Best Practices Aren’t Always Best

Best email practices say every email flow, especially abandoned cart and post-purchase flows, should have an offer to encourage people to take action. But from my experience, that’s not always the case.

My agency has worked with a US sustainable clothing brand since March 2022.

They say no to using all kinds of incentives. “We’re not another discount or free gift brand. We’re running our business for a purpose. We’re different. We have a very loyal customer base who will buy from us without needing an X% or a $Y off” — she made it very clear to us.

The brand agrees to offer 10% off for new subscribers—and that’s all they’re willing to do.

I’m responsible for handling emails for this brand. With such limitations, I knew I had to be very creative with content and just focus on testing whatever non-incentive-related ideas I could come up with.

For example, for abandoned cart flow, I created three emails:

Email 1: Cart reminder. A personal message from the founder, saying the person left an item in their cart and offering support if they need any help.

Email 2: I reviewed their best-performing campaigns in the last six months and identified high converting elements. Sharing reviews and quality of materials were two winners. I used them to create an email tailored to abandoned cart customers.

Email 3: A short and straightforward last cart reminder.

I A/B tested a lot: messaging, word choice, CTA buttons, colors, delay time, you name it. After one month, I found a working framework for the three emails. And it has brought in revenue every month.

                                    Revenue from abandoned cart flow in June.

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Search “email marketing best practices,” and most of the time, you’ll see discount, free shipping, free gift, mysterious offer, or loyalty points in the list.

Undeniably, using incentives is effective in driving purchases. But if you want to stay true to your brand and don’t want to go that way, you can still do email flows and campaigns without needing to offer anything for free.

People might say, “you need a discount for abandoned cart flow,” or “your post-purchase flow doesn’t work because you don’t give away anything.”

Listen to their advice but don’t panic thinking you must do that. A/B testing different ideas, and remember, sometimes it takes time to find out what actually works.​That's it for today. Hope you find it helpful.