Lax Mariappan’s Post

Your Black Friday success won't be determined by how big of a discount you offer (although the price and offer are super important). It will be determined by the quality of the audience you offer it to. A huge list of unengaged people is useless. A small, engaged list is a goldmine. If you want your emails to actually get opened and clicked, you need to warm up your list now. Here are 3 things you can do this week to boost engagement: 1. Prune the Unengaged: Send a "last chance" email to subscribers who haven't opened your emails in 90 days. Be direct: "Is this goodbye? If you want to stay, click here." Purging inactive subscribers can improve deliverability and ensures you're only talking to people who want to be there. 2. Ask a Simple Question: Send a short email asking for a reply. Don't ask them to click or buy anything. Just ask a simple question related to what you do. For a coach: "Are you struggling more with X or Y?" 3. Serve: Provide value directly within the email itself. Instead of just saying "New blog post is live!," share the most valuable tip from the blog post right in the email. Give them a win without asking for a click. But let's be honest. An engaged email list is a powerful tool, but it's still just one tool. If your engaged list clicks over to a confusing sales page, or if your offer isn't crystal clear, that engagement dies on the vine. Views, opens, and clicks don't pay the bills, a connected system does. This is the difference between having tools in a toolkit and having the blueprint to build the house. An engaged list is your foundation, but you still need the walls, the wiring, and the roof to make it a revenue-generating asset. Are your marketing "tools" connected to a blueprint? Let me know what your favorite tool is in the comments.

Gmail just dropped something that'll improve the performance of your emails. But you have to implement it! And honestly? Perfect timing for Black Friday. Google recently rolled out "Deal Cards" in the Promotions tab, and here's what's happening: Deal Cards are auto-generated summaries that appear at the very top of your promotional emails; it shows your offer before subscribers even see your creative: your discount, promo code (with a copy button), expiry date, and action buttons. All in prime position. Why this matters: - Maximum visibility. Your offer is the first thing recipients see. - Reduced friction. Everything's at a glance, especially on mobile. - Higher engagement. Actionable buttons in prime real estate can boost click-through rates significantly. The catch? This isn't automatic. You need to add schema markup (DiscountOffer type) to your email's HTML. This is part of a bigger trend we've been tracking for years with Gmail rewarding brands that use structured data (look so cool in the inbox!). I've implemented similar features like Google product carousels and deal previews for clients who wanted to maximise every opportunity in the inbox. Implementing this ahead of Black Friday is smart timing. Don't let your offers get lost in inbox noise. If you're not leveraging schema markup, drop me a DM and I can guide you through it! This is low-hanging fruit that adds that little something to your emails - that je ne sais quoi that makes subscribers stop and click.

Black Friday used to be a day. Now it’s a season. And brands are going earlier than ever, for good reason: Consumer fatigue is real. By the time actual Black Friday lands, inboxes are overflowing and customers are numb to discounts. Early campaigns cut through before the noise peaks. Cash flow relief. Bringing sales forward by even a week or two can transform November cash flow, giving you the liquidity to fund ads, incoming stock, and freight before the chaos hits. Avoid the postage bottleneck. Each year, postage networks hits capacity and delivery times stretch from 2-3 days to 7-10. Launching early means fewer delays, happier customers, and less stress for your ops team. Easier to hire casual staff. When your peak comes before everyone else’s, you’re not competing for the same short-term talent pool. Ads are cheaper. CPMs and CPCs spike mid-November. Going early means lower competition, stronger ROAS, and more efficient spend. And you still have optionality. Start early, then double down on actual Black Friday with a “last chance” or bonus offer. It’s extra revenue, not missed opportunity. The early birds aren’t impatient, they’re strategic. Are you launching early this year, or holding out for the big weekend?

⚡ The Power of an Early Access Waitlist There’s a reason top-performing brands always launch with a waitlist before Black Friday. It’s not just about collecting emails. It’s about building emotional investment before the sale even begins. When someone joins your waitlist, they’ve already committed their time and attention - two things that are incredibly scarce during peak shopping season. That simple act of signing up shifts their mindset from “maybe I’ll buy” to “I’m waiting for this.” And that anticipation is what drives higher conversion rates once early access opens. Here’s what actually makes waitlists so effective 👇 💡 Exclusivity creates focus: You’re speaking only to people who genuinely want what you’re selling. 🔥 Engagement boosts performance: These subscribers open more, click more, and help improve your sender reputation naturally. 🎯 Momentum builds trust: By the time your sale goes public, inbox algorithms already recognize your brand as high quality. To get the best results, make your waitlist feel like a privilege, not just another sign-up form. Offer first access, limited products, or a small loyalty reward that makes joining feel special. This isn’t just a pre-sale tactic. It’s the start of your Black Friday momentum. 💥 #EmailMarketing #BlackFridayStrategy #EcommerceTips #RetentionMarketing #LifecycleMarketing #MarketingStrategy

It's Black Friday month. Please make life easier for your clients I know you want your reports to look aesthetically pleasing, but that's not the goal I see reports that would've been better off as Google Docs or simple spreadsheets. Instead, it's fancy charts and graphs that just cause problems Your client now has to spend extra time trying to understand what they're looking at. That's if they even bother before closing it And you don't need to present every single metric. Just show them the most important ones and add notes that explain your reasoning. That's it The report is not for you. It's for the client. Present it in a way that's easy to understand and not cluttered This will also save you from wasting hours on reports that don't get read. And it'll save you from having to walk them through it again because they couldn't make sense of it the first time Keep it simple..

Black Friday emails aren’t won in November — they’re built in March. Every year, brands panic when November hits. Suddenly, inboxes get flooded, domains get flagged, and engagement tanks. But the truth is that deliverability doesn’t care about your discount. It only cares about your history. Strong Black Friday performance starts months earlier when you’re cleaning your list, warming your domain, and keeping subscribers engaged long before the hype. By the time November comes, inboxes already know who’s trustworthy and who’s spammy. Email isn’t a sprint — it’s conditioning. And those who train early always perform better under pressure. P.S. If you’re only just “getting ready” for holiday sends in Q4… you’re already late.

Is it too early to think about Black Friday? Many businesses lose the opportunity before it even begins. While it might seem premature, savvy businesses are already strategizing their offers, content, and inventory ahead of the rush. If you're feeling overwhelmed by the upcoming holiday season, you're not alone. Numerous small businesses find themselves reacting rather than preparing. That is why I created “7 AI Prompts to Dominate Black Friday and Holiday Marketing.” It is a practical, high-impact prompt chain built to help you plan smarter, sell with confidence, and finish the year strong. Each prompt helps you: ✅ Understand market and competitor trends ✅ Build your seasonal strategy with purpose ✅ Craft offers that truly convert ✅ Create scroll-stopping content with AI ✅ Launch and optimize your campaign with confidence You can use them one by one or together as a complete workflow. They work with any AI tool you prefer, ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, or others. 💡 Before you start: Replace the placeholders in [brackets] with your real business context. The clearer your inputs, the more tailored your results will be. 👉 Swipe through the carousel to see all 7 prompts. Save it, test one today, and tag another small business owner who is gearing up for the holiday season.

If your Black Friday plans are still sitting in a Google Doc, or worse, your head … you’re not alone.   Most of our clients are just getting their plans locked in now. And it’s not too late.   Here’s the truth: A simple, strategic plan will outperform a chaotic campaign every time.   Here’s a simple recipe for a winning Black Friday campaign: ✔️ One irresistible offer ✔️ A dedicated product collection or landing page ✔️ Two emails a week (yes, that’s enough) ✔️ Repeat messaging across your socials   That’s it.   No panic posting. No 37 content ideas. No burnout.

Stress your systems, not your engineers! Halloween just passed 🎃, but with Black Friday around the corner, for companies without a solid load-testing strategy it might come back at the end of the month 👻! One of the most effective ways to prepare is through Stress Testing 😬 Here are 5 simple rules for performing the test: 1️⃣ Aim for realistic numbers. Testing at around 1.5× your expected load is enough for most cases. Modern Black Friday deals are more balanced, with fewer “10 products at 90% off” meaning systems need less extreme elasticity. 2️⃣ Do the tests in time. A test done too early can become irrelevant as dependencies change. But a test done too late is even worse, as time to change will be scarce and the risk profile will increase, making the situation unpredictable. 3️⃣ Trust, but verify. Calling Service A often triggers requests to B, C, and D. If any of the other services gets updated, even if the team swears “the change won't affect performance” --> trust, but verify and run the test again. 4️⃣A negative result stress test is positive outcome. It may sound counterintuitive, but an “errorful” test helps identify bottlenecks. Whether in the service, database, or infrastructure layers, this will lead to sessions where that will be slowly removed, up until the next bottleneck! 5️⃣ Document your results. Track your load test numbers year over year. It’s invaluable for understanding system evolution, performance trends, and supporting discussions about maintenance budgets and technical debt. Doing these simple steps will make sure the developers will have time to focus on operations and consistent order flows 🧘♂️, rather than entering a hyperbaric chamber.

Stuff you need to do RIGHT NOW before Black Friday (Part 1) Black Friday is weeks away and I'm already seeing brands make a massive mistake. They're about to blast their entire email list with emails every day for a week straight. No warning. No choice. Just full-on email assault. Here's what's going to happen: massive unsubscribe waves and destroyed sender reputation. Smart brands do this differently. Send a pre-Black Friday preference email NOW: Give people the option to: ➡️ Temporarily opt-out of promotional emails during Black Friday week ➡️ Choose how many emails they want to receive (1, 3, or 5 per week) ➡️ Select which types of offers they're interested in ➡️ Stay subscribed but skip the chaos This ONE email will save you thousands of subscribers. Here's what happens when you do this: ✅ People feel respected (you're giving them control) ✅ Unsubscribe rates during Black Friday drop dramatically ✅ The people who DO want your emails are more engaged ✅ Your sender reputation stays healthy ✅ You show you actually care about their inbox Most brands lose 5-10% of their list during Black Friday because they just blast everyone with zero warning. You can avoid this completely by sending one simple preference email this week. The brands that crush Q4 aren't just the ones with the best offers, they're the ones who maintain healthy lists and good deliverability. Have you sent your preference email yet? Or are you planning to just blast away and hope for the best? Ps. I'll be sharing more Black Friday prep tips over the next few days. Follow along so you don't miss them! 😎