Emails about product and service updates are a joint effort between marketing and product teams. This guide explains how to craft the most effective ones.
These emails serve as a way to inform customers about enhancements made to a product or service. They keep customers engaged while highlighting new features and driving traffic to the website. In essence, product and service update emails are designed to introduce changes and upgrades within a system.
However, given that the average person receives 126 business emails per day, it’s challenging to stand out in a crowded inbox. Therefore, it’s crucial to make your product and service update emails engaging and informative to capture attention. You can achieve this by showcasing significant improvements, promoting a product, and directing customers to a landing page. Instead of overwhelming them with technical details and bug fix logs, strive to transform mundane information into something captivating.
Best Practices for Creating Outstanding Product and Service Update Emails
1. Craft Compelling Subject Lines for Update Emails
Ditch the generic “Product Update” subject line and opt for something more creative. Make it both appealing and intriguing. Draw inspiration from these examples:
- Introducing your new product with enhanced features.
- Get a sneak peek at the latest update.
- Customers love the new feature.
- Our product line just got an upgrade. Check it out.
- Don’t miss these new features/updates.
- A fresh look at our product.
These are just a few ways to make your subject line pop and entice your readers. Take, for instance, this product update email from Hotel Tonight with the inviting subject line “Even more perks.” The email content itself is clear and informative as well.
Furthermore, you can maximize your subject line’s impact by highlighting the update’s most noteworthy feature. Emulate Apple’s approach with a concise yet impactful subject line like "AirPods Pro are here" followed by minimal text and a sleek, monochromatic email design.
2. Ensure Your Update is Worth Sending
Developing a product update requires significant effort. From conception to development and launch, your team likely invested weeks. It’s natural to be eager to share the news with your subscribers. However, your customers might not share the same level of excitement.
Put simply, bombarding them with emails for minor updates can lead to frustration. Before sending any product or service update, have your email template developer assess its importance and whether it truly warrants an email. Take a page from Conductor’s book with this product update email.
This particular email succinctly informs users about the newly added features and how they can benefit. It’s straightforward, effective, and worthy of the customer’s attention.
3. Craft Relevant Content for Update Emails
Before drafting your product update email, having a clear objective in mind is beneficial. Are you aiming to notify subscribers about specific changes or promote an educational or promotional tool? Based on your goals, incorporate relevant content such as:
- A guide on maximizing the new feature.
- Product description.
- Welcome message.
- List of features.
- Feedback.
- Cross-selling and up-selling opportunities.
- Reasons behind the update.
Here’s how Readdle effectively utilizes the product update email to inform its users about the introduction of email templates in Spark. They also provide a concise overview of the new features.
4. Highlight the Benefits in Product Service Update Emails
You can make your product update emails more engaging and impactful by clearly communicating their value to your subscribers. Depending on your products or services, explain how the latest update benefits them. Consider this example from FilmSupply.
Observe how they structure their product update email into distinct sections, each concisely and transparently conveying the benefits.
5. Incorporate Interactive Elements to Boost Engagement
Emails consisting solely of text tend to be dull. Visually appealing emails, on the other hand, can generate more interest. Did you know that adding videos to emails can increase click-through rates by 300%? To enhance subscriber engagement, integrating interactive elements into your product update emails is key. These elements include GIFs, videos, collapsible menus, sliders, and accordions, to name a few.
Leverage these elements to visually demonstrate how your product or service works. Entice customers to explore the latest update by showcasing its functionality. Take inspiration from Nest, which uses video to showcase its new smoke alarm to its subscriber base.
6. Invite Customers to Beta Test for Product Service Update Emails
Companies utilize beta releases to test products and tools during their development phase before official release. You can do the same with your new products and services to gain direct feedback on customer perception. Start by inviting a select group of customers to test your product, gradually expanding the beta tester pool to reach an optimal size.
Ensure you only send these emails to genuinely interested subscribers. This targeted approach helps gather valuable feedback. Here’s how Mailchimp does it by granting early access to its new website builder.
In Conclusion
Product and service update emails provide a direct line of communication with your customer base, keeping them informed about the advantages of each update. From guiding subscribers on how to get started with new features to providing more in-depth information through blog post links, numerous strategies exist to perfect your product and service update emails.
Apply the tips and tricks outlined above to unleash your creativity and craft compelling emails that capture user interest and drive engagement simultaneously.