From awareness to loyalty: Email marketing customer journey strategies that drive results

Want to better understand what will help a customer move from the moment they first learn about your brand to the state of a loyal client? How can this knowledge be applied in email marketing? We have collected working strategies, valuable insights, and inspiring examples of how emails push a customer to decide at each stage of their journey.

Understanding the customer journey

A customer journey is the series of interactions that customers have with your brand — from initial awareness to post-purchase engagement. It is a crucial aspect of email marketing, as it helps businesses understand their customers’ needs and preferences. By mapping the customer journey, businesses can identify opportunities to improve the customer experience and increase conversions.

Understanding the customer journey for your product and business is essential to correctly build a strategy for attracting potential customers and retaining existing customers in different marketing channels, including email marketing. When building this strategy, research on the target audience and the creation of customer journey maps are important and must rely on facts rather than guesswork.

Your email strategy must precisely hit these critical touchpoints to offer prospects what they need when they need it.

Defining your email marketing strategy

Traditionally, the overall customer journey is divided into five basic stages: awareness, consideration, acquisition, retention, and advocacy. Customers have their pain points, intentions, and motivations at each stage.

Email marketing is “the ability to send the right message to the right customers at the right time.” Understanding the customer journey and email marketing form the perfect partnership for creating the best customer experience. It involves understanding customer needs, preferences, and behaviors to create targeted and personalized email campaigns. A well-planned email marketing strategy can increase customer engagement, loyalty, and conversions.

Email marketing allows you to identify subscriber segments and create email campaigns and sequences for each segment to smoothly build your customers’ email marketing journey at each stage of their interaction with the product.

Create customer journey mapping

Customer journey mapping visually represents the customer’s experience across all touchpoints. It helps businesses identify pain points, areas for improvement, and opportunities to delight customers. A well-crafted customer journey map can inform email marketing strategies and improve customer engagement.

Three crucial steps of customer journey mapping

Vlad Sidniov, conversion rate optimization (CRO) and web analytics expert, shared advice on building a detailed customer journey map for your business.

Conduct a detailed study of your customers’ behavior to maximize the use of the customer journey map. Although the customer journey map is not the only way to conduct such research, it is one of the most effective ways to study the customer journey.

Customer journey mapping is unique because it allows you to visualize strategic information about the customer journey. This, in turn, simplifies the process of communicating this knowledge to all members of your company and allows you all to be in the same information field regarding your customers.

Among the different options for conducting this research, I can recommend the following:

• a current-state journey map visually shows the customer’s current experience with a product or service from start to finish at every touchpoint;
• service blueprints are applied process charts that show the service delivery process from the customer’s perspective. They make it easier to design a new process or document and improve an existing one.

To conduct a study, regardless of the option you choose, you need to take the following three steps:

1. Having ready-made buyer personas responsible for your most profitable customer segments would be helpful.
2. For each persona, you need to select five real customers and conduct a study of their journey from the beginning of the need to a successful purchase and even further — to a repeat purchase or to the process of returning or exchanging the product. Choose a research method for this part of the study. I recommend user interviews and unmoderated usability tests for this.
3. After working with personas, you must identify the customers’ key touchpoints, pain points, and opportunities. Visualize this information on the customer journey map that best suits your business processes.

Tools for customer journey map visualization

Creating a customer journey map helps you visualize how subscribers interact with your emails at each stage of their journey, from the first sign-up to becoming loyal customers. Although plenty of tools can help you craft detailed, insightful journey maps, let’s explore three popular options: Google Sheets, Smaply, and Miro. 

1. Google Sheets
Google Sheets is a flexible, easy-to-use spreadsheet tool that can be customized to map your customer journey step by step. With its straightforward interface, you can create columns for touchpoints and opportunities and track metrics such as open rates and click-throughs at each stage.

2. Smaply
Smaply is a dedicated customer journey mapping tool designed to create in-depth visualizations. It offers templates, personas, and touchpoint management features to help you understand your subscribers’ behaviors and emotions at every stage.

(Source: Smaply)

3. Miro
Miro is a platform where teams can collaborate online to map customer journeys. Visualization is performed using sticky notes, diagrams, and pre-built templates. It is perfect for brainstorming and refining ideas with your team.

(Source: Miro)

Alternative tools such as Lucidchart, Canva, and Omnigraffle are worth exploring depending on your team’s preferences, budget, and workflow.

Crafting the perfect email for every journey stage

Here, we present the maximum possible email journey stages along with strategies, tips, and email examples for each one. Use these tips and examples and make your email customer journey as perfect as possible.

Brand awareness stage

Brand awareness is the first stage of the customer journey, where prospective customers engage in communication and become aware of a brand or product. It allows you to gather email addresses and connect directly with potential customers. Focus on promoting your email subscription program at touchpoints where people will most likely encounter your brand for the first time. For instance, if a significant portion of your audience discovers your business through blog content, feature a prominent email sign-up form or link within your blog posts.

Email campaigns at this stage should focus on introducing the brand, providing value, and building trust. Examples of awareness-stage emails include welcome series, newsletters, and promotional emails. Collaborations with celebrities and memorable products work well to attract the attention of new subscribers at this first stage.

(Source: MailCharts)

Here is an example of a welcome email that immediately draws you into using the service’s capabilities.

(Source: Email Love)

Consideration stage

At the consideration stage, customers evaluate their options and consider purchasing. Email campaigns at this stage should focus on providing more information, addressing concerns, and building credibility. Examples of consideration-stage emails include educational content, product demos, and customer testimonials.

Your marketing materials must captivate your audience; personalization is key to achieving this. Leverage customer data and AI tools to gather insights about your audience. This will allow you to segment them into targeted email lists and craft messaging tailored to their demographics, interests, and values. Even simple touches, such as addressing customers by name, can build stronger connections and make your emails feel more personal.

Incorporating these strategies enhances engagement during consideration and strengthens relationships throughout every stage of the customer journey.

(Source: Stripo email template)

Decision-making stage

At the decision-making stage, customers purchase or perform a desired action. Email campaigns at this stage should focus on providing incentives, creating a sense of urgency, and making the purchase process easy.

Limited-time offers, exclusive discounts, and abandoned cart reminders are examples of decision-making-stage emails. To maximize the impact of your emails, include a compelling call-to-action (CTA) that motivates customers to complete their purchases. Adding urgency can be highly effective — consider offering a limited-time discount or free trial to create a sense of urgency and encourage immediate action.

See an example email including a special discount to encourage recipients to purchase Vans:

(Source: Email from Vans)

And here is an excellent example of an abandoned cart email:

(Source: MailCharts)

Purchase stage (acquisition)

The acquisition stage begins with the purchase but extends far beyond the click of the “Buy” button, marking the start of a relationship centered on service and communication. At this stage, you foster loyalty by ensuring customers are satisfied with your offerings. Key touchpoints may include personalized discounts, automated follow-ups, and other engagement strategies. 

By understanding this stage, you gain valuable insights into why customers choose your brand, enabling you to create email campaigns that nurture their loyalty through incentives and community-building efforts. These emails help to finalize the transaction and start the business relationship.

After a purchase is completed, transactional emails should take center stage. Customers expect immediate confirmation that their order has been received, followed by updates on shipping status and delivery timelines.

(Source: Email Love)

Advanced email marketers now utilize package tracking emails with live updates, providing real-time information whenever the email is opened. These updates refresh automatically, ensuring the information stays current even if the customer revisits the email later. This level of functionality is no longer a luxury but a standard expectation in modern email communication.

Post-purchase stage

Retaining existing customers is more cost-effective than acquiring new ones and is essential for long-term business success. To maintain a strong connection, send post-purchase emails such as thank-you messages, personalized recommendations, product usage guides, or requests for feedback. Encourage customers to follow your brand on social media or join a loyalty program. These strategies keep your customers engaged, fostering repeat purchases and brand loyalty.

(Source: Email Love)

Upsells and cross-sells

By now, you are a trusted presence in your customers’ inboxes, with insights into their preferences and interactions. Use these data to craft personalized, segmented emails that strengthen relationships and boost upselling and cross-selling efforts. Tailor messages based on seasonality, life events, or milestones such as a one-year anniversary, making your campaigns more relevant and impactful. The better you understand your customers, the more effective your emails will be.

Here is an example of an email with upgrade possibilities from Zoom:

(Source: Email Love)

Loyalty program

Highlight the perks and benefits of your loyalty program to show your customers that their loyalty matters. Use emails to encourage members to redeem points for new products or services, emphasizing the value they receive. These messages keep members engaged and inspire them to explore exclusive rewards tailored to their preferences, strengthening their connection to your brand.

(Source: Email Love)

Advocacy and re-engagement stage

Customers at the advocacy stage are passionate about your brand but may need a little nudge to actively recommend it. Make it easier for them to become advocates by using targeted email marketing strategies that encourage reviews, referrals, and social engagement.

Key tactics for this stage:

1. Request reviews: Send post-purchase emails with an easy-to-use review form or link, and consider offering incentives such as promo codes or loyalty points.
2. Promote referral programs: Encourage sharing by offering benefits for both the referrer and their friends, such as discounts or store credit.
3. Boost social engagement: Invite customers to follow you on social media and share posts using branded hashtags, which will help you collect valuable user-generated content.

(Source: MailCharts)

Re-engagement emails allow brands to gently remind themselves if a customer has been inactive for some time:

(Source: Stripo email template)

4 tactics to effectively use the customer journey in email marketing 

The four pillars of successful tool use are automation, segmentation, measurement of results, and best practices to eliminate typical mistakes.

1. Automating your email journey

Automated emails can help businesses save time, increase efficiency, and improve customer engagement. Email marketing automation tools can help businesses create targeted and personalized email campaigns based on customer data and behavior. Examples of automated email campaigns include welcome series, abandoned cart reminders, and birthday emails.

2. Segmentation and personalization

Segmentation involves dividing your audience into smaller, targeted groups to deliver tailored content. Customer journey mapping helps identify how different user types interact with your brand. By leveraging segmentation, you can use audience insights to craft personalized emails that meet their specific needs, avoiding low-value content while improving engagement and tracking customer data more effectively.

3. Measuring success

Measuring the success of email marketing campaigns is crucial for understanding customer behavior and improving future campaigns. Key metrics include open rates, click-through rates, conversion rates, and customer feedback. By tracking these metrics, businesses can identify areas for improvement and optimize their email marketing strategies.

4. Best practices to avoid common pitfalls

Common mistakes to avoid in email marketing include the following:

• sending too many emails to each subscriber, especially to new ones;
• not updating email lists, which decreases the power of personalizing email content;
• using misleading subject lines and overusing capitalization, punctuation, emojis, trigger words, and phrases;
• not optimizing for mobile, which can lead to thousands of missed conversions;
• not testing email campaigns.

By avoiding these common pitfalls, businesses can improve customer engagement, increase conversions, and build brand loyalty.

Wrapping up

Use the email marketing customer journey to make your email strategy more structured, targeted, and effective. The customer journey will give you a deep understanding of your customers’ needs, preferences, and behaviors. This will help you attract new customers and build long-term relationships with existing ones, ensuring consistent growth in marketing metrics.