Email marketing and user acquisition challenges

An ecommerce company recently approached my team to do an email audit as they were facing challenges with low open and click-through rates. After analyzing their email account, here are our main recommendations to revive their email marketing channel: 1. Strategic Email Segmentation: Currently, your emails lack personal relevance due to a one-size-fits-all approach. This is a crucial area to address. Action Plan: Implement segmentation based on purchase history, engagement levels, browsing behavior, and demographic information. 2. Personalized Content Creation: Generic content won't cut it. Your audience needs to feel that each email is crafted for them. Action Plan: Develop emails specifically tailored to the different segments. This includes curated product recommendations, personalized offers, and content that aligns with their interests. 3. Subject Line A/B Testing: Your current subject lines aren't doing their job. You need to be implementing ongoing A/B subject line tests, as this is low-hanging fruit to improve your open rates. Action Plan: Regularly test different subject line styles and formats to identify what resonates best with each segment. Keep track of the metrics to inform future campaigns. 4. Mobile Optimization: A significant portion of your audience reads emails on mobile devices. Neglecting this is causing a decrease in your email engagement rates. Action Plan: Ensure all emails are responsive and visually appealing on various screen sizes. Test your emails on multiple devices before sending them out. Additional Campaign Strategies We Recommend: - Launch a Monthly Newsletter: This should include new arrivals, style guides, and user-generated content. It’s an excellent way to keep your brand in the minds of your customers. - Seasonal Campaign Integration: Tailor your campaigns to align with holidays and seasons. This approach can significantly boost engagement and sales during key periods. - Re-Engagement Campaigns: Specifically target subscribers who haven't interacted with your brand recently. Offer them unique incentives to rekindle their interest. Next steps: 1. If you found this helpful, please leave a comment and let me know. 2. If you own/run/work at an Ecommerce company doing at least $1 million in annual revenue, message me so my team can audit your email channel to see if there's a good fit for working together.

𝐒𝐮𝐛 𝟏𝟎% 𝐨𝐩𝐞𝐧 𝐫𝐚𝐭𝐞𝐬 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐮𝐧𝐝𝐞𝐫 𝟎.𝟓% 𝐂𝐓𝐑. 𝐀 𝐧𝐢𝐠𝐡𝐭𝐦𝐚𝐫𝐞 𝐟𝐨𝐫 𝐦𝐚𝐫𝐤𝐞𝐭𝐞𝐫𝐬 𝐭𝐫𝐲𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐭𝐨 𝐝𝐞𝐩𝐥𝐨𝐲 𝐜𝐚𝐦𝐩𝐚𝐢𝐠𝐧𝐬 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐨𝐟𝐟𝐞𝐫𝐬 𝐭𝐡𝐫𝐨𝐮𝐠𝐡 𝐞𝐦𝐚𝐢𝐥. Something had to change! Here’s what we did 🌟  ↴ Community Insights: ↳I reached out to operators in ClubPF ⚓︎, Pavilion, and other communities, and LinkedIn to learn from their email campaign strategies. Focused Segmentation: ↳ We noticed that the top marketers and ops professionals were creating highly engaged audience segments. We reduced our audience size by 90%, focusing on: → Last email opened from sales/marketing → Recent website visits → Event registration/attendance → Asset downloads or form submissions Building Engagement: ↳ We enriched contact details and evaluated titles, companies, goals, challenges, and content engagement across emails and our website. Gathering Feedback: ↳ We contacted 20+ engaged contacts to understand their email preferences, knowledge gaps, and content consumption habits. Strategic Expansion: ↳ We expanded our list by 5-10% weekly, monitoring performance closely. Within 3 weeks, we saw: 20%+ open rates 1.5%+ CTRs By the end of the quarter, our segmented email campaigns achieved a 30%+ open rate! Key Takeaways 💡: 👉 People-First Approach: Engage internally with the best team and externally with your audience. 👉 Data-Driven Decisions: Use engagement signals to create focused segments. 👉 Continuous Improvement: Regularly gather feedback and adjust strategies. ✨ This journey was about putting people first, aligning our team, and delivering value to our audience. The results speak for themselves! S/o to Ritakshi J. Sagar Mishra and Soumyajit Chakladar - we worked week after week to make this happen! Picture Context - Winter in Boston in 2010. Sometimes this is what being a GTM Operator feels like 🤣 #EmailMarketing #GTM #datadriven

With CAC rising is EMAIL the? UK’s Most Underrated Acquisition Channel? In the UK, email is often underestimated in terms of customer acquisition. Meanwhile, in the U.S., it's a top-performing channel, with 81% of businesses using for acquisition (v. 80% for retention), with an average ROI of $36 for every $1 spent (DMA) you can understand why. So why the disconnect in the UK? A big part of it comes down to GDPR & perceived limitations around high-quality data. But after sending billions of acquisition emails for some of the UK’s biggest brands, I can say with confidence: email works—when done right. Here are my top 10 tips for using email as a scalable acquisition tool & ensuring you qualify traffic: 1. 🚫 Don't buy or rent data to send emails yourself Sender reputation determines inbox placement. You could buy the best list, but if you haven't engaged with them before, you are unlikely to inbox. Only work with senders who mail their data. (nb. Delivery is everything to them, so they will ensure your offer drives engagement or they wouldn't send) 2. 🤝 Trust senders to know their audience Ask providers what’s historically performed well—designs, content, send times. Use their insight to maximise your campaign effectiveness. 3. 🧪 ROI rarely comes from a single send Create a structured testing programme. Experiment with subject lines, creative formats, audiences, timing. Think performance, not one-and-done. You wouldn't run a one hit wonder on meta - so don't do it on email. 4. 🔁 Use a multi-touchpoint approach Just like paid media or social, consumers need multiple exposures before they convert. Plan repeat sends to build familiarity and intent. 5. 🖼️ Tell your story, but make it scannable Email gives you space—use it! Combine visuals, GIFs, storytelling. But keep it easy to skim, with prominent CTAs. Guide the reader clearly. 6. 🙅♀️ Skip the “Hi [First Name]” In acquisition, personalisation by name isn’t effective. You haven’t earned a relationship yet—focus on value and relevance first. 7. ✨ Nail your above-the-fold content The top section drives most engagement. Make sure your primary USP shines here. Grab attention fast, and give users a reason to click. 8. 👁️ Think beyond opens—email is brand awareness Even unopened emails contribute. People read subject lines and from-names when deciding what to engage with. An email from “M&S – 50% Off Sale” makes an impact, even if it’s deleted. 9. 📊 Question low open rates Thanks to auto-image loading, open rates are often inflated. So if your open rates are low, it may point to real quality issues—look deeper. 10. 🚀 It can be a pure acquisition channel Email makes it easy to exclude existing customers. Clean deduplication ensures you're reaching only new potential buyers. Email isn’t just a retention tool—it’s a powerhouse for acquisition, brand visibility, and testing at scale. UK marketers who embrace its potential will unlock a competitive edge that many are still missing.

Why 90% of Email Marketing Campaigns Fail? Your prospects' inboxes are battlefields. Hundreds of brands compete for that coveted Primary tab spot, yet most marketers are fighting with broken weapons. Here's the reality: Email marketing is a science, not an art. Most campaigns fail because they skip the fundamentals. The #1 Mistake: Bad Targeting. Before you worry about subject lines, nail your ICP. Ask yourself: • What stage of growth is your ideal customer in? • What specific triggers create urgency for your solution? • When do they have budget availability? • Who are the real decision-makers? Generic targeting tools often aren't enough. The best campaigns use custom AI agents to identify prospects based on complex behavioral patterns and real-time triggers. Fresh, receptive leads always outperform spray-and-pray approaches. Technical Foundation (Most Skip This): ✅ Use lookalike domains (protect your main domain) ✅ Set up SPF, DKIM, and DMARC properly ✅ Warm up your sender reputation gradually ✅ Verify your lists (bad emails = spam folder) ✅ Test actual inbox placement Precision Over Volume: Stop sending 1,000 generic emails. Start sending 100 highly targeted ones to prospects who: Match your exact ICP Are at the right buying stage Have recent trigger events Actually need your solution NOW Bottom Line: While everyone else is being lazy with their email marketing, those who execute properly are seeing incredible results. The competition is fierce but surprisingly weak. The opportunity is massive for those willing to do the work right. Want the complete playbook? I've written a detailed guide covering everything from ICP development to technical setup. Link in the comments 👇 Found this helpful? Hit like and share to help other marketers level up their email game! 🚀

Bigger isn't always better. Sometimes size is a hindrance, rather than an advantage. Brands love to brag about the number of addresses on their mailing lists, but size isn't everything! An oversized list that under-performs, bloats your marketing costs, and contributes to deliverability problems is hardly boast-worthy. In the simplest equation, sending more emails = making more money. I don't dispute that entirely, I'm not a monster. The problem is what that calculation fails to account for: the potential for lost revenue later, when mail gets delayed, sent to the spam folder, or rejected completely. Most likely, sending more mail to some users does net more profit! But sending more mail to others does more harm than good without additional considerations being made for list quality, prior engagement, and purchase history. Let's unpack the risks in blasting another sale announcement to your full list: 🎒 An address that never confirmed opt-in could be a spam trap that contributes to a blocklisting. Or, it could be a real, disinterested person who's one message away from reporting your mail as spam and damaging your reputation in the process. Impactful blocklistings and excessive complaints can both result in mail being being rejected outright. Instead of more mail & more money, your users get no mail and you end up with no money. 🎒 A user who hasn't opened/clicked the last few emails they've received could be dormant, over-quota (stuffed full of mail and unable to accept more), or a spam trap, none of which contribute positively to your bottom line. 🎒 If you're planning on sending mail beyond your typical daily volume or attempting to re-engage lapsed users, you could be penalized if that additional volume doesn't respond positively to your overtures. Target users thoughtfully, with regard to their prior interaction with your messages (or lack thereof). 🎒 Remember that waning engagement could mean some special Gmail or Apple user is just waiting for the perfect offer before converting, but it could also mean that special someone reported your mail as spam previously and your messages are now delivering straight to their spam folder, languishing unopened. #deliverability

If I wanted to launch email marketing for an ecom brand in Q3 of 2025, here are 7 pieces of advice I'd follow religiously: (pulled from helping 150+ brands drive over $100M in revenue) 1) TRACK THE RIGHT METRICS If you believe "email marketing = 30% extra revenue", you’re about to get a real kick in the pants. This number is total BS. There’s no solid data backing it up. So focus on metrics that actually matter: - How many email subs are you gaining vs losing? - What can you improve through A/B testing? - Are you maximizing UGC and reviews? - Are you using ZPD to help your acquisition team create better ads? - How effective are your abandoned cart strategies? - Is your email deliverability improving? For one-time buys, track how fast subscribers convert. For repeat-purchase products, focus on getting that second buy. 2) FOCUS ON THESE EMAIL FLOWS: Pop-ups. Welcome flows. Abandoned cart flows. Post-purchase flows. That's it. They're quick to set up, & they start working for you right away. Pop-ups capture new leads. Welcome flows nurture those leads & start building a relationship. Abandoned cart flows recover lost sales. 3) MAXIMIZE THE FIRST 24-48 HOURS All top ecom brands do one thing: they strike while the iron’s hot. Most new subs decide to buy within 24–48 hours, so you can’t afford to just drip content slowly & hope for the best. You need 1–3 punchy welcome emails on day one that: - deliver instant value - showcase product benefits + success stories - offer a killer discount to seal the deal 4) PLAIN TEXT > TOO MUCH DESIGN Yes, your HTML emails look great & good design is still king for established brands. But when every inbox is full of polished templates, a plain text email is a powerful pattern interrupt. It feels personal, direct, & real. Plus, it’s faster to build, better for deliverability, & often outperforms fancy designs when used right. 5) OVERSEGMENTATION SUCKS If you’re spinning out endless email versions for every tiny segment, the tiny gains won’t justify the extra effort and it’ll actually hurt your ROI. Usually, one or two solid, well-targeted versions get the job done just fine. 6) GROCERY LIST EMAILS DON'T SELL "New arrivals! 20% off! Check out our blog! Follow us on Instagram!" These emails trying to do everything at once feel like a chaotic grocery list. Instead, pick a lane & drive attention to one clear action. 7) TAKE A HARD LOOK AT HOW YOU COLLECT &  NURTURE LEADS If you’re gaining 1,000 new subs but losing 900, you're barely growing. To fix both acquisition and retention, ask yourself: Is our lead magnet irresistible? Are our signup forms frictionless? Are our CTAs placed where they convert? Are we running consistent engagement campaigns? Is our list segmented by behaviour, interests, or demo? --- Email isn’t dead. It’s just badly used by most brands. If you nail these, you’ll build a retention machine that floods your brand with repeat buyers & serious revenue.

Most email marketing fails for one simple reason... People send emails without respecting where the customer actually is in the journey. Email isn’t a single lever. It’s a sequence of touchpoints that should evolve as trust grows. Here’s the birds-eye view of the customer journey, and how email should support each stage 👇 1. Cold (Never heard of you) This audience doesn’t need offers. They need awareness. Your job here is simple: Introduce the problem you solve and earn the right to be remembered. 2. Aware, but not convinced They’ve heard of you. They’re curious. Now they need education. Email becomes the teacher. Stories, insights, frameworks, and examples that build trust & understanding without pressure. 3. Educated, but hesitant They know what you do. They just haven’t committed yet. This is where email shifts into persuasion. Social proof, objections addressed, outcomes demonstrated. Not hype. Confidence. 4. Happy customer Most brands stop here. Big mistake. This stage is about action. Repeat purchases. Deeper engagement. Advocacy. Email becomes the relationship manager, not the salesperson. When you zoom out and map the journey like this, email stops being “campaigns” and starts becoming infrastructure. Same channel. Different intent. Different message. That’s how email compounds over time.

Brands are lighting money on fire - and calling it email marketing. Here’s how the top 1% of brands use identity resolution to 3x repeat sales: 🧵 The problem isn't your subject lines or send times. It's that you don't know who you're talking to. With iOS updates and cookie deprecation, traditional tracking is broken. Yet most DTC brands still send generic emails to everyone. Smart brands use identity-aware flows that adapt in real time. They know Sarah bought 3 times vs. Mike who's browsing for the first time. Dynamic personalization examples: • Returning customer sees UGC from previous purchase • New visitor gets shipping reassurance + incentive • High-value buyer gets personalized offers • VIP customers skip generic flows entirely Many brands don't know if their cart abandoner is a first-timer or repeat buyer. This means they're leaving money on the table every day. Smart brands resolve unknown visitors into complete customer profiles. They connect session behavior to purchase history instantly. Here are zero-party data strategies that actually work: • Interactive quizzes that sync to email profiles • Post-purchase surveys that reveal acquisition source • Smart popups that personalize based on user resolution • Progressive profiling that builds customer understanding over time For retention, stop treating customers like strangers. Route power users to bundle promos instead of 10% discounts. Show loyal customers exclusive products, not generic sales. At Opensend, we turn unknown visitors into CRM-ready identities. They enrich profiles automatically and sync behavior across platforms. If your email strategy relies on guesswork, performance will be limited. When you build owned channels on identity intelligence, everything changes. Higher open rates, better conversion, stronger retention. All because you finally know who you're talking to. The brands winning in 2025 treat personalization as infrastructure, not tactics.unk

Your email campaigns are crushing it. Open rates up 30%. Click-through rates are soaring. Then suddenly... crickets. What gives? Here's what nobody tells you about scaling email marketing: success breeds failure. As a skilled product manager, you know best that the growth needs to be ongoing, not come with a spike or a few spikes. When you go from sending 1,000 emails to 50,000 overnight, email providers get suspicious. Your sender reputation takes a hit. Messages start landing in SPAM folders instead of inboxes. I've watched promising startups lose months of momentum because they didn't see this coming. Their product was solid, their messaging was on point, but their emails simply stopped reaching customers. One founder told me they lost 3 months of growth because password reset emails weren't reaching new users. Imagine losing customers because they literally couldn't log in. The solution isn't sending fewer emails (that's growth suicide). It's understanding that email deliverability is infrastructure, not marketing. Smart founders treat it like server capacity. So, something you prepare for BEFORE you need it. This means gradually warming up your sending domains, establishing trust with email providers, and monitoring your sender reputation like you monitor your uptime. Tools like Warmy.io - Email channel. Reliable. , a partner of this post can automate this process, helping maintain your sender reputation as you scale. But the key insight is planning ahead, not reacting after damage is done. With this choice, you get: • Automated Deliverability: No configuration headaches, just reliable inbox placement. • Time and Cost Efficiency: No dev resources wasted on constant updates. • Built-in Compliance: GDPR and security taken care of, so you can focus on strategy. • Scalability on Demand: Whether it’s 100 or 10,000 emails, Warmy scales without breaking a sweat. • Expert Support: Real deliverability specialists ready to help when things get tricky. Your growth strategy shouldn't break your communication channel. Because what's the point of acquiring customers if you can't talk to them? Do you struggle with promoting your product? Looking forward to your comments! #productmanagement #emaildelivery  #productmanager