In less than a couple of weeks, Fathers’ Day will be here. Aside from being the only day in a year dedicated to celebrating dads, it’s also an opportunity for eCommerce stores to ramp up their revenue. With effective Fathers’ Day email marketing strategies this year, your business will increase sales and strengthen customer relationships at the same time.
How important is it to plan your Fathers Day email marketing ideas?
Seasonal campaigns are nothing new. Ecommerce stores take advantage of holidays to ramp up their sales. They do this through creative campaigns and attractive discounts. The Mothers Day holiday last May and this upcoming Fathers’ Day are just two examples.
Last year, the National Retail Foundation estimated Mothers’ Day spending to be around 26.7 billion dollars. Their estimate for spending during Fathers Day was only 17 billion dollars. This 2021, however, the NRF leveled up their estimate for consumer spending during Fathers Day to be around 20.7 billion dollars.
Even though the amount is still significantly less than the estimate for Mothers’ Day consumer spending, one thing is clear. There is definitely revenue potential for eCommerce stores during Fathers’ Day. Effective email marketing strategies for Fathers Day will give your store a much-needed boost before the second half of 2021.
Sure, there are a lot of ideas that you can implement for a successful Fathers’ Day campaign. But here are five must-have strategies that you should zero in on.
5 Fathers’ Day email marketing strategies eCommerce stores need this 2021
#001. Put your products front and center.
This is the perfect strategy for eCommerce stores that cater specifically to men. If your products include men’s apparel, leather wallets, socks, or other trinkets that dads might like, Fathers’ Day campaigns will be a breeze for you. You have the upper hand because you can put the spotlight on your products and position them as the perfect Fathers’ Day gifts.
Here’s what you can do to get started:
- Identify your best sellers and present them as the right gift for dads
- Create gift guides or special Fathers’ Day bundles using your best sellers. You don’t need to launch new products!
- Don’t forget to use attention-grabbing CTAs. Draw in your email subscribers to complete their purchases!
But what if your products are not really that relevant for Fathers’ Day? Think out of the box and be creative!
Here’s an example. We had a client who sold healing crystals. The Fathers’ Day campaign we crafted for them emphasized the positive energy that specific healing crystals have. Thinking of creative angles like this can be quite a challenge. This sample campaign shows how you can tie in unconventional products and Fathers’ Day to generate results.
#002: Focus on emotions and tug some heartstrings
This strategy is unique for eCommerce stores that are used to fronting products all the time. After all, your objective is to generate sales, right? However, email marketing doesn’t just focus on increasing revenue. The beauty of email marketing is that it can be present along different touchpoints of the customer journey. This means that it doesn’t just stop at acquisition.
If you’re having a hard time positioning your products as Fathers’ Day gifts, you can forego the product-focused approach. Instead, you can craft your content to revolve around the celebration itself. Move away from hard-selling, and take the emotional route instead.
You can opt for a heartfelt message or greeting. You can also do something along the lines of this sample email we implemented last year for one of our clients. We put some suggestions for last-minute gifts that were not directly related to the products—like breakfast in bed or a photo compilation.
This strategy adds a human touch to your eCommerce brand and can do wonders for your engagement levels and customer relationships.
#003: Target different types of fathers
Fathers’ Day, despite its name, is no longer just about dads. It’s also a day to celebrate your brother, or your uncle, your stepfather, or even your friends who just became new dads. For some people, they even celebrate their moms during Fathers’ Day if they stood in as their father figure during their childhood days.
Stand out from other eCommerce brands by catering to a wider audience this Fathers’ Day. How? Create a curated gift guide for different father figures and outline these all in one solid email marketing campaign. Talk about hitting more than one bird in one email.
#004: Grab your subscribers’ attentions with winning subject lines right from the get-go
Every email marketer knows how important subject lines are. After all, almost half of recipients will open your emails based on the subject line alone. So without a note-worthy subject line, your creative emails will remain unread and in short, useless.
While coming up with catchy subject lines is already a challenge in itself, it’s even more of a challenge to stand out during holidays like Fathers’ Day. With your competitors all gunning for a share of the Fathers’ Day billion-dollar potential, you have to create a splash when you land in your subscribers’ inboxes.
For inspiration, check out these sample subject lines used by actual brands in Fathers Day campaigns:
- What Dad Really Wants for Father’s Day (Groupon)
- The gift for the dad who has everything (PureWow)
- Hand-picked Father’s Day gifts (Harrods)
- You know it’s almost Father’s Day, right? (Dollar Shave Club)
#005: Give a way out
It’s important to note that not all of your subscribers may be in a celebratory mood for Fathers’ Day. For some, this holiday may resurface some feelings of loss or sadness, and receiving marketing emails for Fathers’ Day may not be such a pleasant experience for them. In fact, this can lead them to unsubscribe completely.
That’s why providing an option for them to ‘opt out’ of Fathers’ Day-specific emails is a good strategy to implement. This will give them room to set their preferences, As a result, this will reflect positively on your brand as you lead with empathy and build stronger customer relationships in the process.
Klaviyo shows this email below as a good example of what eCommerce brands can do.
BONUS Fathers’ Day Crucial Email Marketing Tip: Employ a shorter version of our tried and tested (over time and time again) holiday sequence
When it comes to seasonal holidays, we actually already have a proven email sequence that has produced outstanding results especially during the much-awaited Black Friday and Cyber Monday sales.
You can read more about this six-step holiday sequence here to familiarize yourself with the different areas of the customer journey that you can hit using email marketing. Though this is typically composed of at least six emails, you can cut it short to three emails for shorter holidays like Fathers Day. For example, you can use the hype builder, general announcement, and sales closing.
These strategies discussed above are all key drivers of not only sales generation, but also customer retention. Have a team of email marketing and retention experts take a look at your current strategy to see where you can level up. Apply for a strategy session with us and let’s take your email marketing game to the next higher step!
