SNDR›New to email›What email marketing is
What email marketing is_□×

What is email marketing, for a small shop?

Email marketing is sending emails to people who have asked to hear from your shop. It comes in two kinds: campaigns, which you write and send on a day you choose, and automation, which sends itself when a customer does something.

Campaigns: the emails you choose to send

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A campaign is a one-off email to some or all of your list. You decide what it says and when it goes. A new product, a restock, a sale, a seasonal gift guide, a note about what you have been making this month. Most people picture campaigns when they hear "email marketing", because they are the part you can see.

Campaigns keep your shop in front of people who are not ready to buy today. Someone who signed up in March and has not ordered yet is still reading the subject lines. When the right product turns up, they already know who you are.

How often campaigns go out

Twice a month is a sensible start for most small shops. The full answer, with the warning signs that you are sending too much, is in how often to send marketing emails. If you would rather someone else wrote and scheduled them, that is the campaigns service.

Automation: emails that send themselves

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Automation (also called flows) is a set of emails that start when a customer does something. They sign up, so they get a welcome series. They leave items in the basket, so they get a reminder. They buy for the first time, so they get a thank you and, a few weeks later, a nudge towards a second order.

You build each flow once. After that it runs every day without anyone pressing send, and every email arrives at the moment it is most relevant to the person reading it.

The flows most shops start with

There are ten in total, set out in build order on the ten flows page.

Campaigns vs automation: where the money comes from

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Campaigns are the obvious half, so shops start there. Automation is usually where most of the email revenue ends up, because each flow email reaches one person at the moment they are already thinking about you, rather than the whole list on a Tuesday morning.

That does not make campaigns optional. A shop with flows and no campaigns goes quiet between orders. A shop with campaigns and no flows misses the baskets, the second orders and the people who signed up and never heard anything back. You need both, built in the right order: the welcome series and abandoned cart first, then a regular campaign habit, then the rest of the flows as the list grows.

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What email marketing is not

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It is not spam

Everyone on the list should have chosen to be there, and you should be able to say how. In the UK that is a legal requirement as well as good practice. The short version is in UK email marketing law.

It is not a bought list

A purchased list is people who never asked to hear from you. They do not open, some of them complain, and the damage to your sender reputation follows you onto the real list.

It is not only a newsletter

A monthly newsletter is one kind of campaign. On its own it leaves out every email that responds to what a customer actually does.

What you need to run both

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A domain you can authenticate, permission you can point to, a sign-up form, a platform and something worth saying. Each of those is explained on the New to email page. For the platform, the platform finder asks seven questions and suggests three that fit how you work.

When the reports start coming in, reading your numbers explains which ones matter and which ones to ignore. If a word in any of this is unfamiliar, the glossary has it in plain English.

Questions people ask

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Is email marketing still worth it for a small shop?

Yes. It is the one channel where you own the audience. Ads stop when you stop paying and social reach changes with the feed. A list keeps working for as long as you send to it properly.

Should I start with campaigns or automation?

Build the welcome series first, because it is what every new subscriber receives. Then the abandoned cart flow. Start a regular campaign habit alongside them.

How many people do I need on my list?

There is no minimum. A few hundred people who chose to hear from you are worth emailing. The welcome series pays off from the first sign-up.

Can I do this myself?

Yes, and plenty of shops do. The platforms are built for it. The hard part is keeping it going every month, which is the part most shop owners hand over.

Read next

Start hereNew to emailThe five things you need first and the first 90 days.ToolFind your platformSeven questions, three platforms that fit.GuideEmail versus social mediaWhy the list is the audience you own.
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