10 Novel Content Ideas for Your Next Email Marketing Newsletter

If you are an E-commerce marketer, you know the importance of coming up with novel newsletter templates. After all, every time you decide to brainstorm, you land upon similar grounds. But, does that imply that it’s that simple? 

And if you are in similar situations, you needn’t worry as we at TargetBay are here to give you food for thought. Plus, we have done all the research and come up with 10 novel content ideas for the next email marketing newsletter.

What can you achieve with eCommerce email marketing? 

Research from Shopify found that email marketing can help you grow your customer base, and boost average order value. Emails are 2.5 times more effective and people are more likely to click on it.

Via: Shopify.

What can you achieve with eCommerce email marketing? 

Research from Shopify found that email marketing can help you grow your customer base, and boost average order value. Emails are 2.5 times more effective and people are more likely to click on it.

Besides, email marketing can also come in handy:

• To persuade new visitors to become new customers and increase sales
• Increase brand awareness of your brand
• Build and strengthen your brand’s relationship with the existing customers
• Send out win-back emails to re-engage with dormant customers.

To Sum it up, email marketing can either make or break your eCommerce business. So, you need to go steadily towards finding and executing this email newsletter idea into compelling emails that meet business goals. 

Now, it’s time for some creative juices to flow and look closely into some simple, compelling, and effective ideas that only have pros to use all the time!

So, let’s jump in!

10 Novel Content Ideas for Your Next Email Marketing Newsletter

1. Add Videos to Up Your Newsletter Game

Over 79 percent of the customers say that watching video has the power to convince them to buy. Whereas, another study from MarTech Advisor, suggests that embedding video to your emails shoots up the click rates by 300%. Amazing, right? Thus, it becomes all the more essential to include videos in your email newsletters to increase engagement and sales. 

You can embed the video in email, just the way Jambox did it here: 

Or do it the way Snowman did it. They used a screengrab of a single frame of the video to increase curiosity among subscribers to click through.

Via: Really Good Emails

Idea threads

• Create and Share Video Series: If you are looking to educate your consumers, creating Loom tutorials/ interactive video series can help you bridge that gap. It provides you with a space to talk about your favorite marketing strategies, events, product stories, etc. 
• Create Tips-based Video: If you don’t have the bandwidth to create a video series, you can create a single-tips video. Start talking about one aspect of your business to test the waters. 
• Create Promos: Use sneak peeks and promotion videos to grab the attention.

Source

• Embed Live Videos: You can also link your social media videos like IGTV, Reels, and Facebook lives on your email to promote email newsletters. 

This tips not only saves you time, but also helps you repurpose the content!

2. Share Your Content 

Content of any form be it audio or video needs to reach your audience. After all, your subscribers are looking to consume your content and what’s the better way than sending it in the form of email newsletters. 

Idea Threads:

• Case study: Your case study needn’t be sale-sy at all, but make it enriching for your customers. After all, a self-praising case study doesn’t always work. As an inspiration, you can check this example from Rock Candy Media.

• Add Blog Posts or Articles: Just add blog posts and articles to your email newsletter. Easy peasy, right? But, what do you do when you just don’t have the resources to create content every week? Then, it’s time to curate great blog posts created by other creators, brands for your next newsletter. Learn how to start your own blog and implement it in your email marketing strategy properly. If curated and delivered the right way, this can yield tons of results.

For instance: Dave Pell runs a successful email newsletter called NextDraft where most of the content is sourced from the crevices of the internet to add value.

Or, you can take a look at how Trello does it, where they present a round-up content on their newsletter accompanied by a compelling CTA. 

Here’s another example of link curation from Marketing Spark:

Source

This type of curation email newsletter benefits both your customers and your business.

• Share Your Podcast: If you have a podcast, just add it to your next email newsletter and witness the rise of engagement.  However, you should also be confident of the content you produce as it would directly reflect on your business. 

For instance, the productivity expert Michael Hyatt uses the power of storytelling to introduce his latest podcast episode to his subscribers.

3. Motivate People

With so much happening around the world, sometimes few kind words do have the power to make a subscriber’s day. 

Idea Threads:

• Use Quotes: Motivating quotes on a Monday can help cheer up tons of people and get past the Monday blues. For instance, a successful financial newsletter Finimize had a motivating quote from Pearl S. Buck. You can also add colors and a fun design to make it shareable! 

• Encourage Subscribers to reflect: Not all content is meant to inspire, some can be used to help your audiences pause a little and reflect. Although we belong to the hustle culture, these little words of encouragement also help build immense brand value among your customers. 

For instance, this MINNA email edition hits all the right chords. 

4. Webinars, Tutorials, and Workshops

With the pandemic in place, the Global Market Insights found out the accelerated growth of the online courses. One such online course creation platform called Thinkific reported a 221% increase in the new course creation during the early days of the pandemic! So, if you’re still reminiscing about creating a course, now is the time to do it. Email Newsletters because a single email send out can get you hundreds of registrants. 

Some experts like Joanna Wiebe, Founder of Copy Hackers, rely heavily on emails. She not only promotes her workshop with the email but also establishes the key takeaways for the subscribers.

5. Share Your Brand’s Inside Story 

If you’re an expert in your industry, then it’s essential to start sharing different tips, hacks, etc., to establish credibility. Your subscribers joining the list are surely going to grow as you start putting up important information one your newsletter.

For instance, if you’re looking to grow your fitness brand and establish yourself as an expert in the arena, you can include a research study that proves the science behind your suggestions and tips. Even brands like The Hustle, which is a daily business and tech newsletter, includes various ‘snippets’ of interesting technological news from other outlets.

Idea Threads:

• Give a sneak-peek: Most artists on Instagram have now resorted to embedding a studio tour video, photos, or just a sneak peek on packaging orders. This is not only a great way to build relationships with customers as it also helps build company values. 

For instance, Chipotle uses this approach in a great way. Through this email newsletter, they are not only giving a sneak peek at their dish making process but also shows how it chooses and prepares all the ingredients.

Via: Really Good Emails.

• Share an insider’s dos and don’ts list: While checklists are common to share by brands, another easy way to do is do’s and don’ts such that they get a quick idea of all that they should avoid and things to stick with! 

6. Subscriber information

Everybody loves attention and personalization. So, do it for them. After all, people love to see their name shine like a diamond on the subject line! Besides, also don’t forget to wish your subscribers on their birthday as that would get you a step closer to them.

For instance, this daily newsletter from Skimm has millions of subscribers. Even though it’s successful, they don’t forget to mention their subscribers’ birthdays along with putting the spotlight on those people who are achievers.

Here’s another example where Morning Chalk Up, an email newsletter for the CrossFit community, celebrates their subscribers’ wins and fitness milestones!

Idea Threads

• Make subscribers feel personally special: Although Personalization has taken the email marketing world by storm, there’s more to it than using a subscriber’s name. It’s all about making this email newsletter template relevant. 

Here’s what Barkbox did who used subscriber’s pet’s birthday to suggest a birthday treat for them:

Via: Really Good Emails.

Another from Kikki K where the brand offers a free birthday voucher:

Via: Best of Email.

Not to worry, you can also make your subscribers feel special by offering them VIP or subscriber-only offers. Here, Withings allows its subscribers early access to its Black Friday Sales. And as we all know, how Black Friday sales are probably the most sought after discount sale, and early access means a great way to engage customers.

Via: Really Good Emails.

• Pass on Key Takeaways from the industry: Nothing beats lessons from and around the industry. This not only adds value but also establishes your brands as ultimate. Here’s an example from Eddie Shelyner, who does use this method a lot in his email newsletter template. 

Source

• Share a Roundup: Subscribers are also looking to know and understand your growth as a brand. So, year or quarterly roundups can do wonders. 

7. Let the graphics talk 

If you have too many beautiful or funny photos to share with your audience, then why would you not! Just whip up some ‘cute and funny’ content and put them in your next newsletter template.

For instance, Buzzfeed sends out this weekly newsletter about cats that are full of funny, witty and cuteness. And this is quite an inspiration for a great email idea!

8. Showcase the Use of  Your Products 

Although you might know that at times it’s all about product placement. So, the way to promote is showcasing how to use your products and services. Just jott down the different product use cases and showcase it on your email newsletter! This would help you get close to all your new customers and also show them how your product can change their lives. Plus, some good photographs can actually encourage them to buy. 

 Here’s an example from Jigsaw that features an upcoming sale.

Via: Pinterest.

9. Plans or steps

What can come in handy other than steps or plans that can make your subscribers’ life easier and better! This type of email newsletters are a perfect way to slide into your subscriber’s email and help them accomplish something. Just adding a plan or detailing the steps out in your newsletter to show them how, can get you engagement. 

For instance, food blogger and founder of Skinnytaste Gina Homolka regularly sends her healthy meal plan recipes to her subscribers, every week. It not only makes her subscribers’ lives easier, but also reduces their time to plan weekly meals and instead stick to Gina’s simple plan.

Here’s another step-by-step example of a newsletter that showcased on how to use the product with how-to guides.

For instance, here’s an email newsletter template by Design Files who had sent this step-by-step video tutorial to their audiences. 

However, creating a detailed video tutorial is not as easy as it sounds. 

• Share how-to-guides: Well, you can give your newsletter an educational spin by breaking down topics into how-to-do or DIY guides. 

•  Share a tip of the month: Sharing tips on email newsletter is another way to make it an interesting and engaging read! You can include a monthly interview, and even free consultation sessions to add value. As an example: James Tennant who is the Founder of Converge, in his TrendingUp newsletter templates, shares the monthly trending keywords!

Source

10. Quizzes, polls, questions or riddles

Last but not the least is including different questions, quizzes, polls or riddles to increase customer engagement. Not only does it have the power to get people involved, but also suggest some new information for your brand. 

For instance, this email newsletter from AWeber asks people about marketing goals of the year. The customers not only interact but also spill the beans about insights and help the brand to grow. Besides, it also informs the brand of the type of email content they need to create to keep the audience interest intact. 

Polls and quizzes are also effective to engage with your subscribers. Here is an example of one such quiz.

Here’s another great example from Harry’s. It was made interactive and here the consumers have the option to explore the online store along with having fun. 

Via: Milled.

Wrapping up,

Well, it brings us to the end! We hope that these 10 novel content ideas help you to come up with better newsletter templates. Besides, now that your creative juices are free- flowing, it’s time to execute them and make the most out of it.

However, if you’re still worried about the impact and resources, TargetBay’s product BayEngage offers some great resources that come in handy. Our products can help you cut down time and offer you access to some great email newsletter templates.