Are your emails feeling a bit…static? If so, your sales funnel performance has likely hit a plateau too. Dynamic email content gives your subscribers the instant gratification and easy engagement they’ve come to expect by spending their days on TikTok and Facebook.
So, how do you make your emails more dynamic? The easiest way is to replace all that boring text with video. Research has found that video email marketing has a huge impact on the performance of your emails. Simply by including a video in an email, you can:
- Boost open rates by 19%
- Increase click-throughs by 65%
- Reduce unsubscribes by 26%
That’s a lot of funnel fuel.
But you can’t just put any old video in your marketing emails. Your videos must hook your subscribers and deliver value that entices them to click through. We’ve got some creative ideas on how to do that below. But first, let’s take a quick look at what video email marketing is and why it’s so beneficial.
What is Video Email Marketing?
Video email marketing involves including video content in marketing emails to move leads through a funnel. Video emails may be entirely video-based or include sections of text too.
The goal of a video email is the same as that of a traditional marketing email: to motivate subscribers to take action (e.g. click a link, request a consultation, make a purchase, etc.).
Video content is more accessible and engaging than text content. In fact, statistics tell us that 72% of consumers prefer video to text when receiving branded information such as marketing emails.
This means that email videos can help you convert more leads. With more control over your message, you’re almost guaranteed to make a bigger splash with each email — if you use video correctly. More on that next.
6 Ideas for Using Video in Your Email Marketing
You don’t have to reinvent the wheel when designing your video emails. There is plenty of video email marketing best practices that are proven to work.
A great thing that you can easily use videos within email marketing tool and it eases your work a thousand times. You can not only add videos to your email, but also send email and SMS campaigns, create popups and forms (and much more!). On top of that, you’ll have much more time once you automate your sequences. See how easy it is:
Here are our top ideas to use in your next campaign.
1. Share Social Media Videos
If you want to build community and loyalty through engagement, consider integrating your social media and marketing campaigns. Ideally, your leads should subscribe and follow your business on multiple platforms if you want to achieve optimal brand awareness.
Instead of just including a link to your Facebook and Instagram at the bottom of an email, why not show your subscribers what they’re missing? Add popular video content from your social media pages to your emails, along with any notable comments. If your communities are healthy and active, your email subscribers will be happy to join.
This also saves you from creating separate videos for your social and email campaigns. However, don’t overdo it. If you reach a critical mass of email and social media subscriber overlap, your emails will become redundant.
2. Give a Product Demo or Tutorial
New subscribers are near the top of your funnel. So, while a promised benefit might entice them, they may not yet understand how your product delivers that benefit.
Your welcome email sequence is a great opportunity to include a how-to video (or a few training videos) showcasing how your product works. A quick product demo, explainer, or tutorial gives viewers exactly what they wanted when they signed up for your email list—and it puts them on the path of least resistance to a click-through.
3. Make an Important Announcement
Are you launching a new product? Partnering with a famous influencer? Announcing a massive Black Friday offer? A video will get your message through to more of your subscribers and add gravity to the announcement.
If you regularly include videos in your emails, make sure this one is special. A grand unveiling should excite your viewers, which won’t happen if your announcement video looks and feels like all the others.
4. Showcase Customer Testimonials or Case Studies
Email marketing can start to feel a bit insular, especially if you don’t integrate it with your social media pages. Your subscribers don’t want to feel like they’re corresponding with a sales team. They want to feel like they’re part of something. To make them feel that way, you need to create social proof.
Traditional emails included text-based reviews, but those don’t inspire trust like videos. When your subscribers can view a real person, hear their voice, and see them interact with your brand, their confidence in your brand gets a huge boost. They’ll also be nearly 10x more likely to remember a video testimonial than a text-based review.
5. Say ‘Thank You’ Properly
Showing gratitude, fostering loyalty, mitigating post-purchase regret, and reinforcing brand identity—a thank-you email is a heavy-hitter in your campaign. It’s also one of the best opportunities to use an email video.
You only need one great thank-you video to send to all first-time buyers, so it’s worth investing time and cash. This is a critical moment for converting new buyers into loyal customers. Consider adding the following to make your thank-you email video more effective:
- Include people showing emotion to make the thank-you warm and genuine;
- Include the buyer’s name or a personalized message;
- Reinforce just how good the buyer should feel as a result of making their purchase;
- Let the buyer know of any goodwill that resulted from their purchase (e.g. “We planted a tree in your name…”).
6. Recap News or Events
Do your newsletters look like old-timey newspapers (aka walls of text)? Recapping the monthly or quarterly news in video form makes it easier for your subscribers to digest and retain beneficial information.
You may not have the resources to turn your entire newsletter into a series of videos. Instead, create a header video that summarizes each story, giving subscribers the gist and encouraging them to read more.
If you’ve recently attended a conference, hosted an event, or won some awards at a trade show, make some recap videos for your email campaign to show off the highlights.
Video Email Marketing Examples
Need some inspiration for your video email marketing campaign? The following brands have used the ideas above to craft highly motivating emails.
Made In Cookware
The cookware brand Made In takes video email marketing to the next level by turning its emails into dynamic video cookbooks. Each email in the campaign (titled “Chef Notes”) is packed with how-to cooking videos featuring real chefs and even celebrities.
Made In has basically won the video email marketing game here. It effectively combines multiple engaging ideas to create value-packed emails, including:
- Branding: Demonstrating the product
- Utility: Providing valuable cooking advice
- Entertainment: Creating share-worthy videos featuring celebs
Video tutorial by Shopify
Most people assume that it’s not easy to launch an online store. The eCommerce giant Shopify turns leads into customers by demonstrating the opposite. In a brief tutorial video, Shopify helps the viewer open a store in just 25 minutes.
This video email reduces a seemingly monumental task down to a few simple steps—all initiated by clicking “play.” Here’s why it’s so effective:
- No need to navigate: Instead of having to learn the Shopify dashboard or navigate FAQ pages, potential store owners get the info they need in one convenient click.
- Starts the fuse: Once subscribers take the first steps toward launching a store, they’re more likely to return and finish.
- Keeps it simple: Shopify beginners understand email videos. They don’t understand the Shopify app. Shopify leverages email videos to make a complicated product more approachable.
Product demonstration by Ubisoft
Ubisoft uses video email marketing to recap top performances at its gaming event, Ghostfest. Featuring the popular videogame Ghost Recon: Breakpoint, Ubisoft’s clips introduce subscribers to the game and the event while delivering the type of content its audience wants: FPS carnage.
Ubisoft skillfully combines a recap and a product demo in its video email, getting lots of bang (pun intended) for its buck. Here’s what it’s done well:
- Gives social proof: Subscribers can see those involved in the event and how they benefited;
- Demonstrates the product’s value: Ubisoft allows its fans to show off the product’s capabilities;
- Entertains: Give the people what they want—epic gaming videos.
How to Insert a Video into an Email
When building your video marketing emails with Sender, it takes about 10 seconds to add a video to any email. Check out the clip below to learn how to attach a video to an email using our software.
Here’s a step-by-step breakdown:
- Under the “Blocks” menu on the left side of your screen, click “Video” and drag and drop it into your email.
- Now, you’ll see a blank video player in your email. Click it to open the “Video Content” menu on the right side of your screen.
- In the box titled “Video YouTube URL” paste the link to your video. Click the “Insert Video” button below.
Voila! Your video is now inserted into your email and ready to send to any subscriber, whether they use Gmail, Outlook, or any other email server. And because Sender converts all of your videos to high-quality GIFs, your email videos will not be affected if the original video gets deleted or made private.
That means you can post YouTube videos, social media videos, stock video, animations, and more with peace of mind.
Key Takeaways
We’ve hit on many video email marketing ideas in this article. Let’s recap the info you need to make successful email videos.
- Video emails can boost open rates, click-throughs, social subscribers, and more—all while dramatically reducing unsubscribe rates.
- Your subscribers prefer video content to text content, so give them what they want!
- Integrate your social media and email marketing campaigns by sharing social media videos in your emails and vice versa.
- Use video email funnels to show how your product delivers benefits.
- Video emails are a window to your brand’s community—use them to give social proof.
- Flesh out your brand’s identity with nuanced video content—it says a lot more than text!
Email campaigns are still incredibly effective marketing tools. Adding video to your emails makes them even more effective. Use the ideas above to start crafting dynamic video emails that inspire subscribers to act.
Author Bio
Carlos is part of the marketing team at Videvo.net. He is passionate about media and technology, especially when applied to the marketing field. He loves learning new languages and seeing how cultures respond to changing technologies.
