Users instinctively look for familiar names in their inbox, not company logos. Sending emails from team members, even if automated, creates a personal connection and improves open rates because it mimics a social feed experience where personal identity is paramount.
A B2B marketing newsletter saw a massive spike in replies when it shifted from tactical advice to a personal story about managing mornings and avoiding burnout. This shows that content resonating on a human, empathetic level can outperform purely professional topics, even for a specialized audience.
Instead of asking an LLM to generate a full email, create a workflow where it produces individual sections, each with its own specific strategy and prompt. A human editor then reviews the assembled piece for tone and adds "spontaneity elements" like GIFs or timely references to retain a human feel.
Go beyond sending from a real person by creating a consistent "inbox persona." For example, framing messages as coming from an intern establishes a unique voice and a story that subscribers want to follow, making plain-text emails feel like an ongoing series rather than one-off communications.
When stakeholders demand cramming too many product updates into one email, position yourself as the expert. Explain the science of audience attention—that users won't read past a certain point or absorb more than a few items. This shifts the conversation from personal opinion to data-backed strategy.
The value of a campaign isn't always in direct clicks. A monthly customer email was stopped, revealing its hidden role: it acted as a reminder for "lurking" customers to log in and use the product, evidenced by consistent usage spikes after each send. The campaign's true value was only visible after it was gone.
Effective user onboarding focuses on helping users achieve small, tangible victories that lead to the product's core value. Instead of generic feature tours, use in-app messages triggered by specific user behaviors (or lack thereof) to guide them to the next "micro-yes," like sending their first Zap in Zapier.
Every email campaign has a different role. An event follow-up's goal might be to generate replies, making that the key metric. A nurture email aims for value delivery, while a sales email aims for demos. Judge each campaign by its intended outcome, not by universal vanity metrics.