In a world of fancy algorithms and ever-evolving social media platforms, email marketing is truly the best way to reach your ideal audience. In fact, email marketing is a place where your subscriber will see more of your emails than social media posts. They raised their hand and are interested in seeing YOUR content. Pretty powerful stuff, huh?

And the most effective way to harness the power of email marketing is to use a welcome email sequence. It is the most important email sequence that you can have as a blogger or business owner.

Now, if you had a million gazillion questions pop into your head when you see the words “Welcome email sequence” then let me explain what this is and why it is the most important for you to implement.

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What is a Welcome Sequence?

A welcome email sequence is an important set of automated emails that are sent to new email subscribers. Your welcome email sequence comes after a new subscriber hands over their precious email address in exchange for your freebie, and then becomes a loyal reader of your weekly emails (and buyers of your products and services, woohoo!).

Think of it like this. You meet a new person at a workout class, and you think to yourself “I think we would be great friends.” But to become friends with that person, you first need to introduce yourself.

Then you’ll probably share meaningful stories, bond over common interests, tell them about your favorite things, and ask them about theirs in return.

Essentially, your welcome sequence does the same kind of thing. In your emails, you introduce yourself to your stranger subscriber, share a few stories, point to your favorite resources and tips, and invite them to share about themselves by including engaging questions.

Why do you need one?

But why should you go to the time and effort of creating a welcome email sequence? Take a look at these stats…

• Welcome emails generate 320% more revenue than regular emails/newsletters
• Over 74% of people expect a welcome email immediately after joining your email list
• A study done by Experian indicated welcome emails produce 4X the open rates than bulk emails
• Your email subscribers are a list of people who are interested in the content that YOU have to offer
• Your open rate will be WAY higher than social media.

And, it will enable you to…

• Introduce yourself and your brand
• Building trust with your subscribers
• Beginning connections that’ll help your blog and business in the long-term
• Give them a reason to stay an engaged member of your email list
• Get more results and earn more money
• Bring people back to your blog

Execute it well, and you’ll have people opening your emails SO fast and they’ll remain: engaged and active.

Because a welcome email sequence builds trust, and helps your new subscriber know and like you. Without these three things, you’re not going to be able to sell the services, courses and products that you’ve worked so hard to create.

Just like no-one wants to buy from a random cold-calling salesperson, no one wants to buy from a random business owner who’s popping into their inbox screaming “buy my stuff” without, at the least, a proper introduction…

Now, there’s nothing wrong with selling in email. But the truth, to sell successfully, you need to do it the right way. And that way is to build a relationship with your readers before you try to shove your product/service/course down their throat, ya hear me? 

Why is a Welcome Email Sequence so effective?

When people have just handed over their email address in exchange for your valuable freebie, they’re ready to see what more you have to offer them and they are ready and waiting to learn from you.

When they first sign up to your email list, this is when they are paying attention to you the most, which means they are most likely to open your emails, click on the links to your resources, and hit reply and chat with you.

But if you don’t have a welcome email sequence, you’re missing out on an opportunity to connect with a new subscriber when they’re most willing to engage with you!

Think about this: Why bother to create an amazingly long and valuable freebie if you’re not going to follow it up with more valuable free content that serves your ideal reader and brings them back to your blog for more?

If you’re going to take the time to create new content to attract your ideal people, promote it on social media, and create and schedule a million Pins on Pinterest, then you need to have a strategic plan of how you will nurture your subscribers to buying whatever it is you have to offer.

You’re a blogging business owner, after all, and you need well-calculated plans to bring money into the bank as quick as possible. Your welcome email sequence is one of those plans.

How to Write a Welcome Email Sequence

Now let’s dive in deep and I will show you step-by-step how you can write a welcome sequence that builds trust and drives conversions.

Let’s jump in.

Email One: Lead Magnet Delivery

In this email you want to make sure that the new subscriber gets the lead magnet they signed up for. Whether it was a downloadable document, a video lesson, an audio file, a spreadsheet, template, whatever… make sure that you remind them to open it up and drive home the benefits of the ‘quick win’ that lead magnet will provide to them. 

We want to show our new subscriber that what we have given them will produce some kind of positive result. Them experiencing a positive result = them trusting that we are the expert and that we will get them MORE positive results if they keep opening up our emails, using our advice, and eventually purchasing our product(s).

This email will be sent immediately after someone signs up. You want to ensure that it delivers quickly so your new subscriber doesn’t have to wait around for it because this does not look good on your end. Always test your emails and sequences before you publish them to the world.

Email Two: Your Story

The purpose of the second email in the welcome sequence is to create personal connection and build your status as subject matter expert. 

This is your story email. You don’t need to give you entire life’s events in this email, but you want to highlight some kind of transformation you’ve experienced as it relates to your business niche. 

First Example: If your blog is about yoga, your story could be about how you “found” yoga and when you started practicing it consistently, you reduced your chronic pain and became a more positive person.

Second example: If your blog is around teaching others how to build their business using webinars, your story would be about how you started using webinars and after stumbling around, finally found out what worked and scaled your own business.

Example: If your blog is about how to de-clutter your home, you could tell a story about the time that your house was such a mess when you had a baby at home and how you tackled the clutter and instantly felt like a more calm mama.

Fourth example: If your blog is about teaching parents how to teach kids to read, your story might be about your experience as a teacher and working with children. You could even highlight one particular child’s journey with you.

The point is that you are showing the reader the same transformation that they want to achieve, but you’re doing it in an easy-to-relate to story. Stories sell. The more we can weave our lessons, value, and message through story, the better.

And this doesn’t have to be the whole enchilada of your story. Pick a piece of your story and highlight just that. Whatever feels digestible in an email format. 

If you haven’t gone through the transformation yourself that your product/offer provides, then highlight how you have worked with people through their transformation. You are positioning yourself here as the subject matter expert, so you need to be able to do that through your past experiences in one way or another.  

This email is sent 1 day after the last email. I will show you how to set up a welcome sequence later in this blog post so you can put it all on automation.

Email Three: Favorite Things

In this email, you want to become BFFs with your new subscriber. 

Think of this email like meeting a new friend at a cycling class. You keep the conversation light, you are getting to know each other, asking each other questions, and just having a fun conversation.

That’s what this email is all about. 

This “fun” email could be created a few different ways:

#1 – It’s a “favorite things” email. This is where you might list out 3 or 5 of your absolute go-to favorite products or services. These products and services don’t have to be related to your niche – they just need to be YOUR fave things and demonstrate your personality!

So it could be like “The 5 things I can’t live without” and it might include your subscription to a meditation app, your weekly nail appointment, a good book in your purse, your fave essential oils, and the TV show you binge-watch on Netflix.  See how sharing those things totally lets your new reader get to know you? And they may have some things in common that they are able to connect with!

#2 – The second option here is a “things you don’t know about me” email. It has a similar objective to the first option, but instead of being product-driven it’s more about fun facts. I am using this in my own welcome sequence. These could be things like your fave hobbies, something about where or how you grew up, past jobs you’ve had, anything! 

Remember to have fun with this email. Add in a personal picture if you can! Throw in some emoji’s. Make FRIENDS with your subscriber here as best you can.

This email is sent one day after the last email.

Email Four: Value

In this email in the welcome sequence, you want to give another quick win or tip for your new subscriber.

You know how you gave them a lead magnet that was super valuable and useful? Well, you want to do that again here (but without a formal lead magnet this time). 

Basically –> What piece of advice or actionable tip can you give them via email that they can put into action and get results from? 

Don’t go too overboard here. Remember, QUICK and ACTIONABLE are key. 

If you want to get fancy and have some kind of attached PDF, video, audio file, or some kind of ‘extra’, feel free to, but know that it isn’t necessary.

Example: If you teach about meal planning, this quick tip might be something about how to double your meal prep so that you create 2 meals out of 1. Give them 5 recipes they can do this with for the next month to get 10 meals for every 5 they prep. 

Example: If you teach business owners how to use LinkedIn to find clients, this might be some kind of tip that tells them how to best layout their LinkedIn profile. Show them exactly how the profile should be laid out, and give them the blueprint on how to do it for themselves.

Example: If you are an interior designer and teach clients how to makeover their homes, this might be a quick tip on how to create a whole-house paint palette. You could even include a downloadable PDF for them to print and fill out. 

The idea here is that we are continuing to position our status as expert in our niche, build our authority, and give our subscribers a WIN. Remember that getting your subscribers/customers/audience RESULTS is always the most important element, as it’s those results that will make your marketing so much easier. 

This email is sent two days after the last email.

Email Five: Solution to their Problem

Now that you have gained the trust and connection with your new subscriber and have positioned yourself as the expert in your niche, it’s time to start seeding your actual offer.

Because growing an audience is great, but that audience is no good if they aren’t going to actually BUY your product or service. In order to run a successful blogging business, you need SALES. 

But you don’t have to think of this email as being a really pushy sales email. It doesn’t have to be like that at all.

You have a few options here: 

1. If you sell your product through a webinar, video series, or some other kind of funnel you’ve built out, then you are going to direct people to signing up for that. 
2. If you sell your product through a sales call, then you are going to direct people to book that call with you through your calendar system. This is best for 1:1 coaching or higher ticket services/offers.
3. If you don’t have any “conversion mechanism” that you use to sell your offer (“conversion mechanism” refers to a call, a webinar, etc) then simply send them toward your sales page here. This is only really going to be applicable if your offer is low-ticket. 

For option 1 or 2, you want to highlight the benefits that the subscriber is going to get from attending. You want to let them know how valuable the call or webinar is going to be and what they can expect to get out of it. Always lead with transformation and benefits, not facts and features.

This email is sent 1 day after the last email.

Email Six: Reminder of CTA (Call to action)

You’ve told them what to do next, but often people need to be reminded! 

In this email you are going to direct your subscriber to the same thing you directed them to in the last email (a webinar, a call, sales page, blog, etc).

The difference with this email is that you are going to lead with testimonials. 

You want to showcase your juiciest, best case studies here. Any past client, student, happy customer, or personal reference should be showcased here. The more that the testimonial(s) presented can relate to the product you’re selling, the better. 

Testimonials and case studies are THE MOST IMPORTANT thing that help to sell your offer. Think about how often you look at reviews of a product on Amazon before you hit that ‘buy’ button. It’s a lot, right? They play into our buying decisions in a really major way. Those real-life case studies help your subscriber truly believe that they could get the results that your product/service is promising: “Well, if Susie could get that result as a mom just like me, then I probably could too”. 

If you haven’t collected testimonials before, start doing it! Reach out to past clients, students, or customers and ask. If people were happy with your service/product, they are generally more than willing to give a testimonial.

Don’t have a testimonial yet? Think about how you can one. Can you offer a beta-round of your product or program? Or can you work with just a few clients for free, in exchange for a testimonial? Can you think back to someone who could give you a personal reference? Get creative, and know you can always switch out these testimonials down the line as you collect more. 

If you don’t have a webinar, video series, call, or something to direct your audience to to buy your product, then in this email you would again be sending them straight to your sales page. 

The most important thing here is to highlight these great testimonials, and then give ONE call-to-action (whatever that looks like for your blogging business).

This is sent 2 days after your last email.

What’s Next?

At this point — if they go watch your webinar or take the next step, then they would go into that next part of your sales sequence. If you don’t have an evergreen sales sequence, then just cap it off there or add one more email that says something about what they can expect from you now! I suggest that you let them know that they will only hear from you once a week from now on.

Make sure to send weekly newsletters to your whole list to continue building trust and connection. Your email list is your most valuable asset as a blogging business owner and will be what drives a vast majority of your sales – so don’t ignore it! After your new subscriber goes through this welcome sequence, they should now be added into your regular newsletter list and get your weekly emails from here on.

How to Set Up Your Welcome Email Sequence- In Flodesk

I have created a video tutorial that walks you through how you can set up a welcome sequence in Flodesk.

If you are interested in Flodesk, you can get it for 1/2 off the price each month by signing up with this link here.

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OK, that’s the roundup of my favorite tips to help you create a powerful welcome email sequence! I hope this was helpful and that you are on your way and ready to write yours!

To help you get started, I’ve created a welcome email template with emails that are completely done for you that’ll help you put together your first email in 20 minutes. Seriously, it’s so easy.

If you would like to check out the welcome email sequence template, you can do so here.

Have a beautiful rest of your day or night!

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