The Retail Email Blog monitors the email marketing campaigns of more than 100 top online retailers. Here are highlights from my inbox this morning:Spiegel, 9/18 — Our Exclusive PERFECT-FIT PANTS + Fabulous Styling Tips!
Many people don’t have a good sense of how to wear clothes—or more specifically, what items to wear together. Email marketing is a great venue for suggesting clothing combinations and educating customers on how to pull off various looks. Presenting outfits with an rundown of the items in it is one way to do this. In this email, Spiegel starts with three different styles of pants and suggests two pairings for each. Not only does this approach help subscribers find the fit that’s best for them, but it also creates an upsell opportunity for the secondary items. To encourage sales of those secondary items, consider linking their images to their product pages. Spiegel lumped those secondary item images in with the pants image and linked it all to the page for the pants, forcing those interested in those other items to do a search for them.
Old Navy, 9/20 — Easy Layered Styles, Starting at $10Old Navy gives us another example of how to combine fashion education with an upsell opportunity, using a simple arithmetic format.
JC Whitney, 9/18 — Shift Into Fall With Free Shipping JC Whitney!
JC Whitney redesigns their email template, making a number of significant changes: (1) The design is about 20 pixels wider, but still under 650 pixels overall, which is a width that we’re recommending to our clients in most cases. For more on email width, check out
Soon Even More Emails Won’t Be Optimized for Width. (2) They expand their navigation bar from six links to 11, making it match the nav on their website. This is a move that we don’t recommend. They also construct their new nav using graphical text, instead of HTML text like they did before. For more on nav bars, check out
Email Navigation Differs Radically from Website Navigation. (3) JC Whitney adds a border to give the email more structure. I’ve seen several retailers—including Ann Taylor (see
Sept. 2 AM Inbox)—use background colors to create a frame around their email content for the same purpose. And (4) The new design features the search button much more prominently. Here’s the new design:
And here’s the old design from a Sept. 11 email:
SUBJECTIVITY SCANNER: Select noteworthy subject lines
Omaha Steak, 9/18 — EMAIL EXCLUSIVE! Better than Employee Prices . . . only 500 at this price!
Fingerhut, 9/18 — Fingerhut: FREE SHIPPING: Email ONLY Exclusive
Ann Taylor, 9/18 — Saturday & Sunday! 40% Off Private In-Store Event For Email Members
Lillian Vernon, 9/20 — Picture This: The 2010 Calendar is in, Order Yours Now
Oriental Trading, 9/18 — Get crafty for Halloween, let us pay your shipping
Finish Line, 9/18 — Show your support with the official shoe of the Susan G. Komen Race For The Cure!
Baby Universe, 9/20 — Free shipping on Halloween costumes and Eebee's adventures
ShopNBC, 9/18 — Suzanne Somers is here Join the Party
Ralph Lauren, 9/19 — Take A Front Row Seat: Spring 2010 Runway Show
Barnes & Noble, 9/18 — Oprah's New Pick Just Announced
Urban Outfitters, 9/18 — Where The Wild Things Are
NikeStore, 9/17 — Nike's New Marathon Shop: Get Ready for Race Day
Sam’s Club, 9/17 — Make your media room a multiplex: HDTV, Blu-ray and sound systems
PC Connection, 9/18 — Save Money and Use Less Energy With HP OfficeJet Pro Series Printers!
Coldwater Creek, 9/19 — Psst! Free Shipping + 30% off + Whisper corduroy is here!_____________________
SEARCH... By Post Category / By Selling Season / By Retailer / By Topic / Monthly Archive
