If you think you can send out a monthly newsletter or one-off promotional blast when you need to drive sales to meet your targets, think again! Gone are the days of relying on one-off blasts and expecting customers to run and grab their credit cards. Customers are now looking for timely, relevant and personal communication from the brands they buy from. That’s where email workflows come in.
By automating sequences of emails triggered by customer actions or timelines, you can build relationships with customers that go far beyond their initial purchase, allowing you to nurture customers, reduce the strain on customer service teams and drive revenue growth.
An email workflow is a series of automated emails triggered by a customer’s actions. Unlike a one-off campaign or newsletters, workflows are designed to guide your customers through a structured journey.
For customers, it helps them to feel valued, builds trusts and makes them feel as though they’re getting added extras from your brand once they’ve made a purchase.
For your business, it’s a chance to nurture customer relationships, introduce upsell or cross-sell opportunities and build customer loyalty.
Examples of automated email journeys include:
When it comes to email, sending one-off blasts to promote a sale or your latest products is no longer enough. Customers now was to be communicated with in a personal way with communications that are relevant to them and which stage of the customer journey they’re in.
According to statistics, automated emails drove 37% of all email generated sales for brands, despite only accounting for just 2% of email volume. Email marketing ranks as the most effective channel for 41% of marketing professionals, outperforming social media and paid search.
Building workflows allows you to send the right messages to your customers at the right time. If you build them well, emails can be triggered based on the actions customers take such as a purchase, an abandoned basket or a newsletter sign up. This allows you to make your email communications feel seamless and more relevant to individual customers, without having to spend time sending out single emails or monitoring each customer!
Workflows provide the following benefits for your business:
Workflows are a great tool for improving customer communications and freeing up internal team’s time so they can focus on strategy rather than doing repetitive tasks. It also brings consistency to communications as you know every customer is receiving the same emails with the same message.
At Destination Digital, we’ve been working with some of our clients to build email workflows and help them improve customer relationships and drive revenue growth.
When a customer buys a log cabin or a timber garden building from Tuin, their journey doesn’t end at the checkout. Tuin customers often need support with delivery, storage, installation and beyond. Without any communication, this process can feel overwhelming and leave customers wondering whether they made the right choice with the brand or whether a competitor might have offered more information.
With such an expensive purchase, customers want to feel reassured that their investment is safe and appreciate added contact and value from the business they’re buying from.
For Tuin, we developed workflows that act as a digital hand holding guide. An order confirmation tells customers that their order has been processed but we helped to develop a journey that provides customers with updates on their order and a ‘Welcome Pack’ with details on what they can expect from their delivery, extra installation support and care or maintenance tips.
The workflow is built using Netsuite CRM and the email flows sent out will be triggered by the type of product bought from Tuin.
This gives Tuin a chance to provide added value to customers throughout their post-purchase journey and gives them a chance to upsell or cross-sell products such as wood treatments or any added extras.
By providing customers with the right information at the right time, Tuin builds trust with customers while helping to reduce customer service queries, leaving the customer service team to focus on other activities to support business growth. Providing this information can help to set Tuin apart from their competitors and provides upsell and cross-sell opportunities.
When someone buys a defibrillator from Defib4Life, they’re investing in a product that could one day be needed to save a life. However, simply buying the device is only the first step. It needs to be set up, stored properly, maintained and checked regularly. Many customers buy a defibrillator as a box ticking exercise but don’t realise that it requires a little more care. Customers often forget about pad and battery dates, putting them at risk of being unprepared in an emergency.
For Defib4Life, we built workflows using Mailchimp and Shopify that help every customer to stay rescue ready. We set up the following automations:
A Welcome Pack: This is sent to any customer who buys a defibrillator with details on exactly what they need to do with the defibrillator now they have it. This includes, unpacking it, connecting pads, installing the battery and ensuring it’s displayed somewhere it can be seen and easily found in an emergency.
We then provide customers with details of Defib4Life’s maintenance package which can be opted into or simply opt into a free pad and battery reminder service. This provides Defib4Life with an opportunity to provide after-sales support to customers, building trust in their brand, as well as a chance to upsell or cross-sell their other products and services.
Pad and battery reminders: When customers buy a product from the website, they’re tagged with the product they buy. This tag is imported into Mailchimp along with their contact details so that they can be added into a workflow to remind them to purchase pads and batteries when they expire. By setting up workflows for the type of defibrillator bought, customers are sent links to the exact pads and batteries they need for their device instead of a generic link to the category page.
Customers are supported long after their purchase and receive personalised and helpful email content that allows them to ensure their defibrillator remains rescue ready. Pads and battery renewals form a huge part of Defib4Life’s business so it’s important to keep in touch with existing customers.
When someone is interested in Weiss Technik UK’s environmental test chambers, the journey doesn’t start with an online purchase, which is due to the complexity of their products and the end user’s requirements. Instead, prospects request a brochure to explore the different options available. This first step signals valuable buying intent, but without a structured process in place, these leads could easily go cold. Weiss Technik needed a way to capture that interest, respond quickly and connect prospects with their sales team to discuss specific testing requirements.
Events are another key part of Weiss Technik’s marketing activity. From open days to industry exhibitions, these events generate strong interest, but without automated follow-ups and reminders, it’s difficult to keep track of registrants, non-registrants and those who engaged with invites but didn’t go on to sign up.
We created a workflow in HubSpot that is triggered when a website visitor requests a product brochure. Once the request is made, the prospect automatically receives a follow-up email with the brochure download and a thank you message. At the same time, the contact is scored and passed into a workflow that alerts the sales team, enabling them to reach out directly to discuss requirements and recommend the most relevant solutions.
We have also set up an event-based workflow for Weiss Technik UK. Registrants for their events are added into a sequence that sends reminders, agenda updates and follow-up resources, while non-registrants and those who only opened the invite receive tailored nudges to encourage them to sign up. This ensures that every segment of their audience receives timely, relevant information without the team needing to manage multiple lists, and individually tailored emails, manually.
By putting these workflows in place, Weiss Technik UK can capture and nurture leads efficiently, ensuring that sales opportunities don’t get lost in the shuffle. Prospects receive immediate, helpful communication while the sales team benefits from qualified leads landing straight in their inbox.
For events, the automation help to maximise registrations and attendance by keeping communication flowing at exactly the right moments. Overall, the workflows support and streamline Weiss Technik’s marketing and sales processes whilst creating a more professional and consistent experience for potential customers.
Email workflows are becoming an essential part of digital marketing. They save time, increase engagement and help to build long-term loyalty by guiding customers through a structured, personalised journey.
For your business, they give you the chance to connect with customers beyond their initial purchase, show them what else you can offer and give customers something that’s easy and low cost for you to provide but provides added value to customers. Workflows transform emails from one-off communications to structured customer journeys.
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