| Good morning, Marketer, what does your holiday email marketing strategy look like? With the holidays looming and the pandemic still in full force, marketing during the gift-giving season is going to look a lot different this year. So what should marketers expect to do differently? “Besides the obvious steps – looking at the data, defining your authenticity, and getting in touch with why people like and engage with your brand – you need to seriously consider what you will do differently this year,” wrote Ryan Phelan, co-founder of Origin Email. Phelan offered three key predictions for email marketing as we head into the holidays: 1. Forget your focus on the subject line. It’s what’s inside that counts. Phelan urges marketers to consider how to make email content resonate more with customers and differentiate from everything else in the inbox. 2. Use real-time content to make a difference. Make it easy for customers to connect by offering real-time value in the email. Examples include showing the customer’s nearest store, surfacing real-time promotions and sales banners, or even displaying a dynamic videocast based on the audience segment. 3. Be prepared for your “screaming down the hall” moment. “If you’ve spent enough time in retail email marketing, you know exactly what I mean,” Phelan said. “It’s the moment somebody checks the numbers and runs down the hallway to your cubicle, shouting, ‘We need to send another email!’ You can defend against the mayhem by creating default campaigns targeted to preselected segments and using easily updated message templates.” Take care, Taylor Peterson,
Deputy Editor | 