Have a crystal clear vision of who they are, and most importantly, how you can serve them in the highest possible way.

If you don’t take it from me, take it from one of the most successful businessmen of all time.

If you’re the type of person I described earlier, it’s likely that you’re not looking to be too caught up in what other brands are doing…

Obviously you check them out, but you want to be the predominant brand in your niche.

The only way to achieve this is with an obsessive focus on who you’re serving.

Do this correctly, and your overall marketing efforts will skyrocket.

Your campaigns will resonate deeply.

Engagement and conversion rates will go through the roof.

The brand identity will leak through the entire business.

Customers will buy into the vision. They will start to buy from you just because it’s you. Their experience with your brand will dwarf that of competitors and they will keep returning and become an ambassador for what you do.

Not to mention that your employees will notice this and similarly buy into the movement.

Alternatively, if you skimp past this, your marketing will have holes throughout, the brand will have no real concept, the product will not consume mental real estate of customers, and you will be left in the endless sea of e-Commerce brands that have popped up since the COVID saga.

Not an ideal position.

To create messaging that resonates with your target audience, you need to understand their motivations and pain points.

This is where research becomes essential.

By gathering information from forums, customer reviews, and product reviews of competitors who solve a different problem than you, you can gain insights into your target audience’s interests and concerns.

You can even call your customers on the phone and ask them how they felt about the product or what things held them back from buying.

• What keeps them up at night?
• What solutions have they tried and failed with?
• What’s most important to them?

These are the types of questions to be asking.

By doing so, you gain a deeper understanding of their motivations and preferences.

Then you can put together a comprehensive customer research document that will guide your copywriting efforts going forward.

It’s important to refer to your customer research document often, especially when writing copy and making content plans, as it will help you create messaging that resonates with your target audience.

By investing time in researching the motivations behind why someone buys, you can make your messaging more impactful and persuasive.

If you want access to Strike Copy’s internal customer research document, DM me on Twitter or LinkedIn and I’ll be happy to share it with you.

Now – I’m not talking about copying and pasting emails that you’ve seen before or using a swipe file and just changing a few colours to fit your brand.

This is by no means a passive, or unspecific process.

If you do that, you will turn into another cookie cutter brand and have no real identity.

I know agencies that operate this way and have talked to some of their ex-clients and the results are far from ideal.

Something that features ALL of the possible sections you will ever use in a flow or campaign email.

You want to take your time with the master email design template and make sure it’s congruent with the styles you have on your website.

If the template is off, your voice will be off, the look will be off, and customers will be more confused than sold.

Not to mention the headache of spending most of your time shifting the tiniest of elements to try and fix the granular parts of design.

On the flip side, if you can manage to nail it, you will be able to generate 4-5 times the amount of content, stay more consistent, focus on creating compelling copy rather than spending all of your time designing, as well as empowering A/B test on which elements of certain templates are leading to increased conversions, and which elements can be improved.

With the way things are going, to set your brand apart you will need to be hitting your list and audiences at least three times per week.

This can be incredibly time consuming if you don’t have a way of systematising the process.

On top of this, it will also help maintain a consistent brand identity with recurring tones, colours fonts, and vibe to make the brand more memorable compared to everything else in the inbox.

In some cases, you can even design multiple if it makes sense for your brand. The whole goal is to create a clean template that you’ll use to design the flow and campaign emails to increase their quality and reduce the time it takes to make them.

The steps to create the master design:

1. Set the base template style using the exact branding featured on your website / outlined in your branding guidelines.Text styles, button styles, colours, headings etc.
   
   Good email design mimics the exact design style on your brand’s website.
   
   Buttons, colours, text style, sections… everything.
   
   We want to create that seamless congruence between someone opening the email and clicking onto the site.
   
   Do you ever open another brands email and think “wow”. That’s the effect we’re trying to create by implementing a design template first.


2. Using the styles, go through and create all sections that we will ever feature in flow and campaign emails. Product sections, text sections, blog feature sections


3. Save the blocks so we can easily drag them in when we want to use them


4. Review



5. Make any final iterations.

Before we started implementing these strategies at Strike Copy we found that we couldn’t get the maximum LTV out of each customer that our clients acquired and left a tonne of cash on the table that could have been used to be more agile in advertising.

On top of that, our deliverability was a step slow and we just couldn’t seem to break through our KPI’s. We had plateaued on a few accounts.

Then once we figured it out we immediately broke through.

Engagement skyrocketed on the segmented campaigns.

We could manipulate deliverability.

LTV on the brands’ best customers went through the roof.

Not to mention, customers actually started thanking us for emailing them.

When have you heard of that?

Here’s how:

Engaged Segments.

You want to start with your engagement segment.

These are the subscribers who have opened and clicked on one or many of your emails.

This signals that they are interested in your brand and are more likely to purchase from you.

These subs are the most common segment that you’ll send campaign emails to, and this will include your 30, 90, and 180-day engaged segments.

As a general rule in email marketing, you only want to send to the people who are actually engaging with your emails to ensure positive deliverability.

Otherwise, your emails will start to go into the promotions tab or spam, which obviously kills their chances of being read.

What you want to do (when sending emails to engaged segments):

Start out less aggressively first and assess the key metrics to see if you can open up to a larger segment.

For example, test the campaign on a 30-day engaged segment. If you’re getting a really high 60%+ open rate…

 Then send the next campaign to a 90-day engaged segment and see how that affects your performance.

Within your engaged segment lies two specific pockets:

1. New subscribers:

These are the people who have just signed up for your email list. They may or may not have bought anything yet, but they are still considered engaged because they just signed up.

The types of emails you should be sending to your new subscribers are highly tailored welcome sequence. Typically, these are educational emails.

You want to introduce your brand, build a relationship, and educate your subscribers on the value of your product.

Eventually, they’ll want to buy from you. Now, the key here is that within these new subscribers, you should still segment them.

You can do so by sorting:

• Custom Profile properties (what they’re interested in etc.)
• Demographics (male or female etc.)
• Pages viewed

And ideally, you should craft a separate welcome sequence for each, as each specific pocket will resonate with a different message, but we’ll cover that in a later guide.

2. Potential customers:

These are the people who have visited your website but have not yet made a purchase. They may be interested in your products but aren’t yet convinced to buy, and they’re engaging in your emails.

This is a good signal.

You should be sending value-building emails to these people, just like the new subscribers. Focus on showing the potential customer the value of your products and why they should buy from you.

Customer Segments.

Next, the customer segment.

This is your list of people who have placed orders with your brand.

It’s crucial to segment your list by what they actually purchased.

If you skimp on this you will miss out on the chance to send extremely relevant and specific emails to certain customers.

And as we know – more relevance = more engagement.

We also know that previous buyers are the best people to sell to.

So it’s a great chance to:

1. Show appreciation to your best customers by giving them special offers
2. Squeeze some extra LTV without having to spend more on ads (after all, you spent the money to acquire the customer, you deserve that backend bonus)

This may be customers of:

• A specific collection

• A certain promotion or advertising campaign

• A single item

. . . because the campaigns you want to be sending to this segment should aim to drive a repeat purchase – which means that if we align the messaging then we can increase the relevance.

These emails include:

• Cross-sells

• Upsells

• Educational

• Discount emails

They’ve already bought from you once, and they only need a well-timed, well-executed email message to convince them to buy again.

These customers will drive the profitability of your business to new levels, but only if you can keep them buying and loving your products for years on end.

Again – this stems back to the obsession over the customer and their journey.

These emails need to be relevant or they will be ostracised and the lead will go to waste.

Conversely, do it right, and you will have them waiting in the inbox for your product drops and practically salivating when reading your emails.

Window Shopper Segments.

Thirdly, I would like to talk about the window shopper segment. This segment includes individuals who have visited your website but have not yet made a purchase.

They may have signed up to your email list through an exit intent pop-up.

The key here is to give them the right information to build up the value of your product and brand. This may include:

• Testimonial campaigns 
• Showcasing the publications you’ve been featured in 
• New arrival campaigns 
• Product showcase campaigns 

Within this segment, you will also have window shoppers who abandon their cart.

With these customers, you can try and send general discount emails or cart abandonment emails, highlighting the products they had left behind.

VIP Segments.

Next, these are your high-value customers. They have placed an order with you three or more times or have placed an order value above a certain amount.

You want to treat these customers like royalty.

Reward them for their loyalty, and they’ll continue buying from you.

The types of campaigns you should be sending to these VIPs are:

• Exclusive product reviews
• Personal discounts
• Exclusive access to products
• New product releases

Within your emails, highlight that they are getting these emails BECAUSE they are loyal. Thank them for their continued business and support.

People want to buy from brands that they identify with – this will encourage that emotion.

Show them that you value their business and make them feel appreciated.

And they’ll be buyers for life.

Inactive Segments.

Lastly, I want to cover the inactive segment. These are subscribers who have not engaged with your emails in a while.

The goal with this segment is to get them to re-engage with your list and get them to re-enter the 30-day engaged audience group.

To do that, your main focus is to send out re-engagement emails, which typically include:

• Discount emails
• Abandoned emails
• Reminder emails (retarget their initial pain point)

One of the strongest re-engagement strategies can be to run specific flash discounts every month.

If a customer still hasn’t engaged after this, you will want to suppress these profiles in Klaviyo.

As Klaviyo charges per subscriber, suppressing these accounts will allow you to maintain our deliverability and save a decent chunk of change.

Get these three segments mastered, and you will be well on your way to an outrageously profitable backend..

These will be triggered automatically, last forever, and will drive about 50% of the email attributed revenue.

Because of this, you will need to take your time with this and make sure that the core 8 email flows are built out in full detail and you are continuing to split test and add/remove emails over the course of 2-3 months to optimise everything.

Even an incremental increase in conversion through one of these emails can drive massive amounts of revenue, because if you go from 1% CTR to 2.5%, and it lasts for the rest of time, the additional revenue will grow to 6-7 figures from a few tweaks.

This is an area of extreme leverage within an e-Commerce business.

Flow success comes down to setting up a solid base strategy, monitoring results and making tweaks and big changes over the course of a couple of months.

Unlike most agencies, all flow strategy is custom tailored to each individual brand we work with meaning, we don’t just copy and paste flow paths etc. we spend the time to brainstorm THE most optimal strategy for your company.

For example, for brands with multiple SKU’s the abandoned checkout with be highly detailed.

We create different “conditional splits” and send people down different flow paths depending on which product they were checking out.

This allows us to talk about the specific benefits and features of every single product individually.

It also means that the content is more relevant to the reader and they will actually be engaged.

In some cases, we’ll have 10 different flow paths in ONE flow because it makes sense for the brand.

The Exact Flows to Implement (view charts below):

• Welcome Series
• Abandoned Cart
• Abandoned Checkout
• Post-Purchase Flow
• Win-Back Flow
• Browse Abandonment Flow
• Customer Thank You Flow
• Cross-Sell Flow

Welcome Series Flow

Abandoned Cart/Checkout Flow

Post-Purchase/Thank You Flow

Win Back Flow

Browse Abandonment Flow

Cross Sell Flow

Time and time again I’ve seen this be a major bottleneck for brands.

The issue is that it’s an extremely technical problem that requires a deep knowledge of how Klaviyo works – something that most founders simply don’t have the time, energy, or expertise to fix.

So I thought it would be valuable to show you how. This will improve your reputation with whatever sending platform you use (Klaviyo, Active Campaign etc), give you a better customer experience, build more trust and obviously increase CTR and conversions because your emails will actually get seen.

Or you can stop reading now and have your emails stay in spam forever (up to you).

But before you even think about fixing your deliverability issue, it’s crucial to understand why they’re landing in spam in the first place.

Recently, there’s been a major crackdown on email scammers and “Nigerian Princess” trying to rob grannies of their last via email. Thank God because I don’t know if I can handle anymore calls from my Nan asking if “this email looks real”.

You’ve probably seen it before… A random email popping up in your inbox from unknown addresses requesting you click some link to unlock “infinite monies!”

These scams are very real and as a result, email inbox providers (like gmail and yahoo) have cracked down on scam emails and are a lot more strict now than ever before.

Less emails are getting let into the primary tab overall… which has led to a lot of frustration for brands who just can’t manage to figure out the issue.

So why are your emails landing in spam if the content is valuable?

Think about email deliverability like a point system.

Every time someone opens, you get a point.

Every time someone clicks, you get a point.

Every time someone replies, you get a point.

Same is true for the opposite – every time someone doesn’t engage, you lose a point.

Get the point?

Over a long enough period of time, if your list doesn’t engage with your email content… you’ll dip into the negatives – where Gmail will start placing you in spam. Not the place you want to be.

You need to integrate with Gmail and show them that you’re a positive influence.

You can’t fight with the tech, you have to be one with the tech. See image:

Whilst the point system isn’t literal, it gives a good idea of how the Gmail system actually works.

You want to be one with the tech and get the best deliverability possible, so therefore you will want to put most of your time into the Gmail aspect rather than other providers.

What you’ll find is, Gmail subscribers make up the majority of your list – so your time is best spent focusing on the deliverability issue there.

Gmail will also analyse your emails content such as images, body copy, from name, subject line, links and more.

Every single piece of content inside the email has an incremental effect on inbox placement.

It’s for this exact reason that we advise brands to NEVER upload pure image slices as their emails.

This is a sure way to land in spam for the rest of human existence.

Gmail analyses content rigorously – it knows what emails are marketing emails based on the content.

For example, when two (normal) people email each other back and forth, they aren’t sending a bunch of images.

So when your marketing emails are all image slices, it immediately scream’s “marketing email”. Simply because, scammers looking to make infinite monies use all image based emails too.

As a result, in general, Gmail does not like image based emails.

It’s crucial that you feature some live buttons and text (HTML), even if it is just a few. See above.

If you do include this then you will show gmail that you aren’t a scammer and can be trusted to be put in at least the promotions tab in the worst case scenario.

If you don’t include this then you can guarantee that you won’t ever be trusted by gmail and forever fight an uphill battle with driving revenue from your email campaigns.

If you do this well then you will consistently land in the primary tab and rain make every time you send and email campaign.

If you do this poorly then you will struggle to land in the primary tab and bounce from primary, to promotions, to spam. Every time you email your master list and don’t get a perfect engagement… your results will tank.

Gmail will also scan your emails for anything that may appear as spammy and place your emails in either Primary, Promotion, or Spam based on the scan.

** Spam content analysis from deliverability test.

** Trigger words will set off spam filters.

Despite this, the main determinant of deliverability and inbox place ment is the health of your domain.

An unhealthy domain means you’ll be flagged as untrustworthy by Gmail.

Whereas a healthy domain means you’ll be trusted by Gmail.

To fix this, the first step in the process is to double check you’ve set up your MX, SPF, DMARC, and DKIM records on the domain you are using to send email. This is a basic rule that applies to all email domains regardless if you are sending marketing material or not.

If that all sounds like gibberish to you (it did to me at first), these are basically just text records hosted in the DNS settings of your domain.

Think of it like your domain’s passport.

It essentially flashes up to say “I am not a complete scammer and you should let me get into the primary inbox” when you send an email.

It establishes and certifies the connection between the emails you are sending, and a reputable source, so the providers can be confident that you won’t be sending Nigerian Prince style emails.

At the base level, they help authenticate the sender which prevents the spam filters from blocking the emails.

You’ll probably find that they are already listed in your DNS settings, however, you’ll need to double check because if not… there is ZERO chance of getting placed in the primary inbox on Gmail.

This is step one.

Once you’ve validated that you have all of your DNS settings configured properly, it’s time to start getting points on the board.

The solution to getting your emails out of spam folder is by adjusting your sending patterns to start earning more points than what you’ve been losing in the past, (think of it like making a comeback in sports).

We want to consistently tell Gmail that the emails we are sending are actually interesting and are being received well by our recipients.

You will need to become a Gmail Whisperer and show the platform you can deliver exactly what it wants (a good user experience).

This is what we are doing when we are increasing the volume of positive points and decreasing the amount of negative ones.

We do this in two ways…

1. Segmenting campaigns.
2. Only activating very high engagement emails

Let’s talk about campaign segmenting first.

Create a segment of Gmail subscribers and for the first 30 days, we excluded these Gmail subscribers from your campaign sends.

If you are landing in spam on a specific mailbox provider, you want to cease sending to subscribers who use that provider until the deliverability issue is solved.

You’re going to create a segment of highly engaged Gmail subscribers and, for at least 30 days, only sent campaigns to these Gmail subscribers.

Segment out ALL gmail subscribers from your main send, duplicate the campaigns, and send only to highly engaged gmail subscribers.

These are the people that are going to positively interact with our emails which is exactly what we need. Enough of this over an extended period of time will assist in getting emails delivered back into the primary inbox.

And not only that – but making sure that we’re the emails at the right send times with the right frequency.

A little too often, and unsubscribe rates will shoot up.

Not often enough, and you won’t be driving as much enough revenue as you could be.

When it comes to sending times, it’s a little less relevant if you’re just starting out, but if you’re in the phase of making micro optimisations for incremental gains, it’s definitely worth looking at:

6AM (they just woke up).

10AM (first break after meetings).

1-2PM (work break).

4PM (commute home / finishing work).

6-8pm (before bed).

Tuesdays & Thursdays (avoid weekend rush).

To break things down even further, you’ve got a bunch of campaign styles at your disposal, and mixing things up is crucial to keeping things fresh and exciting.

Here are some ideas to sprinkle throughout your content calendar:

Promotional / Sales Focused: We all love a good deal, and your customers are no exception.

Send out emails showcasing limited-time offers, discounts, or exclusive sales to pique their interest and get them clicking.

But remember, no one likes being bombarded with sales pitches all the time, so be strategic with your promotional emails.

For instance, a Valentine’s Day sale, a summer clearance event, or a festive holiday promotion can really amp up your customers’ excitement and drive sales.

Keep them in mind as you craft your content calendar.

Some ideas for sales focused campaigns include:

• The “New Arrivals” campaign
• Discount campaigns
• Objection handling campaigns
• Product of the week campaigns
• VIP Customer Flash Sale

Informational/Content Focused:

Customers just want to be in the know.

Keep them informed with updates on new products, upcoming events, or company news.

Share valuable tips or how to’s that relate to your products, making your brand a trusted resource for your customers, crafting email content that’s not only relevant but also downright irresistible.

Some ideas for content/informational focused campaigns include:

• Product education emails
• UGC content re-purpose campaigns
• Blog spotlight campaigns
• Product of the week campaign

A dialed in email campaign strategy should generate you 50% of your total email attributed revenue and generate results like these:

Now that you’ve got the brand vision and content schedule planned out, your emails are landing in the primary inbox, and you have your list properly segmented, you will need to learn to write emails that can sell without looking like you’re cashing out.

As we discussed earlier, if you can’t actually drive revenue from your list, it’s not worth much and there will be a tonne of cash left on the table.

To stay agile across the board, you need to be squeezing every last dollar that you can (without seeming like you’re doing so).

To do this, there are two types of copy that you need to be writing:

→  Branded Copy and Direct Response Copy (or DR).

→ Branded copy is the type of copy that conveys your brand voice and builds brand equity with your audience.

This includes things like your brand messaging, tone of voice, and brand personality.

This is important because it helps to differentiate you from your competitors, builds trust with your audience, and ultimately drives brand loyalty.

However, branded copy alone isn’t enough to drive sales.

Branded Copy Example →

That’s where DR copy comes in.

DR stands for direct response, and this type of copy is designed to drive sales. This includes things like product descriptions, headlines, and calls-to-action that are designed to convert visitors into customers.

The goal of DR copy is to get someone to take action and buy right now. Without DR copy, you won’t be able to effectively sell your products.

Now you may be asking the question… “which one will work for my brand”.

You need both.

If you only focus on branded copy, you’ll have a beautiful emails and copy that no one buys from.

If you only focus on DR copy, you’ll have a website that converts, but no one will remember your brand, and you run the risk of burning your email list.

You need to strike a balance between the two.

On the other hand, if you can nail both types of copy, you’ll see some serious benefits.

You’ll build a brand that people love and trust, and you’ll be able to convert those people into paying customers.

Your branded copy will help you stand out in a crowded market, and your DR copy will help you close the sale.

So, don’t neglect either type of copy.

Make sure you’re putting in the time and effort to craft copy that sells AND copy that builds your brand.

It’s the only way to truly succeed in the eCom space where there are thousands of competitors flooding the market.

When it comes to writing DR copy for your eCom brand, there are a few frameworks that you can use to help you write copy that sells.

Two of the most popular frameworks are AIDA and PAS.

AIDA stands for Attention, Interest, Desire, and Action.

This framework is all about taking your reader on a journey from the moment they see your ad or landing page to the moment they take action and make a purchase.

The idea is that you need to capture their attention, build their interest, create a desire for your product, and then get them to take action.

PAS, on the other hand, stands for Problem, Agitation, and Solution.

This framework is all about identifying a problem that your customer is facing, agitating that problem to create a sense of urgency, and then offering a solution to that problem in the form of your product.

So, how do you use these frameworks to write copy that sells?

Well, it starts with understanding your audience and their pain points.

Once you know what they’re struggling with, you can use the PAS framework to write copy that speaks directly to that pain point and offers a solution.

For example, let’s say you sell a skincare product for people with dry skin. You might start with the problem:

“Are you tired of dealing with dry, flaky skin?”

Then, you could agitate that problem by talking about the negative effects of having dry skin: “Dry skin can be uncomfortable, itchy, and embarrassing.”

Finally, you offer your solution: “Our moisturising cream is specially formulated to hydrate and nourish even the driest skin, leaving you with a healthy, glowing complexion.”

Similarly, you can use the AIDA framework to write copy that takes your customer on a journey from start to finish.

You start by capturing their attention with a bold headline or eye-catching image.

Then, you build their interest with copy that speaks directly to their needs and desires.

Next, you create desire by highlighting the benefits of your product and how it can make their life better.

Finally, you close the deal with a strong call-to-action that encourages them to make a purchase.

By using these frameworks, you can write copy that is compelling, persuasive, and effective at driving sales for your eCom brand.

So, take the time to understand your audience and their pain points, and then use AIDA and PAS to craft copy that speaks directly to them and encourages them to take action.

You’ve probably seen and heard that ChatGPT has been taking over – but if you’re like any of the brand owners I know you probably haven’t had the chance to dive in as much as you’ve wanted to.

Leveraging AI in email marketing and copy can be a game-changer for your business. The benefits of using it as a tool in your email strategy are clear.

With AI, you can generate great ideas, save time, and increase your conversion rates.

Not to mention, AI can help you personalise your messages and make them more relevant to your audience.

By leveraging AI, you can ensure that your emails are always optimised and effective.

On the other hand, not using AI in your email marketing strategy can lead to missed opportunities, wasted time, and lost revenue.

Without AI, you may struggle to come up with new ideas for your emails, or spend hours drafting and editing copy that doesn’t convert.

You may also find it difficult to personalise your emails at scale, which can lead to lower engagement and fewer sales.

These problems are particularly relevant for most e-commerce brands, who rely heavily on email marketing to drive a good chunk of revenue and boost LTV.

Unfortunately it takes time and calories to figure out the best way to use it, but if you’re reading this now you can cut both out of the equation.

In the fast-paced e-commerce landscape, using it as a tool in your email marketing strategy is not just a nice-to-have, it’s a necessity.

While AI won’t replace copywriters, it can certainly make their job a lot easier and more efficient by generating great ideas that can be used to write better copy.

The first step to leveraging AI in email marketing is to create an AI that knows your brand and customer very well.

By feeding it information about your brand, brand voice, and customer, you can create an AI that can help you write more effective copy. Rather than just giving it directions, give it information to digest and then directions after.

You can also ask the AI to ask you a number of questions before providing an answer to ensure that it’s well informed.

Once you have your AI in place, you can prompt it to help you write emails.

Simply tell the AI the goal of the email and the specifics of the copy you need.

The AI can then generate copy that is tailored to your brand and your target audience.

But, AI-generated copy can sound robotic and impersonal if deployed without editing.

To make it sound more human-like, you’ll need to take the ideas generated by the AI and re-format them.

This involves adding a personal touch, tweaking the tone, and making the copy sound more natural and conversational.

The key is to use AI as a tool to enhance your writing process, rather than a replacement for human creativity and intuition.

Everyone wants to be the Gymshark of apparel, the Lumin of skincare or the Oodie of comfort wear.

There are new brands popping up out of nowhere who all want a piece of the market.

We’re seeing the big ad platforms like Facebook and Instagram simplify their software which allows any Joe Schmoe to create a new ad account and have ads live within a day.

Not to mention Sabri Suby bombarding everyone’s feed with his “free” book meaning EVERYONE knows how to market on paid social.

The barrier to entry has never been this low and people are taking advantage.

So how exactly has this affected the eCommerce Industry?

The smart business owners have adapted to the changing tides and we’ve seen this push toward native User Generated Content (UGC).

Consumers don’t want to feel like they’re being sold to anymore.

They’ve already seen hundreds of ads that look and feel the exact same and “salesy” ads are officially out of style.

They want to watch advertising content that is ACTUALLY engaging and displays real benefit to them.

Brands that have adopted UGC have built a loyal customer base of people who LOVE their brand because the User Generated ads are “non-salesy” and can even seem like it’s just a recommendation from a friend.

Not to mention the ad platforms are favouring UGC adopters because these types of ads engage users for longer and as a result, they end up spending more time on the platform.

UGC is clearly a powerful tool… BUT, most companies aren’t using it to it’s fullest potential.

At this point, most brands understand the importance of UGC when marketing to cold traffic…

But they don’t use it for their email marketing.

Similar to what has happened with the ad platforms, where users are constantly getting hit with ads that look the same…

Your email list subscribers are getting their inbox flooded with marketing messages from your direct competitors, their aunties and random email scammers.

So how do you ACTUALLY stand out?

Repurposing existing pieces of User Generated Content and featuring them in “Content Focused Emails.”

Content Focused Emails are designed to showcase all of the great content you’ve created for your business to build trust and engage your email list.

If you’re using UGC to nurture cold traffic, there’s no reason why you shouldn’t be doing the same with your email subscribers.

All we’re trying to do with content focused emails is get our subscribers to view our content over on the original platform.

We’re not asking for a sale or pushing any discounts.

At least not yet.

The whole goal is to get the list to watch our content.

When it comes time to send a sales email, we’ve already built in so much trust and our list has seen so much of our content… the orders will FLY in.

Now, although the goal with content focused emails isn’t to make sales, good content emails will still drive revenue.

Creating a top performing content email requires you to create eye-catching header GIF’s.

With the GIF creation process I’m about to outline… you can create interactive emails that hook the attention of your customer straight away.

Step 1: Download Your Piece Of Short Form Video as an MP4… Make Sure it’s A Good One:

The first step in creating a content focused email is to download the short-form video that you want to use in MP4 format.

* Side note: you don’t have to create brand new pieces of content for the emails. Use the same pieces of UGC you’re using in ads and organic content. This is a re-purposing strategy.

The video will be used to create a GIF that will serve as the main attention-grabber in your email.

You want the video to be a top performer because this is where you’ll be sending the bulk of your viewers that open the email.

Step 2: Upload Video to Canva and Select a GIF Video Clip:

Next, upload the MP4 video to Canva. Here, you’ll need to select a 1.5-3 second segment of the video that you want to turn into a GIF.

This segment should be visually appealing and showcase the best aspects of your piece of content. It will replay over and over in the inbox.

You might also want to add a play button over the video to make it clear to your email subscribers how to want them to interact with the GIF.

Step 3: Add an iPhone Border to the Video:

Once you’ve selected the GIF segment, add an iPhone border to the video.

By framing the content within a familiar device, it also helps create a sense of authenticity and relatability, resonating with your subscribers who view the email on their smartphones.

It also triggers a dopamine response in their brain because their so used to seeing pieces of content like this on the short-form platforms.

Make sure the iPhone boarder covers the entire outline of the video and there are no edges or corners sticking out.

Your final product should look something like this (would usually be animated)…

Step 4: Download the GIF and Add it as Your Email Hero Image:

After adding the iPhone border, download the file as a GIF and upload it as the header image of your email.

Link the GIF back to the original piece of content on the platform it’s hosted on.

This way, when subscribers click on the GIF, they’ll be redirected to the source where they will see your products in action.

Step 5: Add 3-5 Additional Pieces of Content to Complete the Campaign:

To create a well-rounded content-focused email campaign, add 3-5 other pieces of relevant content below the GIF header.

These could include other UGC videos, images, testimonials, or informative articles related to your brand etc.

By offering a variety of content, you’ll keep subscribers engaged and interested in your brand, ultimately driving revenue through increased trust and loyalty.

For specific detail on how to create the header GIF, see this explainer video breaking down the process in further detail.

To achieve high return on investment from email marketing, optimising the entire e-commerce funnel is mandatory.

Flows and campaigns alone simply won’t yield the desired results if your customer acquisition strategy is not effective.

Therefore, constantly acquiring new subscribers is essential to maintain a clean and healthy email list.

Ideally, email attributed revenue should be around 30-40%.

If it exceeds this range, it may indicate that your brand is struggling to attract new customers, which can adversely affect your company’s overall profitability.

It is crucial to remember that while email marketing is important, it should not be viewed as a magic solution that can save your business. Instead, it is a combination of all aspects of the marketing mix that can create a thriving eCommerce business.

Therefore, it is essential to optimise other core factors such as paid social ads, (inc. Google, Meta, Snapchat, and TikTok), and Conversion Rate Optimisation (CRO).

A high-quality paid ads strategy will consistently attract new customers and drive repeat purchases through email.

When optimising CRO, focusing solely on aesthetics is not always the best approach.

In fact, some of the highest converting websites prioritise functionality over design. Using a CRO checklist can ensure that every stage of your online store is optimised for conversions.

A good CRO strategy strikes a balance between aesthetics and functionality.

Neglecting the optimisation of these factors will limit the potential of email marketing. Consulting with experts in other aspects of the business can provide valuable insights and help maximise revenue.

The Next Steps

Option 1: Implement this yourself.

You can either run through this process yourself or have your team implement this in house.

However, mastering things like direct response copywriting, email deliverability, the correct way to leverage AI, and integrate user-generated content (UGC) will require significant time and resources from you and your team.

It is unlikely that you will be able to test things as efficiently as possible during this learning curve as you will have to focus on implementing everything correctly rather than optimising it.

Not to mention, handling all aspects of email marketing in-house may stretch your team thin, compromising the quality and effectiveness of your campaigns and other business areas. If you’re still doing it yourself, you might see areas like supply chain, operations, or media buying slip up as you divert focus.

You could hire one of the best copywriters in the world, however unfortunately it is rare that these people are looking for a job, and also rare that they will be well versed in the intricacies of Klaviyo.

All in all, it will take longer to see results.

Navigating the complexities of advanced email marketing without expert help could take 2-3 years before mastery, giving your competitors who are already leveraging these technologies an edge.

Option 2: Outsource to an agency or freelancer.

Another option is to hand off the responsibility to another agency…

But we know how that story normally goes. Amateur hour.

It typically becomes a scenario where you’re either hiring someone inexperienced who doesn’t know how to drive results, or you end up hiring a massive agency who just copy paste the same emails between clients and charge ridiculous amounts.

It might be better than nothing but certainly not ideal.

Option 3: Work with Strike Copy.

We only take on 1-3 clients per month so we can ensure a personalised and specialised customer experience.

We understand that the state of the agency space is absolutely ATROCIOUS so we distance ourselves from it as much as possible. Less clients, better results, higher ROI.

You’ll be able to see the vision of the brand leveraged in combination with lethal direct response copy, AI & UGC techniques, and deliverability hacks to drive the email channel to 30-50% of total revenue within 90 days.

You’ll be able to seamlessly collaborate with us using our SOP’s and frameworks, resulting in a more cohesive brand message and overall experience.

We will also help you optimise your entire funnel with consultations with members of our team who are currently spending $20M+ per year on paid media with wild profitability.

You’ll get all the benefits of outsourcing to an expert, with the level of integration of keeping it in house.

Again, this is for DTC e-Commerce brands already above 50k per month.

Book a call here.