The Power of the Welcome Email: Structure, Implementation & Tips

In this article, you'll learn some insights about a particularly influential tool in email marketing: the welcome mail. Our guest authors Sebastian Hansen and Veronika Stabel will tell you what is technically important and how to best design the content to convince your subscribers.

What is a welcome email for a newsletter?

As the name suggests, it's about sending a welcome message to new newsletter subscribers. This mailing plays a central role in customer communication. The welcome mailing is the first contact that customers have with your brand or company and significantly decides whether they want to read your content or not.

Important: The welcome mail should not be confused with the double opt-in mail. When users sign up for the newsletter on your website, the dispatch of a double opt-in mail is legally mandatory. By clicking on a link in this mail they must actively confirm that they actually want to subscribe to your newsletter. Only then you may welcome your new subscribers.

With the welcome mail, you make your new subscribers familiar with your brand. It is a suitable tool to thank for the subscription and to confirm the registration once again. You can not only arouse interest for upcoming mailings, but also give explanations about the frequency and content of your newsletter. With the mailing, you can also obtain consent for tracking or further personal data and information about the interests of the users.

When is a welcome mail used in a newsletter?

You should always send the welcome letter very shortly after the newsletter registration and the DOI confirmation, so that your readers can assign the letter. This can happen in the following cases:

• Someone specifically signs up for your newsletter, e.g. via your website
• Someone has shopped with you in the online store and agreed to marketing communication
• Someone has set up a customer account with you and given a marketing opt-in
• Someone has applied to you and stated that he*she wants to receive news from you

You had me at hello - or not?

Sometimes a single welcome mail is not enough to turn customers into active readers. In these cases, multiple mailings, so-called welcome routes, can be used. These are created after a certain customer lifecycle. With such routes, you remain in the memory of your subscribers, you create interest in your content and can for example operate cross-selling at a later time.

An example is the welcome route of an espresso machine manufacturer, which introduces customers and interested parties to the brand over a period of one year and additionally plays out relevant content, such as the recommendation of a water filter, at defined times.

Why is a newsletter welcome text important? What purpose does it serve?

First of all: Congratulations on the new newsletter subscription! The first hurdle is taken. You have generated a new newsletter contact. Now it's about binding this contact to you so that he doesn't immediately unsubscribe from your email list.

The welcome mail is in most cases also the mailing with the highest opening rate and therefore has a high potential.

It is important that you clearly define the goals of this mailing and implement it accordingly. The new subscribers should trust your brand and for this, you need to introduce your company first. The welcome mail is a suitable tool to thank your users for the subscription and to confirm the registration once again. Readers consequently feel appreciated and are positively attuned to your content. This is important because they are more likely to interact with your content. Additionally, you gain the trust of the new subscribers and can start an (hopefully long) email relationship with them.

You can also clarify the expectations about frequency, content, and benefits of your newsletter in the welcome text. Finding the right words and an appealing layout for the newsletter welcome text is therefore particularly important.

In addition to the good relationship with your subscribers, the welcome mail fulfills another purpose: you have a mail with an expected high opening rate and usually an above-average click rate. Therefore, you should pick up on content with high relevance here. For example, you can tease interesting blog articles that provide traffic to your website, or campaign landing pages that are interesting for the users, but may also generate leads for you.

What does an ideal welcome mail look like?

When you set up a newsletter welcome, it's important to remember the goal of your mailing: building trust with your readers. The best way to do this is to personalize the welcome mailing.

You should pay attention to this so that you don't immediately lose your readers again:

Personalized email marketing 

The more information you have and use, the better. Ideally, you already know the first and last name of your new contact and can therefore address them directly.

A good subject for a welcome mail

The subject is the first thing your subscribers see. It therefore plays an important role and should be chosen to arouse interest in your subscribers. Depending on the email client, subject lines are displayed differently. A maximum length of 50 characters can be used as a guideline. You should formulate a concise subject that encourages your contacts to open the mail. Personalized address in the subject can have a positive effect on this.

Use the subject of your welcome mail to thank you, this conveys appreciation. Alternatively, you can also refer again to the benefits that you might have promised when registering. Examples of suitable subject lines:

• "First name, thank you for your registration!"
• "Your 20% voucher is waiting for you, first name"
• "First name, here is your e-book on the topic of lead generation"

Example of a welcome mail: Implementation for the Adecco Group Germany

The use of emojis in the subject can also help to increase the opening rate. With emojis, you can also convey emotions in a very short text. But be careful: the display of emojis varies depending on the email client. Furthermore, you should only use those whose meanings are understood without doubt by the readers.

The preheader of your welcome mail 

Next up is the preheader. This is the extension of your subject line and therefore also important in arousing the interest of the readers. It makes sense to continue the thought from the subject line.

Possible preheader formulations are:

• "We are glad that you are here, first name!"
• "Look forward to more exclusive discounts and the latest fashion trends!"
• "Which tips from the e-book will probably help you the most?"

Text templates for the newsletter welcome mail

Let's move on to the welcome text, i.e. the introduction in your welcome mail. Here it is recommended to use the address with the first name or first and last name, depending on whether you use 'du' or 'Sie'. In the further part of the welcome text, you can express your joy that the new subscribers want to receive your newsletters. If you have collected more data in the registration form, you can also use this for personalization. If you have asked for interests, for example, you can link this with your joy about the registration.

An example for the newsletter welcome text:

"Hello first name, great that we share the interest for lead generation and content marketing . We are very pleased that you want to receive our content on these topics!"

What content should be in the welcome mail?

Now follows the content of the welcome mail. This should be short and crisp, but answer all open questions: What can your users expect when receiving your newsletter? Which benefits can they look forward to? What kind of content is sent to them? In what rhythm do the contents appear?

As already mentioned, you should definitely introduce your company again and what makes you special. You should also reward the readers with the goodies with which you lured them to subscribe, for example, a whitepaper for download or similar. If the new contact has only registered for certain areas, e.g. news, jobs, tips, discount campaigns, or even only for certain product groups, you should also use this information for personalization.

Example:

• "From now on, you will receive weekly exclusive discount codes for our shop."
• "From now on we supply you monthly with news about the product category XYZ!"

Finally, you should integrate a meaningful call to action (CTA) into your introductory text. It's important that this doesn't lead to a product or a purchase call. Instead, you should slowly introduce your subscribers to the sales funnel. The likelihood that new subscribers will make a purchase directly at the first contact is very low anyway. It's better if you use the CTA to open the customer journey and to give your users a first orientation.

Examples for CTAs in the welcome mailing can be:

• "Discover assortment now"
• "Download e-book now"
• "These jobs we offer"
• "Get to know us"
• "Learn more about us now"

After the welcome text and the core content that you want to convey, you can link to further content. These should offer your readers added value and specifically guide them through the customer journey. Here again: Do not include a direct purchase call, but rather lead slowly to a purchase decision.

Choose target pages for these additional contents that are easy to understand, transparently represent you, and interest your users. Here again, you can set back to personalized content. Based on collected data, you can select what suits the interest selection of the new contact.

Finally, use the mailing to draw attention to your social media channels. The more touchpoints you generate, the better you can offer new contacts a round-the-news service.

In summary: This is what a successful welcome mail looks like

• Catchy subject that encourages opening
• Preheader that continues the thought of the subject
• Personal welcome text
• Content that answers all open questions
• Clearly named CTA that introduces the customer journey
• Further teasers that are interesting and lead users along the customer journey.

What should be considered when implementing a welcome message in the newsletter?

Your welcome mail will be most successful if you set on marketing automation: The registration of the new contact acts here as a trigger that starts automated and personalized processes without you having to intervene manually. This is particularly advantageous because the communication takes place in real time and you do not let valuable time pass because of opening hours or vacations.

Here you can also work with so-called split automations and integrate only the content, by using data, that you know will arouse the interest of your contacts. If you are currently looking for a suitable Email Marketing-tool or newsletter tool, you should include in your selection whether the automated dispatch of the welcome mail can be covered. Nowadays almost all common tools offer this function. An example of a supportive tool is GetResponse.

For some users, one mail alone is not enough to make them loyal readers of your news. Therefore, consider welcome routes, which gradually convince new subscribers of you and your content. An important point that you should bear in mind when selecting tools. Reviews from other marketers at OMR Reviews can help you with the selection.

An important point with the welcome mail from the newsletter and in email marketing in general is tracking. Keep an eye on when you achieve the highest opening rates, which content your users click on particularly often, and conduct A/B testing to try out different variants. You can then use this collected data to optimize your mailings even further.

Conclusion

Use consistent branding in your mailings to create a recognition value. The use of logo, colors, and buttons should correspond to your CI. Try to design the mailings as appealing as possible. In doing so, you should pay special attention to how the mail is displayed in different mail clients and on different devices. The sender address of the welcome mailing should be identical to that of the newsletter. It is important that readers can see at a glance who the mail is from. Depending on which tool you use, you should also validate this email address together with your IT, so that it is not caught by spam filters.