How to Write Email Marketing Copy That Feels Personal At Scale
Email marketing personalization is not an added bonus anymore it's expected. People want to believe that an email is written for them and not blasted out to thousands of other subscribers. But how does one write such content to make it seem so personal when making an effort to reach so many? With careful automation and intentional, sympathetic writing that makes the reader feel like the author knows them when in reality, most of the time, the author doesn't, and they need to appeal to a broader range.
Understand Your Audience Beyond Their Name
Personalization doesn't actually happen until you enter the person's name in the subject line. Personalization happens when you actually know your audience beyond the demographics, beyond what makes them the average person in a sample size, and instead, what makes them act, what their interests are, what pushes their buttons, where their pain points are, etc. Why did they subscribe to your email in the first place? What do they think your product/service will do to alleviate their concerns? The more you delve into the details and find out what's most valuable to them, the more effective your messaging can be beyond just personalizing.
Don't depend upon static information (location, age, etc.); depend upon dynamic data: what topics they engage with, what emails they've opened and how long they've engaged with them, what they're clicking on, and when. Email warm-up plays a foundational role here by gradually building sender reputation so that these personalized, dynamic emails actually reach inboxes in the first place. Such context allows you to tailor your voice, structure, and content in a way that makes it seem contextually appropriate and personally meaningful when in fact, it's being sent to thousands of others.
Use Smart Segmentation to Guide Tone and Relevance
Segmentation facilitates personalization at scale. When you segment your subscribers based on similar interests, similar actions, and at different stages of the customer journey, you have a chance to better communicate with more of your audience. Instead of sending one generic message, you can send a few variations on a campaign that resonates with more targeted mindsets. For example, someone who just bought your product may appreciate a welcome email focused on onboarding and reassurance; a former customer may be in the mindset to appreciate loyalty rewards or exclusive early access purchases.
The more targeted your segmentation, the more targeted your messaging can be. This doesn't mean you'll be sending a completely different email to every single person but you can provide a more customized experience that feels less arbitrary and less formulaic and it allows you to shift your tone and value proposition based on what's most valued by that cohort.
Write Like a Human, Not a Marketing Robot
There's no better way to ruin the illusion of personalization than an overly stilted, corporate tone. Even if you have the audience segmentation and intentioned targeting that works, the tone of your copy can easily ruin it all if it sounds too robotic or too formulaic. People sense marketing speak and they will understand that you've blasted this line out to one thousand other people instead of addressing them as the unique individual that they are.
To keep that personalized feeling in your emails, you need to write as if you are speaking to them one-on-one. This doesn't mean that it has to be too casual or unprofessional. But it does mean that human, non-robotic, conversational sentiment can prevail. For example, use contractions “you're” instead of “you are.” Ask a few questions instead of only always giving your opinion no one wants to be lectured all the time. They want to interact.
Ultimately, empathy humanizes copy. The best marketing emails read as if they were sent from someone who understands the reader's situation at that moment, what they want, and where they may be vulnerable and instead of preying on pain points, they provide assistance. An empathetic approach gets the job done with an informal tone; strategic placement and genuine appreciation go a long way to make an audience feel validated and noted. Thus, copy does more than sell a good or service, but creates a connection that, in due time, becomes established trust.
In addition to tone, email formatting and flow further personalize the interaction. For example, long, dense blocks of text are intimidating and make people want to turn away. Instead, write in smaller paragraphs to help your audience digest the message with a quick glance. Use varying sentence lengths to appreciate the natural cadence and avoid cramming everything into one sentence full of jargon and unnecessary fluff. Write how you would speak in an engaging, clear, and concise manner.
Another component that can contribute to achieving this is formatting. Use of bold and italics should be kept to a minimum for emphasis and to read how one would speak naturally if you needed to emphasize a certain word here, for example, this would be appropriate. These are natural speaking cues which render one's communication more scannable, especially key for mobile viewing where someone might only give your email a ten-second read to determine whether or not they're going to open it.
Thus, the aim is to create an email that comes across as if someone really did send it and genuinely cares about the end user's experience. Template and automation will not delude people into thinking there's genuine connection; only purposeful copywriting will allow someone to hone in on the details and realize formatting was done specifically for them. When your copy does not sound like something a robot could generate but instead from the mind of a human, you're far more likely to garner trust from your audience and subsequently, their business.
Dynamic Content Blocks Add Contextual Depth
One of the best ways to scale personalization is via dynamic content blocks. These are different pieces of content that can appear for different users in the same email simultaneously based on predetermined rules you've set in place like recent purchases, geographic location, site engagement, etc. Rather than sending ten different emails, you can send one email with ten different purposes and, therefore, valuable content for each sender.
For example, someone who left items in their cart may see a reminder in an email that also features more general content. Someone who visited a blog about productivity may see a prompt for action that showcases a time-saving product or tool. These keep your content fresh and meaningful without the need for hundreds of manually created emails.
Personalization Without Invasion: Respecting Privacy
Strike a balance for personalization versus invasion of privacy. If users think you know too much or worse, that you're watching too closely even the most relevantly designed email will be questionable. Better to err on the side of an overly generalizing approach than a too-personalized one. For example, if someone downloads a white paper, don't thank them for accessing that in your subject line and repeating the same information they just clicked to learn; thank them for paying attention and offering a secondary, relevant resource.
Everything comes down to trust. Use your copy to showcase that you know what's best for the customer without going overboard; let the knowledge come from a trusting space to add value and not come off like you simply want to acknowledge that you've done your research. When this is done in a reasonable fashion, personalization is supportive instead of overbearing; and that will make all the difference between a click-through and an unsubscribe.
Test, Learn, and Refine Your Voice Over Time
Ultimately, this does not entail writing personalized email marketing copy at scale one time and moving on. This is a cyclical, ongoing process that requires assessment with every new send and response and additional data collection. What engages your audience now, for example, does not mean it will engage them in six months. Consumer sentiment may shift, or seasonality may require a new type of message or even industry news. This means that what worked in January and was well received might not be the best thing to say come August, even if it's similar to what you've sent before. This is why establishing a culture of testing is essential for sustained accuracy.
For example, test subject lines. They are the first opportunity for engagement inside a subscriber's inbox, and even slight variations in language, tone, or personalizations can increase or decrease open rates. Then see how this feedback applies to the content of your email body. This means better sentence structure, more or fewer words, variations in casual versus professional tone, or adjustment of positioning/language of CTA. There is not necessarily a rule of thumb for what will work; it's about finding the magic number in specific situations.
Equally important, however, is expanding your measurement of success.
Open rates and click-throughs are traditional measurements of success and very useful measurements at that but they don't paint the entire picture. Look beyond what you can see on the surface. Paying attention to who responds back to your email getting unprompted responses is a surefire sign your email sounds human. Monitor unsubscribe rates and pay attention to patterns; if one type of email makes people unsubscribe more than others, perhaps you should reconsider sending that topic out (or that tone). Perhaps implement surveys to your audience to better understand what people want from you and how often, too.
Also note conversion patterns. Ultimately, the goal of a personalized email should be engagement and subsequent action. Note how different segments engage not just within your email but within your website or landing pages once they click through. Which ones lead to more purchases, signups, or downloads? Which ones lead to drop-offs? This is critical information to understand which copy creates trust on a different level.
Ultimately, over time, the layers of statistics and anecdotal feedback position the voice of your branded emails as something organic, consistent, human. You're not trying to force the latest tonal trend on your readers nor adopt a template suggestion that strangers on the outside have bestowed upon you. You're merely acknowledging the consistent feedback that fosters the expectations your audience has of you and how your messages reflect the progress you've made together. A brand that listens, a brand that adapts, a brand that applies the sense of awareness of what the written word can do will ultimately prevail no matter how big or small the list may be in terms of looking personal.
When you create the equilibrium between systematic feedback and organic loyalty, it becomes something magical. Your subscribers begin to see your emails as more than just emails more than spam or sales pitches. Instead, they are the anticipated correspondence. Subscribers continue to open your emails and read them because they genuinely feel what you have to say will apply to them. In this overstimulated and oversaturated world of inboxes, that's worth its weight in gold.