and other parts of the visual branding.
What Makes It Work
The company’s marketing and communications assets tell the brand’s story, and Uber has mastered brand consistency.
8. Paperless Post
When you think of holiday email marketing, your mind might jump straight to Christmas, but you can create campaigns around other holidays throughout the year.
For example, take a look at the email below from Paperless Post. This email header provides a clear CTA with a sense of urgency. The subheader then asks, “Wait, when is Mother’s Day again? Did I buy her a card?”.
The simple grid design below this copy is easy to scan and quite attractive. You’ll be taken to a purchase page if you click on any of the card pictures.
What Makes It Work
By prompting the recipient to do something they may have forgotten (send a card), it earns a positive sentiment. It saves the recipient from feeling guilty about forgetting Mother’s Day and provides a solution.
9. Crew Factory
Wrapping gifts is a struggle for many of us. For those unable to pull off a Pinterest-like wrap job, J.Crew Factory created this email as a solution: gift cards. With the email, both in-store and online options are offered for picking up a gift card.
To further lower the purchasing barrier, the email also includes a map of the nearest store location.
What Makes It Work
A low-stress, low-friction solution is combined with humor.
10. Dropbox
An email from a company whose product you haven’t used might seem hard to love. Dropbox found a way to make its “come back to us!” email cute and funny by including whimsical cartoons and emoticons.
Plus, Dropox kept the email short and sweet so as not to intrude – just to remind recipients that it exists and why it might be useful. Sending these types of emails might include an incentive, such as a limited-time coupon, to encourage recipients to use your service again.
What Makes It Work
The Dropbox logo is used in a creative and unique way to highlight their product.
11. Stitcher
Whenever Stitcher sends me its “Recommended For You” emails, I get really excited. In general, I listen to episodes from the same podcast rather than trying out new ones. Despite this, Stitcher wants me to discover (and subscribe to) all its other awesome content.
The responsive design of this email is also quite brilliant with bright colors and the large click-to-call buttons. Additionally, mobile email actually has features that are relevant to mobile users. You can open Stitcher Radio on your phone by clicking the “Open Stitcher Radio” button at the bottom of the email.
What Makes It Work
Humans crave personalized experiences. You feel special when you receive emails that appear to be created especially for you – you’re not just getting what everyone else gets. It might even feel like the company sending you the email knows you in some way, cares about your preferences, and wants to please you.
12. InVision App
Weekly, the InVision team sends out a roundup of their best blog posts, their favorite design links, and a new chance to win a free t-shirt. They give away a new design every week. They also sometimes have fun survey questions that they crowdsource. In this week’s, subscribers were asked what they would do if the internet didn’t exist.
What Makes It Work
InVision’s newsletter is not only a great mix of content, but it is also easy to read and mobile-friendly, which is especially important, since its newsletters are so long (below is just one excerpt). The call-to-action (CTA) buttons have clever copy, too.
13. Cook Smarts
“Weekly Eats” from Cook Smarts has always been a big favorite. Every week, the company sends a meal plan with yummy recipes. It’s not just that I love the recipes – I love its email newsletter as well.
Each Cook Smarts email features three distinct sections: a menu, a kitchen how-to, and a tip section. After an email or two, you know exactly where to look to find the most interesting part of its blog posts.
Furthermore, I love Cook Smarts’ “Forward to a Friend” call-to-action in the top-right corner of their emails.
What Makes It Work
Since emails are super shareable over email, you should also remind your subscribers to forward your emails to friends, family, and colleagues.
14. RCN
Bad weather and Internet providers are natural enemies. In theory, telecommunications companies wouldn’t want to publicize storm-caused power outages – the thing that triggers impatience among customers. And then there’s RCN.
The email marketing campaign for RCN, a cable and wireless internet service, was transformed into a weather forecast for its customers. “Storm update” allowed the company to stay ahead of an event that threatened its service, while providing weather updates to its users.
Below, you can see the email even advises personal safety – a nice touch to accompany the promise of responsive service. The email also highlighted RCN’s social media channels, which the company uses to inform users about network outages appropriately.
What Makes It Work
This is simply an update. There is no promotion or selling. It’s in the recipient’s best interest, and they are setting expectations about something coming up in the near future.
15. Her First $100K
There are so many reasons why this email marketing campaign nails it.
In this email, financial education brand Her First $100K uses a list format to great effect. The testimonial at the top draws you in, followed by a list of reasons why you should join their Business Bootcamp — emphasizing that the course is 50% off.
In the email, the details of the course are outlined, giving potential students an idea of what to expect. There is a friendly, concise, and persuasive tone in the language.
What Makes It Work
Customers are enticed to purchase the course with a friendly tone and a sense of urgency. Credibility is enhanced by social proof.
16. Trulia
Thought leadership is something I strongly believe in. Some of the most successful companies gain customer loyalty by becoming the go-to source for expertise. The property search engine Trulia – for buyers, sellers, and renters – is the industry expert. What makes me believe that? Here is an example of one of their emails.
This email campaign cites interesting data about relocation trends in the United States before asking “Why aren’t millennials moving?” Having its finger on the pulse of the industry doesn’t benefit from people who choose not to move, but the company does benefit from having its finger on the pulse of the industry — and showing it cares which way the real estate winds are blowing.
What Makes It Work
Essentially, it opens a loop by asking a question that requires the recipient to take action.
Conclusion
These are just some of the emails we enjoy most. When it comes to marketing emails, don’t just follow best practices. By planning ahead and optimizing your work emails, you can also increase conversions.
Email marketing won’t go away anytime soon. You are simply not optimizing your sales if you don’t optimize it within your business.
Creating effective email campaigns isn’t easy, but there are plenty of resources to help you succeed. Use a template that fits your brand (or a few different templates), or get inspired by our 16 favorite email marketing examples.
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