Shopify Email Marketing: 22+ Apps, Strategies, and Workflow

Shopify is one of the best e-commerce platforms today. It caters to millions of businesses worldwide and allows merchants to sell their products by providing a functional store point of sales combined with point of sale support. This means that you can comfortably run your business from anywhere and still get help whenever you need it.

Related article: Shopify Explained: An all-around review

Besides its high functionality, Shopify also features a wide range of eCommerce tools to increase store efficiency, boost sales, and provide valuable customer insights. Despite all its resources online store points, running your personal Shopify business can be challenging.

It often involves numerous daunting tasks like marketing, shipping products, optimizing store speed, managing inventories, and securing checkout systems. But the good news is that the constant industrial evolution witnessed across the world is continually fostering the adoption of different strategic approaches. Among them is email marketing.

Well, email marketing has been around since the 1970s and is one of the best marketing mediums for nurturing customers, generating leads, and growing sales. With more than 306 billion emails exchanged per day, 64% of small businesses currently use it to reach out to their customers.

By now, you can already see how relevant email marketing is to eCommerce. With more than 4 billion email users today, tidying up your Shopify email marketing strategy could be the missing piece in your eCommerce success puzzle.

I mean, it is the best marketing channel for creating brand awareness and improving customer loyalty, all by sending your subscribers relevant and helpful emails. It is probably one of the most crucial parts of all eCommerce strategies and a proven method for increasing your Shopify revenue.

With an average return on investment (ROI) of $36 from every dollar spent on email marketing, Shopify email marketing stands out as the most cost-effective method for engaging customers and growing business. But where do you start?

This article will take you through Shopify email marketing, give you a holistic understanding of the best automation apps to use, highlight Shopify email marketing best practices, and outline essential email marketing workflows you need to have.

Read along to learn more about the best Shopify email marketing advice ever, the different email marketing tools, and appropriate steps to keep directly engaging customers and boost sales.

Without much further ado, here is more about the Shopify email.

Outline

• Shopify Email: How It Works, Pros & Cons
• 10 Best Shopify Email Marketing Apps
• Klaviyo: Email Marketing & SMS
• Seguno: Email Marketing
• Omnisend Email Marketing & SMS
• SM: Email Marketing & Pop Ups
• Active Campaign: AC Email Marketing Automation
• Email Marketing by CM Commerce
• Privy ‑ Pop Ups, Email, & SMS
• Drip: Email and SMS Marketing
• ONE: Pop Ups, SMS & Email Marketing
• Automizely Emails & Popups
• 10 Shopify Email Marketing Best Practices
• Audit Your Approach and Focus on Collecting Relevant Data Only
• Clean and Grow Your Contacts
• Prioritize Email Segmentation
• Make Your Campaigns More about Opting In
• Keep an Eye on Content Shares
• Focus on Measuring Meaningful Email Performance Metrics
• Optimize the Bottom of Your Funnel
• Keep on A/B Testing
• Pay Special Attention to Customer Retention
• Diversify Your Marketing Channels
• Types of Email Marketing Automation Workflow You Need To Have
• Lead Nurturing Automation Email Examples
• Cart Abandonment Workflow
• Customer Nurturing Workflow
• Product Page Automation Workflow

I. Shopify Email: How It Works, Pros & Cons

As we have already established, email marketing is one of the best ways to send information about upcoming products and promotions to your customers while gently nudging those who might have a previously abandoned cart before completing their order.

Well, you can easily create and run your email marketing campaign on Shopify by either using one of their many supported third-party email automation tools or the Shopify email app.

This Shopify feature will let you automate your email campaigns without using any third-party app. It is an in-built marketing automation tool that allows users to send up to 2,500 monthly emails for free.

If you need to send out more emails, you will have to pay $1 for the next batch of 1,000 emails. This is probably an ideal solution for new store businesses with a smaller customer base if you think about it.

Shopify email aims to make your eCommerce business more accessible and marketing more approachable in a more practical sense. Its top features include pre-built email templates, drag–and–drop functionality, third-party integration, and email campaign analytics.

With that said, Shopify email has all the necessary tools for you to start building meaningful and lasting relationships with all your customers. I mean, you will have adequate flexibility when customizing your emails and measuring campaign success by closely monitoring both click-through and open rates.

Before using Shopify email, you first need to have a paid subscription plan and an online store sales channel installed. That's it! Now you can proceed to set up and customize your Shopify email app campaigns as you please.

Pros

• Does not need coding experience to use
• Offers 2,500 monthly emails for free
• Easy to use
• Customizable email campaign templates

Cons

• Their pre-built templates are few
• Specializes mainly on abandoned cart email automation
• It does not offer unlimited emails

II. 10 Best Shopify Email Marketing Apps

1. Klaviyo: Email Marketing & SMS

Klaviyo is a powerful email marketing app designed to help businesses customize and automate their email marketing campaigns. With an overall rating of 4.2 out of 5 stars in the Shopify app store, Klaviyo offers one of the most efficient marketing systems for Shopify businesses. It mainly provides a 360-degree view of customers, high-end predictive analytics tools, A/B testing, Shopify integration, and a long list of pre-built workflows.

With it, you can quickly analyze and segment customers accordingly, personalize campaigns, automate specific email aspects, test campaigns, and increase ROI. Their main support channels include emails, chat, and SMS opt-in forms.

Klaviyo is an easy-to-use email marketing software, can be set up in a few clicks and is best for small and medium-sized Shopify businesses or any intermediate user who wants to hit the ground running.

2.  Seguno: Email Marketing

Seguno is an email marketing plugin that enables Shopify merchants to run their email marketing campaigns more efficiently. Shopify store owners can create email directories that keep customers engaged and build effective email lists that boost store revenue.

It is a top-rated Shopify email marketing app that currently boasts of 4.8 stars rating from 772 reviews. Its Shopify integration works fine, and you can seamlessly create, track, and manage all your email marketing campaigns without leaving your Shopify dashboard. This means that you can quickly run all email marketing efforts from either the admin panel or your Shopify mobile app without any hassle.

Seguno provides one-click automation for standard emails with ready-made templates for welcome emails to new customers, discount reminders, and thank you messages for buying customers. Some of its unique features include pre-built email touchpoints that let you reduce abandoned checkouts and collect dynamic recommendations for your subscribers.

Seguno pricing includes a free plan for the first 250 subscribers and a $10/month plan for up to 1000 subscribers. They both have unlimited email sending and a 10-day free trial period. For support, their help center section is comprehensive enough to answer most of your common questions, but you can also get live support via email.

3. Omnisend Email Marketing & SMS

Omnisend is a unique omnichannel marketing automation platform that is designed explicitly for growth-focused eCommerce store owners. It primarily allows merchants to add numerous channels to a typical automation workflow targeted for email, web push notifications, SMS, etc.

With a 4.6 star rating, this email marketing app features a user-friendly drag-and-drop email builder and email capturing tools like pop-ups and a landing page. This unique combination is particularly effective if you want to capture new customers and retain all previous contacts. 

Its automation features will help you create robust automation workflows and allow you to personalize your message based on specific customer data like their shopping behavior and level of campaign engagement.

Omnisend further offers integration with several other marketing tools and eCommerce platforms. Their pricing model includes monthly subscriptions, and features support through email, live chat, and a detailed knowledge base section.

4. SM: Email Marketing & Pop Ups

SmartrMail is another leading Shopify email marketing solution with an average 4.9-star rating in the Shopify app store. Its primary features include a user-friendlyinterface for running successful email campaigns. The plugin consists of many attractive email templates that cater to different email needs, especially if you want to spice your operational and transactional emails.

Its Shopify integration process is very straightforward, and it automatically starts to generate working email designs based on your general brand and existing store design. Smartrmail further uses machine learning to curate relevant product recommendation emails for different subscribers based on their behavioral data, and you can choose the interval for sending them out.

You might similarly find its smart segments feature enjoyable, as it automatically groups your contacts to six different parts like "loyal customers" or "new customers" based on specific criteria. Still, you can edit them as you may like. For more help, you can only contact customer support through live chat.

5. Active Campaign: AC Email Marketing Automation 

ActiveCampaign is well-known for its category-defining customer experience automation platform, helping 130,000+ businesses worldwide develop and maintain meaningful relationships with their customers. It is a leading email marketing tool, and it currently has a rating score of 4.4 stars on the Shopify app store.

Its main provisions include over 500 pre-built campaign automation that combines email marketing, CRM, and marketing automation for powerful personalization and segmentation across email, SMS, live chat, and social media. ActiveCampaign typically removes silos that hinder customer relationship channels, creating the perfect environment to grow your business in Shopify.

Other notable features include numerous integrations for Shopify and other third-party apps, hundreds of pre-built templates, an easy-to-use email editor, and accessible customer service. Their main customer service channels include live chat, phone support, and a detailed self-help section on their website.

Their pricing model includes a free plan and three other payable plans. Feel free to use the 14-day free trial to test their services before you commit to any contract.

6.  Email Marketing by CM Commerce

Email Marketing by CM Commerce is a cloud-based email marketing Shopify app that helps eCommerce businesses manage subscriptions, send engaging newsletters, and generate productivity reports. Catering to all major business verticals, this email marketing plugin has a 4.6-star rating and features targeted segments and customer journey automation that help businesses execute effective email campaigns.

They further provide a drag-and-drop email editor coupled with plenty of customizable pre-built email templates, which you can use to customize and expand your email lists and target relevant contacts with appropriate messages. This option additionally provides real-time email performance and campaign activity reports that can be used to keep track of customer behavior, engagement levels, content sharing, and other actionable insights.

Pricing here is on a monthly subscription basis, and this includes support via email and through an online knowledge base that opens an external site.

7. Privy ‑ Pop Ups, Email, & SMS

Privy is another top Shopify email marketing tool for improving website conversion, growing lists of contacts, and boosting eCommerce sales. It has a 4.6-star rating, and both small and large Shopify businesses currently use it.

It mainly offers a free suite of campaign automation and email capture tools. For example, Privy's exit-intent-driven banner and pop-up features are designed to help you automate your cart abandonment workflows and win sales.

Their main customizable features include a wide array of mobile-friendly displays, including scroll boxes, website banners, flyouts, announcement bars, pop-ups, and embedded sign-up forms. They also offer an automated A/B split test, which you can use to ensure that all your campaign resources are correctly optimized.

The Privy text option is great for automating your abandoned cart SMS and other win-back campaigns. If you get stuck, you can quickly get the help you need through email, live chat, or phone.

8. Drip: Email and SMS Marketing

Drip is another excellent email and SMS marketing automation app for growing Shopify brands interested in taking their email campaigns a level higher. This tool helps businesses tap into the power of customer data and curate perfectly personalized marketing strategies that boost revenue. It is the best tool for targeting both previous and potential customers.

Drip essentially features many pre-built templates and custom segments with real-time updates, making it easy for store owners to target the right audiences. With a 4.6 star rating, over 30,000+ eCommerce brands in the world today use Drip to engage with customers using proven pre-built playbooks. Quick working examples include welcome email series, abandoned cart workflows, and post-purchase follow-ups.

Pricing starts at $19 per month, but you can take advantage of their 14-day free trial plan to test if they are a good fit for your Shopify store. Their primary live support channels include phone, live chat, and emails. Otherwise, their FAQ site documentation should answer any common question that you may have.

9.  ONE: Pop Ups, SMS & Email Marketing

ONE is a 5 star rated Shopify email marketing app designed to capture customer attention and improve brand trustworthiness. The app mainly features A/B testing, campaign automation popups, contacts capture subscription fields, 18+ third-party integrations, SMS automation, and gamified lead generation as its unique feature.

Right after signing up, you will get access to 60+ pre-built and customizable email popup themes, 24/7 live chat support, 18+ campaign automation tools, and exit intent popup games. All its social proof notifications successfully capture customer trust and attention, which should help boost your visitors’ confidence to buy.

10.  Automizely Emails & Popups

The Automizely Emails & Popups Shopify app is a 4.9 star rated email marketing solution that promises to make you an open rate guru. It has a very intuitive interface, and all its features are designed to help you engage with all your contacts and consequently grow your business.

In short, this app has everything you need to generate leads, boost conversion, and accelerate sales. These include opt-in email forms, appealing popups, designer-made templates, and targeted push notifications. It essentially helps users to grab visitor attention and display targeted offers that are not annoying.

Its interface is easy to use, and you can seamlessly create beautiful lead-capturing email marketing pop ups with a few clicks. The best part is that all your email marketing campaigns will be optimized accordingly and made mobile responsive. Otherwise, their customer support service operates round the clock, and you can get help by using live chat or going through their extensive help center web page.

III. 10 Shopify Email Marketing Best Practices

Officially launched on September 20th, the new IOS 15 features a series of privacy updates designed to cloak email activity and block ad trackers. While Apple continues to advocate for consumer data privacy, this new update is causing a stir in the digital marketing world, especially to those who rely on first-party data reports when targeting Apple consumers.

Some of its main features that might have significant effects on your Shopify email marketing strategy include:

• Mail Privacy Protection - allows Apple Mail users to use mail privacy features that hide IP addresses and stop third parties from tracking email delivery and other IP-related data.
• Hide My Email - cloaks email addresses and enables users to use "fake" email accounts on promotional sites without revealing their country or region.
• iCloud Private Relay - an iCloud subscription with additional privacy elements that prevent third parties from tracking Safari users' activities and shared information.

This new rollout is a huge deal because Apple commands more than half of the email marketing share and accounts for over 90% of mobile email opens rates. So, here are a few best practices to help you navigate IOS15 and make the most out of your Shopify email marketing strategies.

1. Audit Your Approach and Focus on Collecting Relevant Data Only

Double-check your current email marketing approach and identify areas where you rely on data that IOS15 no longer supports. Now that you cannot use third-party cookies, you should focus on collecting first-party data instead. For example, you can use other nifty assets like landing pages, embedded sign-up forms, and polls to get more information about your subscribers other than relying on location and other open metrics. 

2. Clean and Grow Your Contacts

Every change commonly calls for a general clean-up and re-evaluation. So, ensure that you only have active contacts who are more receptive to your email offers. Clean your email list by scrubbing off inactive subscribers who have not opened any of your emails in a while. 

Also, consistently work on ways to increase your marketing funnel. Spice up your ads and do everything you can to capture new leads. Start testing your on-site pop-ups, and optimize them based on the type of email client they are using. For example, if most of your consumers use Apple Mail, doing this should effectively help you navigate IOS15. 

3. Prioritize Email Segmentation

As customer experience and personalized content keep growing, so does the need for strategic email segmentation. Having a solid email segmentation means that you are sending targeted campaigns with relevant offers to the correct recipients at the right time. 

With the new updates in mind, you can segment based on their different levels of email engagement. While this should be continuous., it would be best to focus on click-through rates rather than open rates. If you manage to execute this to perfection, you should boost conversion rates, customer satisfaction, and store revenue.

4. Make Your Campaigns More about Opting In

If you audit and find that your marketing practices are GDPR compliant, you should not have problems navigating IOS15. Otherwise, ensure that all your website forms have a box that calls users to opt into your email marketing. Another proven example includes putting up an enticing blurb stating that they will be opted in by filling the form but that they can unsubscribe as they please. Building a list of subscribers who opt-in means their engagement levels will be higher because they choose to receive emails from you. 

5. Keep an Eye on Content Shares

Tracking content shares is one of the least mentioned but most effective ways for navigating through the data privacy challenges imposed by IOS15. It provides the best chance for you to understand which email workflows are most valuable. This way, you can precisely pinpoint which approach works best for you, and you can focus on curating newsletters that will keep all your subscribers more engaged and gain new ones from shared content. For example, embedding links of timely attractive offers in your email campaigns makes them more appealing. Most of your customers won't be able to resist sharing it within their circles. Tacking this metric will provide you with insightful tips that you can use to plan your subsequent campaigns and maximize their impact.

6. Focus on Measuring Meaningful Email Performance Metrics

Email open rate is more of a vanity metric than click-through rates because clicks are reliable for measuring email engagement. Therefore, it is best to focus on meaningful email performance metrics like click-through rates – especially with the new IOS15 update.

7. Optimize the Bottom of Your Funnel

The bottom of any marketing funnel is where personalization takes center stage. Since the new IOS update means you will lose access to most of your personalization assets, you must thoroughly examine the infrastructure for successful conversions at the bottom of your funnel. Failure to do so means running the risk of sending emails that sound robotic and automated. While at it, focus on adding a human touch to your automated newsletters for more engagement. Some good examples include using a rhyming sense of humor, being courteous, and adding a bit of quirkiness to your content. Just make sure whatever you choose to use will match your brand tonality.

8. Keep on A/B Testing

Now that email opens are no longer an applicable testing method for email automation success, you must plan to A/B test different email components for effectiveness on the new platform. These include things like email subject lines and actual email content

Similarly, test different levels of personalization, product images, campaign incentives, CTAs, and email layouts. The more informed you are, the better your chances of making the most out of Apple's new email privacy changes.

9. Pay Special Attention to Customer Retention

A solid customer retention program helps strengthen email marketing strategies and guarantees better engagement rates. Assuming that you already have a taste of the new IOS updates, this is one of the most critical steps you should take to maintain store revenue. 

For example, it will be best to start by investing in a loyalty program if you start. With one in place, you will likely see a spike in engagement levels in your emails. You can also intersect new upcoming products with your loyalty emails to take things a notch higher. 

10. Diversify Your Marketing Channels

Assuming that you have come across the many speculations that IOS15 could be the end of email marketing, it probably is the best time to diversify your marketing channels. With SMS gaining popularity fast, it probably is the best way to complement any Shopify email marketing strategy for Apple users. Other promising examples to consider are optimizing web push notifications for abandoned carts and personalized content. Remember to segment the recipients first carefully, or else you might risk irritating audiences.

IV. Types of Email Marketing Automation Workflow You Need To Have

An email marketing workflow refers to a series of automated emails sent based on specific segmentations like preferences and browsing behavior. These workflows always work to accomplish specific marketing goals like purchasing a product. Depending on the level of triggered personalization, these emails also give merchants a unique opportunity to directly engage with their customers and help spice up their customer journey.

Well, here are examples of the types of email marketing workflow you need to have:

1. Lead Nurturing Automation Email Examples

A lead nurturing automation email workflow often activates based on pre-set actions or conditions that a contact meets. This email marketing workflow typically relies on lead segmentation, scoring, and tagging to determine the qualification status and their specific location. It lets merchants tap into lead contact profiles, effectively following up with relevant campaigns with helpful links that encourage conversion.

2. Cart Abandonment Workflow

Indeed, many consumers are often annoyed by abandoned cart emails. Considering that most cart abandonments are purely accidental, most customers are likely to complete their order after receiving a targeted email. That is what makes cart abandonment workflows a must-have in your Shopify email marketing strategy. Although personalization often does much leg work, it is always best to remind the customer before abandoning the cart.

3. Customer Nurturing Workflow

A customer nurturing workflow works to home in different contacts with varying product engagement levels. For example, you can develop a workflow that contains helpful content like tutorial videos to nurture customers who are not fully engaging with your products and a featured success story for the highly engaged contacts.Keep in mind that the end goal here is to boost product engagement levels and nurture customer interest.

4. Product Page Automation Workflow

Product page automation workflows are emails designed to provide contacts with relevant product information that matches their specific interests and needs. For example, suppose a connection bought a toy for his puppy. In that case, your product page automation workflow should feature a series of relevant product recommendations or upcoming products coupled with nurturing messages with clear CTAs. Just make sure that your workflow is fully dedicated to guiding your lead through their customer journey and provides a resounding solution to their needs.

Conclusion

It is best to clearly outline your marketing needs and objectives before deciding on what type of tool you would like to use to automate your Shopify email marketing strategy. Not all Shopify email marketing automation tools are the same. That is why you need to review their features alongside your specific needs carefully.

This includes checking if their most basic plan contains all relevant features you are looking for and if the pricing is within your budget before making any commitments. While individual app reviews will give you a general sense of what to expect, we recommend that you take advantage of the free trial periods to put the different automation apps to test if they will be a good match for your brand.

The ten email marketing apps discussed in this article were carefully handpicked and analyzed. So, feel free to pick one that fits the bill and remember to use the highlighted best practices to help you navigate IOS15. Happy Selling!