Here are some great tips that will help you plan your Valentine’s Day email marketing campaigns …

1. On time

Start early

Plan your Valentine’s Day email campaigns well in advance. Take time to review the email results, as well as the sales impact from last year’s communications.

Schedule well-timed communications 

Map out a campaign schedule. Valentine’s Day is all about gifting, so plan to communicate at the most opportune times.

A simple schedule could include:

• Two weeks before: A general gifting guide
• One week before: A list of categories – 100 gifts under R100/ For Him/For Her/For Us
• Two days before: Last chance deals
• One day before: It’s not too late – free 24 delivery
• One week after: Thank you for shopping

2. Go the extra mile

Spread the love, have customers send eCards to their special someone

Give customers the option to send customized eCards to their loved ones. With personalized messages and a selection of designs, eCards are user friendly and fun. Include that something extra by adding an ‘anonymous sender’ option to the Valentine’s Day eCard.

It’s a great way to get branded content into your customer’s digital space.

Discounts, extended hours or free delivery

Why not give your email subscribers that little something extra for Valentine’s Day. Surely these loyal customers should get some kind of exclusive treatment. A ‘subscribers only’ offer like free delivery or extended hours can really make them feel valued and more special than customers who are not email subscribers – yet…

3. Give your customers some attention

Be social 

…You can grow your customer database by tweeting or posting an exclusive ‘subscriber only’ option to social networks. You can also convert followers to subscribers by mentioning the ‘subscriber only’ alongside an Opt-In link.

Segment

It’s one of the basics, but database segmentation is the key to success. Segment your customers based on gender, so you can include the correct gifting items, then on low or high-value clients for the best-priced offer. Remember to also segment based on geographic location for convenient store locations. When segmenting the database based on email activity,  don’t forget the inactives – give them a little something extra.

4. Check the basics

Write great subject lines

Also one of the basics, but  very important. Have fun with subject lines during February. It’s that time of the year when we can be as cheesy as we want to and get away with it.

Use A/B testing to determine whether the discount, free delivery or the cheesy subject line gets the best results before you send your email campaign.