11 Lessons to Craft the Best Thanksgiving Email Template

30.Oct.2020 Poulami - Seasonal

Be it Thanksgiving or Black Friday or Cyber Monday, both are great opportunities for marketers to win big. Besides, with the raging pandemic in place, it makes all the more sense to invest a great deal in these two to establish a winning momentum when the holiday season arrives. Moreover, Thanksgiving is another opportunity to recover from the recent slump in sales. However, businesses often get torn between which occasion to focus on – Thanksgiving or BFCM?

Well, it’s Thanksgiving. The email open rate for a Black Friday email is much lower than a Thanksgiving email. Don’t believe us? Active research suggests that businesses should focus on turning Thanksgiving into a major sales opportunity and even out the losses. This truly indicates that businesses should go over and beyond to determine a strategy, goals that work well for them.

And nothing beats a good old email template. Wondering how to formulate one? Well, we are here to help you. Give this blog a read to know the tips and tricks that would help you turn Thanksgiving into an excellent business opportunity.

🦃 Looking for quick Thanksgiving Email Templates?🦃

But, before we jump into the lessons, it’s important to understand a few nitty-gritties that would eventually help you to form a definite Thanksgiving goal that also sets you apart from others. Thus, let’s get started. 

Define Your Thanksgiving Goal

Every business, be it small or big, is looking to use Thanksgiving as a platform that sets their sales momentum for the holiday season. Thus, it’s only fair to say that your customers’ inboxes are bound to be filled with similar emails. Now, standing out to promote your seasonal deals with unique content is the only way to forge forwards. 

Here are a few questions that would help you to determine the purpose of your Thanksgiving email campaign:

Here are a few questions that would help you to determine the purpose of your Thanksgiving email campaign:

• Messaging: What do you want your Thanksgiving email template to portray? Is it gratitude towards your loyal customers or seasons greetings? One thing that you should keep in mind is to craft messages that resonate with your audience.
• Bump in sales: Every business is looking out to make up for the losses, so it’s important for you to determine what is your ideal sales target?
• Retargeting or adding new: Do you want to re-engage with your inactive customers or you want to get tailor-made deals for new customers?

These pointers would help you to figure out what makes your Thanksgiving email template special and offers to stand out among the sea of discounts from your competitors. Besides, you should also keep in mind that most of the audiences are immune to straightforward marketing. So, either you can readily design a Thanksgiving email campaign that meets your goals and also helps you engage or make it extra special for the already existing audiences and believe in word-of-mouth. 

Once you are done determining and setting the goals for your Thanksgiving email templates, let’s dive straight into the 11 Thanksgiving Email template formulas that have a killer impact.

11 Thanksgiving Email template Formulas that have Killer Impact

Here are 11 Thanksgiving email templates that can help you get inspired and form successful promotional seasonal deals. 

Add the Feel-good Charm 

1. Delight Your Audience

Thanksgiving Day is all about reciprocating the season greetings and making a delightful start to your holiday season sales. As a marketer, nothing beats the joy of delighting your shoppers with unbelievable deals and promotions. 

However, that’s easier said than done! Your delightful message should be enough to stand out among a ton of emails that people get swamped with every single hour. Besides, it also is an excellent way to convey the spirit of Thanksgiving but also reveals how much you care about your shoppers. 

Example: Fresh Direct’s Thanksgiving email template is an excellent example. 

Why does it work? 

Although the design isn’t extraordinary, it still aligns with the brand theme and meets shoppers’ expectations. The messaging and copy resonates with the audience, who don’t have enough time for grocery shopping. Plus, it also fits the Thanksgiving theme. With a persuasive subject line like, “Don’t forget a Thanksgiving thing” makes it a lot more interesting and fun for consumers to engage with than a mere “Happy Thanksgiving” wish.

Pro-Tip: Get your A-game together to design the perfect Thanksgiving email template.

2.  Send a Warm Welcome to Your Brand New Shoppers

Nothing beats the feeling of adding new shoppers to your existing customer base. Besides, if it’s Thanksgiving, it is a must to send them a special personalized welcome email. This shows that you care about your shoppers but it also helps you to build a relationship with them. 

Example: This Thanksgiving Welcome email template from Expedia, is an excellent testament to the idea of how to welcome your new members.

Why does it work? 

This example is visually not exceptional, but it’s messaging makes all the difference. This brand not only refers to their new members as friends but also offers them a token of appreciation in form of a discount on their first hotel purchase. First-time offers and deals make a ton of difference and help you connect with your customers especially when the traveling season is at its peak.

3. Say a Big Thank You

Although this looks like an old-school and obvious tactic, it still works. Thanksgiving is all about sending out gratitude, love, and saying ‘Thank You’. Many brands forget that being genuine does work like a charm. 

Showcasing your gratitude helps you establish a fruitful and genuine relationship with your audience. Besides, it also shows that your shoppers, that their presence and engagement matters to you more than any other indicator. 

Example: This Many ‘Thanks’giving template from Urban outfitters is just the right example for a template that showcases gratitude. 

Why does it work? 

This Thanksgiving email template does not try out any marketing tactics but only shows gratitude towards audiences. The intelligent design and copy stand true to the messaging and helps shoppers to connect with the brand at a personal level. Besides, it also offers an opportunity for its audience to explore more. 

4. Raise a Toast

Thanksgiving involves family and tradition where raising a toast is a popular one. What better way to show your appreciation than raising a toast for your shopping fam who have helped you to stay in business and strive through all the challenges. Besides, delighting your customers with an impressive email that projects the human aspect of the brand, can make a world of difference. 

Example: This email template from the brand Anthropologie is a delightful example of the above way. It is simple yet short and clear.

Why does it work?

To start with, the design of this Thanksgiving email template is warm and discrete. The use of a fall-inspired palette conveys the spirit of Thanksgiving and also helps you stand out in a crowded inbox. However, here the main attraction is the font used in the template that gives out hand-written holiday postcards/letters, personalized to the core that makes it even more special. 

5. Share traditions

Thanksgiving is celebrated across States and serves as an important holiday where people get together to celebrate. From cooking a whole turkey to the best-mashed potato ever and pies, Thanksgiving is also about following traditions and sitting down for a feat. The last thing you would want is to make your Thanksgiving look like another email in a crowded inbox. But, when you mix creativity, marketing, and tradition, you can get a better result. Thus, if your Thanksgiving email template resonates with this same tradition, you will come an inch closer to winning your audience’s heart. 

Pro-Tip: An image or video that shows respect for these traditions will absolutely win more customers, hearts, and also score you better email open rates. 

Example: This email template from Plated is the best example of how to get better results when you add traditions to your email template.

Why Does it Work?

This Thanksgiving email template is the best way to showcase your brand and Thanksgiving traditions well. It works exceptionally well if you are in the Food & Beverage Industry. As you go on to add food traditions to these templates, you get a step closer to making an impact on your consumers’ minds. Besides, The template allows you to focus on your hero products/services/deals, that can get your customers hooked to read it and eventually buy from you. 

Thanksgiving Email Marketing At Point

6. Re-target your inactive customers 

Thanksgiving email templates also provide you with an opportunity to reconnect and remind your previous or inactive customers about your brand. While adding new customers to your customer base works great, but in the long run, winning back your old customers gets you more brownie points. They can act as your brand’s advocates, and help you get more people to your base. Besides, adding a personalized touch, tailor-made to your audience’s shopping habits will work wonders for you.

Example: This Thanksgiving email template from this brand, nails the idea.

Why Does it work? 

The messaging reminds customers about the brand and the ‘Been a while?’ copy adds to its charm. Plus, they also give them a taste of what they are missing out on and how the brand can make all the difference with their products.

7. Reward Your Loyal Customers

Your customers are responsible for the majority of your success and honestly, Thanksgiving would be the best time to reward those loyal customers who stood by your side. Start with creating special promotional deals that not only make them happy but also yield you more customers purely by word-of-mouth.

Example: This Thanksgiving email template by SocialPilot, portrays the best way to appreciate your loyal customer and how to do it the best way.

Why Does it Work?

Well, this Thanksgiving email template appreciates their customers along with wishing them a happy holiday season. It also offers a reward with an expiry date, that creates a sense of urgency and entices your shoppers to make a quick decision. These offers and deals, only portray how much your consumers matter to you, which is eventually a great way to stay connected to shoppers. 

Bring Your A-game While Designing

8. Use Bright Colors 

Everything needs to be visually appealing and needs to follow a color scheme. Try to choose colors of the template that aligns with your brand and Thanksgiving theme. Use of warm earthy tones like yellow, brown, orange, soft red to set the mood of the feat. You can also use some tinge of green, white, green, and even black to highlight the background.

Example: This whole foods Thanksgiving email template is probably the best example that highlights the beauty of fall-inspired palettes. 

Why Does it Work?

This Thanksgiving email from Whole foods not only nails their design but also their messaging. We all know, the favorite thing about Thanksgiving is the Pie. This email template showcases that and totally brings nostalgia and transports their customers to the day of Thanksgiving where you sit down to gobble up some pie. This email has got effective messaging that totally works.

9. Use Animated GIFs

The last thing you want to do is bore your customers with the same messages and email templates. Well, it’s time to experiment. From static images to animated GIFs, the design has come a long way. Now, use the power of animated GIFs to grab the attention of your customers through Thanksgiving email design. The GIF images only help in conveying appealing messages and work perfectly fine to showcase the different products/services of your brand. Besides, everyone loves animated gifs, and is a great way to spread happiness around. 

Example: This Thanksgiving newsletter format email template from the blurb is creative and uses animated GIFs on point.

Why Does It Work?

The last thing you want to do is to not be noticed in an overcrowded inbox. This Thanksgiving template breaks all conventional rules and makes it even more exciting with animated Gifs. A perfect example of how to have a lasting impression on your customers. 

10. Illustrations at its peak

If images don’t work for you, you can always take advantage of the beauty of illustrations. Illustrations add an artistic touch to your email template designs. Explore different styles and themes to impress your subscribers with a masterpiece. Besides, if you want your designs to scream Thanksgiving, just add more autumn leaves, turkey, pie, acorns, and pine cones to your design. Autumn leaves, etc. 

Example: This email template from Anthropologie, is just the best way to portray holiday and Thanksgiving in one illustration.

Why does it work?

This template works especially well because it evokes the feeling of Thanksgiving the moment you open the email. It not only gets the attention of your shoppers and helps build a connection that will last more than you can think of. It can be a great way to change your shoppers’ minds if they have bet everything on Black Friday and Cyber Monday. So, use such illustrations and achieve more milestones as a business.

11. Choose the Best Hero Images

To make the most out of this Thanksgiving email template, using the best hero images works in the best possible way. Images of roasted turkey, carved pumpkins, a fully served dinner platter, is the easiest way to lighten the atmosphere and spread the festive spirit. A lot of businesses use images as their background, but you can leverage them by using only a single character of an image as a visual material to support your messaging.

Example: This email template is possibly the cutest of all the templates you have come across. 

Why does it work?

Well, look at the cute dog who has been turned into a turkey. This example is sure to melt your heart and put you in a positive mood. It not only works as a way to get your shoppers shop but also as a way to make their day better and lighten their mood after a tiring day.

Best Thanksgiving Email Templates from TargetBay!

This fun-filled Thanksgiving email template is perfect to take your customers by surprise. The design screams of Thanksgiving with Turkey as the hero character. It not only adds the spirit of the holidays but also gets shoppers in the Thanksgiving mood!

Another Thanksgiving email template that is funny and looks appealing. It not only showcases the very spirit of Thanksgiving but also offers its customers some sweet discounts. A perfect Thanksgiving email template to entice them into buying more from you.

This Thanksgiving email template is perfect for showing gratitude to your customers and conveying the spirit of thanksgiving at the same time. Moreover, along with appreciation it also allows you to add various promotional deals to amp up your sales. 

This Thanksgiving email template is best suited for businesses in the Food and Beverage Industry. Here the hero image focuses on the plate of food and clearly shows the love for food, during Thanksgiving. This template brings out nostalgia and evokes their best Thanksgiving food memories. It is just the right template you need to set the mood for a feast and profitable business season!

Take away

While there are many ways to design a successful Thanksgiving email template, nothing beats knowing your audience. To cook the best dish for a successful Thanksgiving email template, add a pinch of creativity, a ladle of love, and a spoonful of gratitude to have a lasting impression. Besides, if you know your audience, speak to them through your messaging and don’t miss out on telling them how important they are for your business. Besides, don’t forget to bombard their inboxes with undeniable offers that get them shopping. Add smaller details within an email to make the difference. Just, be honest, appreciative, and thankful. Also, adding a turkey emoji won’t hurt, either! 🦃