This article was written by Téa Liarokapi, a Senior Content Writer for Moosend, an email marketing and marketing automation platform, and an obsessive writer in general. In her free time, she tries to find new ways to stuff more books in her bookcase and content ideas – and cats – to play with.
Today’s digital marketing world is a fast-paced environment that is highly competitive, with brands adapting faster than others and forcing competitors to stay ahead of the curve. At the same time, consumers lead very busy lives and have shorter attention spans – which means that they need email campaigns to get to the point quickly.
The statistic above shows the areas in which marketers use AI tools to generate content and understand user behavior. As you can see, email marketing is there at the top, making things all the more demanding.
But despite the fact that AI-driven tools and tactics have revolutionized how businesses connect with their audience, not all businesses do it correctly.
Email marketing might need AI to deliver highly targeted, timely, and relevant messages, but what are the tactics you need to use to get there? And what are the tools that are going to help you nail AI-generated email marketing campaigns? Is human touch still necessary?
Let’s get started.
Table of contents
Use Interactive Quizzes
Generally speaking, creating interactive quizzes is a fantastic way to grow your email list, gather more leads, and become viral.
At the same time, using interactive quizzes in your email marketing campaigns is a fantastic way to engage users, gather data, and understand the actions to follow to personalize your message. But what about AI?
You can use tools like Interact’s AI-Powered quiz maker. It looks like this:
AI-generated quizzes in email marketing can be a powerful strategy if you use it correctly.
The first thing to know would be your objective. What are you trying to achieve by using an interactive quiz? Is it a lead magnet, a way to gather customer preferences, or just a way to entertain your audience and keep them interested for longer?
After answering the above questions, you’ll need to create a quiz that resonates with your audience. Some users love personality quizzes, and others love the “pick one” type. Look into your customer personas, and figure out what works best for them.
When creating the content of your quiz, make it complex but not overwhelming. AI-generated content can feature questions that will look and feel tailored to your recipients, and this will help them anticipate your next question.
Develop engaging content and capture interest with concise and easy-to-understand questions and appealing templates. Remember, this quiz is a part of your email marketing campaign as much as a responsive email template and beautiful design are.
A fantastic touch when creating personalized, AI-generated email marketing campaigns with quizzes is the follow-up. Invest in email newsletter software with automation capabilities to help you create non-openers or follow-up automated emails with personalized quiz results.
Urge your users to share these results with their peers and see how you can attract a larger slice of your target market by creating an interactive quiz. Give a little incentive while you’re at it. This is a great way to generate more leads through better engagement.
And, of course, remember that each interactive quiz has data to present. Gather your data, study them closely, and make sure to understand user behavior through the data. That way, your next campaign will be all the more targeted and personalized.
Use AI to Test Your Subject Line
As we all know, the subject line is among the most powerful things in an email marketing campaign. Here’s what I mean:
With 47% of email recipients opening the email based on the subject line, an AI tool that can help you test, improve, and personalize could boost your email marketing performance. In that case, you can use Moosend’s Refine. It looks like this:
By entering your business’ data in the respective fields and clicking the “Predict Now!” button, you’ll get personalized recommendations that make sense to your campaigns and match your audience’s preferences:
AI-powered subject line testers like Moosend’s Refine leverage the power of AI and machine learning to understand the hidden patterns that may fall into the cracks. And since AI tools learn from data and consumer behaviors, they can help you create targeted content that is always up to date.
Generally speaking, an AI-powered subject line tester like Refine can help you understand what type of combination is effective. In our example, an emoji would’ve worked wonders. In another one, perhaps a simple “Hello John” would do.
AI-powered subject line testers evaluate various factors to understand user behavior and learn from it, making it easy to understand why your audience behaves a certain way, what makes users open your emails, and what your next move should be.
AI-powered subject line testers can also help you understand what would resonate with your audience on your next campaign and help you make data-driven decisions. Not to mention how easy it is to personalize and optimize using such tools.
As we all know, personalization goes beyond a first name. Your subject line could mention a specific behavior or a product, like “Hello, John. Maybe you need more treats for your furbaby?”. This is a subject line for the specific behavior of a single customer.
Of course, AI is not the end-all-be-all of email marketing subject lines and content. It’s important to remember that AI tools are just that, and you’ll always need a human touch to help you understand your audience and create what’s best for both your brand and them.
Email Content Created With AI
AI can be a powerful tool when it comes to creating email content. It’s not just that AI machines can take a suggestion and give you some great recommendations. When used correctly, AI tools can make your email marketing content and your campaign’s body copy feel tailor-made, engaging, and relevant.
Phrasee is one of those tools that are capable of helping you out with your email marketing campaigns and boosting your content writing efforts with the power of AI and machine learning.
Here’s what the tool looks like:
Phrasee promises to transform your digital campaigns with AI-powered content that enhances your efforts with natural language processing and machine learning abilities.
AI-generated content is something that most marketers shy away from, but this platform promises to boost your email copywriting efforts.
When using AI content for your email marketing campaigns, make sure you use a tool that can help you maintain a consistent brand tone across all platforms. Add brownie points if the tool you select can help you enhance the clarity and effectiveness of your email copy and make it look well-rounded and human.
Your tool should also help you bounce between specific segments of your email list and understand the small differences between personas, regions, or educational backgrounds.
Of course, since you’re investing in a tool that creates AI-generated content for your email marketing campaigns, make sure to synchronize your efforts with other channels. Create a unified content experience through AI with your push notifications and social media posts. That way, users won’t be wary of omnichannel efforts.
Tools like Phrasee carry AI algorithms that can analyze user data and can deliver a fresh and personalized content experience. Not only that, but such tools learn from consumer behavior in a real-time manner. Which means that it’s the perfect way to freshen up your email marketing campaigns.
AI Content and Grammar Checkers
Using an AI content and grammar checker to ensure your content is grammatically correct can bring several benefits to your email marketing campaigns and your communication strategy as a whole.
As we all know, poor grammar is something we use to spot whether an email is a scam or not. So, using tools like Grammarly can help you be spot-on with your content every time you write a sentence.
As you can see in the image above, Grammarly is a tool that can check your grammar, syntax, and the clarity of your text. But why do you need a grammar and content checker, really?
The first reason is that such tools ensure professionalism, as I mentioned before. Errors, typos, or even ill-branded CTA phrases can make you seem like a spammer. An AI checker can help you eliminate mistakes and write polished email marketing messages that will make users feel confident about interacting with.
AI content and grammar checkers can also show you how to rephrase for better readability and more effective and concise writing. Complex sentences, wordy phrases, and an inability to get to the point can hinder the effectiveness of your email marketing campaigns. Improving the clarity and readability of your message can eliminate this possibility.
Proper grammar and error-free emails contribute to a positive customer experience. Not to mention that simple structures and small sentences with no errors eliminate the risk of miscommunication and confusion. And companies that carry pristine messages and a consistent tone – both brand and quality-wise – are more likely to be trusted and have repeated, satisfied customers.
An AI content and grammar checker like Grammarly can help you curate your content and save you a lot of time and resources, and it’s sure to freshen up your email campaigns.
AI Designers for Spot-on Visuals
If you’re an entrepreneur or solopreneur, AI design tools are especially useful for your email marketing campaigns. Using an AI design tool to create your next campaign will add a creative touch to your visuals and help you appear more consistent when it comes to your branding efforts.
AI design tools and image generators can definitely save you time and resources when creating your email campaigns, so long as you pick out the right one. So, research and see what aligns with your requirements and business objectives.
One such tool is Designs.ai, and it promises to help you with visuals and full concepts that go from copy, to visuals, to audios:
Tools like Designs.ai use a prompt that can produce a visual result. Once you have your logo, video, or banner, integrate it into your email marketing campaign. The ideal scenario is to use an email marketing and marketing automation platform that allows you to import images into an easy-to-use Drag-and-Drop email editor.
Check the placement and the size, and consider where your image or banner fits best. Make sure that your visuals align with the overall design and purpose of your email marketing campaign before sending your email.
Also, be sure to use a tool that can support the visual style you want to achieve. It’s one thing to use AI design tools and another thing to use AI “Painters” like Google’s DeepDream.
Use filters, images, and colors that users can correlate to your branded colors, and consider your campaign as a whole before creating your final design. Make sure your prompt is as clear and comprehensive as possible to get the best out of your tool.
Also, pinpoint details like the type of campaign when giving the prompt. A serious and solemn campaign needs muted tones, while a sales campaign should work with more vibrant hues and lively colors.
And never forget to A/B test and evaluate your results. Your AI-generated visuals could not be what users want to see in the end. Check your data and always refine your approach based on the results of each campaign.
AI design tools can produce fantastic results, but it’s important to understand what your audience wants to see and where the balance is between branded visuals and visuals that are too creative to be consistent with your brand’s identity.
AI Tools in Email Marketing: A Way to Freshen up Campaigns or to Replace Marketers?
AI tools might be ideal for freshening up your email marketing campaigns and giving you new perspectives on what to showcase to your audiences, but they’re just that: Tools.
AI tools are fantastic for some data analysis and data transformation and can help you turn a conclusion into a tangible marketing action – in our case, an email marketing campaign. However, they’re there to save time and resources on tasks that can be automated.
AI tools won’t set up the parameters themselves. You need to “feed” it prompts. It won’t analyze data without someone pushing the button. Nor can it create a strategy from scratch or build a brand without an operator.
AI is still taking its first steps, seeing as it cannot generate one hundred percent “human” content yet, nor can it reach its own “Aha!” moment. On the other hand, it can help creatives and marketers save time and energy by speeding up processes. But original ideas are still meant for humans to come up with.
The Takeaway
Creating an email marketing campaign that can give you the much-desired $40 for every $1 spent ROI takes time and needs some freshening up more often than not.
This is why you need AI tools that can make things interesting for you. Use interactive quizzes, subject line testers, and AI-generated content, but remember: Your audience is human, and so are you. And as such, you’ll need to A/B test, check your data, and make decisions based on the patterns your AI tools show you.