Last minute Black Friday checklist

Checklist for your Black Friday email marketing strategy

Check that you have thought of the following items and tick them off easily.

Are all your CNAMES still validated?

Are you bravely growing your email list? Then now is the time to check if your CNAMES are still validated. It sometimes happens that someone has removed a CNAME from your DNS records and that a CNAME is not validated (anymore). To be sure that your CNAMES are still validated and that you mail out with a valid email address it is wise to check this. Even if it is just to be sure. Then you can be sure that your e-mail does not just end up in the spam box.

Do you have a landing page where people can sign up for Black Friday deals?

For starters, expand your email list by getting your customers to sign up. Make smart use of a landing page where your customers can already sign up for the newsletter. Then to be the first to know about Black Friday deals. This way you expand your email list and inform all your interested customers about your Black Friday and Cyber Monday deals. So a win-win situation.

Do you have a healthy database?

It would be a shame if your Black Friday and Cyber Monday campaigns don't reach the right customers. Be aware of what type of customer you are sending what e-mail message to. Avoid contacting customers who are not engaged with your business. Segment your audiences into several smaller audiences. In this way, always be spot-on with your communications.

Have you segmented your profiles?

Following on from a healthy database, we continue with segmentation. Segmentation remains the basis of e-mail marketing. You don't want to send the same message to all your customers. For example, customers who buy from you often may want to be given early access, while customers who haven't ordered from you in six months may need an additional discount code to persuade them to order from you again. Think carefully about how you want to target your audience.

Can you send multiple newsletters in a day?

Reloadify allows you to send multiple newsletters per day to the same person. You have to enable this in the settings. If you have not enabled this, and you want to send multiple newsletters on one day to the same target group, this is not possible, and only one newsletter will be sent, namely the first one you have planned.

Do you have a schedule ready?

Start announcing your Black Friday deals on time. Make a schedule for yourself when you start creating the buzz. Everyone needs to know about your deals. Left or right: start this on time. You have quite a bit of competition with Black Friday. Let your customers know in time what they can get from you.

Have you checked and scheduled the necessary newsletters?

Speaking of scheduling: in order not to stress about your email campaigns at all in the coming period, it is wise to schedule all the newsletters you want to send in advance. Double-check them for the right content, the right prices, the right deals, etc. Because let's face it: having multiple newsletters scheduled is tremendously nice.

Have you scheduled a resend of the newsletter?

Check if you have scheduled a resend for your newsletter and triggers. A resend means that the email is resent when the newsletter subscriber has not opened the email within a certain amount of time. The same e-mail is then sent again. It would be a bit of a waste of your strategy if your customer gets a newsletter from you on Monday, gets a resend on Tuesday and also gets a new newsletter on Tuesday. Exclude as many emails from each other as possible and check carefully how many emails you send to which target audience.

Do you have profitable triggers live?

Now is the time to set up profitable triggers. Especially with Black Friday, for example, you want to bring abandoned shopping carts back to your website. Make your sales increase even more by putting these kinds of triggers live before you get started with your Black Friday deals. The abandoned shopping cart is one such trigger that brings in profits for you. Just like retrieving dormant customers and thanking customers for placing their first order.

Checklist for the content in your emails

Now that you've thought about the general business of email marketing, it's time to take a good look at the content. Check off the following items easily.

Are you using eye-catching subject lines and pre-headers?

Standing out with Black Friday and Cyber Monday is incredibly difficult. Especially in the inbox where there is now a lot of competition. Therefore, make your subject line and pre-header as attractive as possible. Make them stand out in the inbox. Choose a lot of variety in your subject line. You don't want to "bore" your customer by telling the same information over and over again.

Are you using eye-catching header images?

Has your customer received and opened the e-mail? Then now is the time to entice your customer to click through to your website, where she can eventually proceed to purchase. One way to entice your customer is by using large, eye-catching header images. The crazier, the better. With Black Friday, you can go big.

Do you create extra urgency with countdown timers?

Of course, you want your emails for Black Friday and Cyber Monday to come across as compelling. Ideally, you should grab conversion now and not in a few days. Therefore, make use of countdown timers. You give the feeling to your customers that they have limited time to strike their deal. In addition, be sure to use slogans such as "last ones". Create urgency and scarcity. That makes it so you convince your customers to make a purchase now. Otherwise, they will miss the boat.

Checklist for your website and peripherals

Your email marketing is all set. So is your website? Check it easily with the points below.

Can your website withstand a lot of extra traffic?

Keep in mind that with Black Friday you will have really peak days in your website traffic. Can your website withstand this? With Reloadify, it is possible to spread out the newsletter sending hours. This way you spread out the traffic on your website that comes from your email marketing. Now that's smart.

Is your development team up to speed?

Don't forget to notify your development team about Black Friday week. Should something go wrong with the website during this week or leading up to it, make sure someone is on standby for you. Nothing is more annoying than having your website go offline, for example, and missing out on sales. Especially with such a big e-commerce event.

Are the right discounted deals in place?

Do you have all your deals in place for Black Friday and Cyber Monday? Then it is important to have these deals and the corresponding markdowns already implemented in the back-end of your website. Or in an external system, depending on what you work in. In any case, it is nice to have the right prices ready for the big days.

Is your stock correct?

Are you sure that your current stock matches what is for sale in your webshop? A quick check on this is no luxury. Nothing is more annoying than a customer ordering something you don't have in the warehouse.

Is your warehouse staff up to speed for extra traffic?

Speaking of your warehouse, put extra staff in the warehouse in order to get all the packages out the door on time. This saves for your employees, because the pressure is lower. But also for your customers, because they can trust that their package will be shipped as soon as possible.

All these points are important to check on time so that you are well-prepared for Black Friday and Cyber Monday. It is a week when you can make a lot of sales, but for that you need to be well-prepared. Make sure your marketing campaigns are set up on time and your website is optimized for all the extra traffic. Good luck with your preparations, and we hope you have a successful Black Friday and Cyber Monday!