It’s easy to use email campaign marketing to simply send newsletters and brand-related content. But that’s squandering the power email has to inspire and fuel loyalty among customers. Here’s how you can use email to drive brand loyalty during your client’s next campaign.

How to Drive Loyalty with Email Campaign Marketing

Email and Consumer Loyalty Drive Sales

Before we dive into the how, let’s talk about why loyalty-driven email campaign marketing is worth it. According to a study by Marigold, 50% of consumers made purchases from emails within the last year. That’s more than:

Social Media Ads: 48%
Social Media Posts: 43%
SMS/MMS Messages: 24%
Banner Ads: 21%

When you add consumer loyalty to the mix, that stat gets even better. 63% of consumers are willing to pay more to shop with brands they’re loyal to. Another 65% are so loyal to their favorite brands that if the nearest brand location was closed on a day they wanted to go shopping, they’d go out of their way to go to the brand’s next closest location.

What Email Traits Inspire Customer Loyalty?

Consumers are tired of brand-centric messages. They care more about what your client’s brand offerings can do for them. So, personalization is the key to effective email campaign marketing.

Email characteristics that inspire the highest levels of customer loyalty are:

When brands treat each customer as an individual: 85% of consumers agree
Personalized birthday offers: 84%
Product recommendations based on their past purchases: 80%
Personalized offers tailored to their interests: 78%

Overall, to inspire loyalty, your client’s email campaign marketing needs to prioritize cultivating genuine connections through personalized content that makes consumers feel like VIPs, says Marigold.

What to Promote in Emails

Here are the types of email campaign marketing content that consumers are the most likely to engage with:

Loyalty program promotions: 84% of consumers are likely to engage with these emails
Discounts and coupon codes: 84%
Sales promotions and holiday coupons: 80%
Offers tailored to each recipient’s interests: 78%
Product announcements: 76%
Exclusive VIP offers: 75%

No matter what content your client chooses to utilize, make sure it’s hyper-relevant. Aim for content that has been personalized as well as possible to each recipient. According to Marigold, consumers “seek timeliness, relevance and an individualized touch – email continues to be the optimal channel for marketers to deliver on these fronts.” Personalization is the deciding factor on whether consumers will make a purchase or click unsubscribe.

How to Keep Consumers Loyal

Consumers say that the following are important factors when it comes to keeping them loyal to their favorite brands:

A wide range of product choices: 79%
Offers and promotions: 74%
Customer service and support: 74%
Quality products and/or services: 72%
Loyalty programs: 67%

Loyalty programs are a HUGE part of maintaining your client’s hard-earned customer loyalty. First and foremost, consumers love loyalty programs. Secondly, according to a previous SalesFuel blog based on data from ebbo, loyalty programs offer brands benefits such as:

Increased sales: 84% of loyalty members feel more inclined to shop with brand with fun and rewarding loyalty programs
Keeping the brand top-of-mind to consumers: 80% say they think about the brand more often after joining the program
Bigger sales: 78% spend more once they join a loyalty program
More shopping trips: 78% say they shop more times per year with brands that offer loyalty programs that they love
More frequent engagement: 77% engage more with brands once they’ve joined a program

To learn how to craft the best loyalty program and create effective email campaign marketing to advertise it, check out the Loyalty Card/App Users profile on AudienceSCAN on AdMall by SalesFuel.

Photo by: Boudewijn Huysmans