Most brands start thinking about Black Friday in early November, but by then, it’s already too late.
The groundwork for successfully selling stuff online is laid out in September and October.
By failing to prepare right now, you’re preparing to fail in late November/December.
This comprehensive Black Friday email marketing guide outlines the steps to prepare for BFCM 2025.
Let’s dive right in:
Who shops on holidays?
First of all, it’s important to understand who you’re targeting with your BFCM offers.
There are usually five types of people looking to lighten their wallets during this season:
Current customers
These are your best customers. They have previously bought from you, and they would happily do so again at full price. They don’t need discounts because they love your product(s) that much.
Promo-driven customers
These people have also bought from you, but they only do so when there’s a sale going on (hint: BFCM).
Observers
These people have never bought from you, but they’re aware of your brand. Presenting them with the right offer will convert them into customers.
Converting these people is your biggest opportunity during BFCM.
Gift-seekers
These are friends of the fans of your brand. They’re looking for gifts, and you’re one of the brands on their radar.
Unengaged category fans
Unlike all of the groups above, these people have never heard of your brand before. But they do like to shop for products in your category. Presenting them with the right offer can convert them as well.
For most brands, BFCM shoppers are current customers, observers, and gifters*.
*Whether your product is gift-friendly or not is a question you need to ask yourself. Can you visualize someone gifting your product? Be honest.
How valuable are holiday shoppers for your brand?
This is purely a strategic question that’ll help you plan for BFCM.
Ideally, you’d conduct a lifetime value (LTV) analysis around previous year’s holiday shoppers. Are your Black Friday customers coming back for another purchase? Or are they just there for the best deal and then bounce for good?
You also want to see if most of your holiday sales are driven by repeat customers. If the answer is yes, then you know you need to invest heavily in customer acquisition months before BFCM.
Now, the action steps…
Step 1: Fill your marketing funnel
Your goal should be to increase your potential pool of shoppers by the time Black Friday arrives.
For most brand owners/marketers reading this, this means investing in Meta ads.
If you can’t convert these people before BFCM, then you should at least get them on your email list. That involves running some kind of welcome promo in exchange for an email address.
I won’t cover pop-up best practices in this post, but your offer should be clear/easy to understand and valuable enough to motivate people.
Pro tip: Late October/early November, run a pop-up on your website that allows customers to sign up for early access to BFCM offers.
Here’s an example:
Step 2: Warm up your email list
Weeks before BFCM, you should invest in good(!) email marketing content. Notice I said good.
That means emailing your list 3-4x per week and delivering non-promotional, value-giving campaigns.
You want to get the message out EARLY about your brand, so by the time the big day arrives, you have an intrigued email list with wallets in their hands.
Below are some of my favorite no-discount email campaigns you can send to your list:
Us vs them
What’s your unique selling point (USP)?
Example: Our protein bars have 50% more protein than any other bar on the market.
Brand mission
Does your brand exist for something other than making money?
Example: Our protein bars are designed to increase muscle and decrease fat.
Crush an objection
Example: Why do all protein bars taste artificial?
Explain why yours doesn’t.
Expose the industry’s dirty secret
Example: Most protein bars aren’t actually healthy.
Explain why yours is.
UGC / customer story
What results have other customers seen?
Example: John switched from snacking on M&M’s to our protein bars and lost 15 lbs.
If you want more ideas, here are 43 no-discount email campaigns with examples from leading eCom brands.
Step 3: Optimize the Core 4
When I refer to the Core 4, I’m talking about the most important email automations for your e-commerce brand.
These include:
Welcome series
Do you have a nurture sequence in place for new subscribers? Are you answering the question: “Why us?”
Your welcome sequence should consist of 5-8 emails where you position yourself as the brand of choice.
Cart abandonment
If you have a discount code in your cart abandonment sequence, replace it with another email where you focus on limited stock and urgency.
Browse abandonment
Same thing applies to the browse abandonment sequence. If you have any other discount codes here, remove them and focus on your BFCM offer instead.
Post-purchase
Do you have a clear marketing strategy in place to retain customers? Your highest leverage activity here is to build out an email sequence that targets customers 0-90 days after the purchase.
Step 4: Create your offer(s)
Now, the fun stuff begins – offer creation.
Ideally, you’ve tested different offers throughout the year, so you already know what resonates with your customers.
But if not, below are some ideas:
Good Black Friday deal examples
X% off sitewide
Buy one, get one free
Free gift with purchase
X% off on orders over $AOV
Bad Black Friday deal examples
25% off sweaters and 50% off backpacks
Spend $X, get Y% off
Or anything that’s difficult to understand
Rule of thumb for BFCM offers: can a customer digest the offer in 3 seconds or less?
If the answer is no, then you probably need to come up with something better.
Ideally, you want to have a plan A, B, and C, in case the original offer flops.
One more thing about offers:
Just because you see other brands (or even your competitors) run crazy good offers, it doesn’t mean it works. So, spare yourself from the FOMO.
Step 5: Give early VIP access
Targeting your best customers with a preview sale is one of the most effective BFCM tactics you can run.
Don’t overthink this.
You can simply announce the sale by sending a plain-text email 3-14 days before Black Friday begins.
Here’s an example VIP offer:
- Site AOV: $110
- VIP Offer: 35% off orders of $175+, 25% off orders <$175
- Public offer: 25% off sitewide
During the preview sale, focus on stock availability, and the offer’s exclusivity.
You should also send follow-ups to create urgency before the cart closes (and before the offer goes out to the rest of the public).
- Email 1: Announce the sale
- Email 2: 48 hours left
- Email 3: One last chance
The Big Day: Black Friday
You’ve made it to the big day.
All the hard work has been done, now it’s just time to reap the rewards.
Before you announce any sale, I’ll give you a tip which sounds a bit counterintuitive, or even silly.
But it’s important you do this if you want to build long-term relationships with your customers.
Give your email list a chance to unsubscribe from BFCM deals.
Send a separate email a day or two before BFCM, and warn your subscribers that you’re going to be much more active in their inbox around this time.
I’m serious…
Some people just don’t want to take part of the shopping mayhem, even if they like your brand. The last thing you want is to make them unsubscribe.
Because during Black Friday (and all the way up to Cyber Monday), you should increase your email marketing cadence to 2-3x emails per day.
That’s a lot of emails to receive if you’re not interested in any of the offers.
In these emails, you want to focus on your offer (duh!), urgency, and limited stock.
Below are some examples…
Black Friday email marketing campaign examples:
UpCircle
Eight Sleep
Seed
November Black Friday Email Campaign Calendar
Week 1-2: No-Discount Emails (3-4x week)
Week 3: Early VIP Access Sale
Week 4: Black Friday Sale (2-3x emails/day)
Pro tip: Give your email list a chance to unsubscribe from BFCM offers.
CASE STUDY: How Von Baer increased email revenue by 878% during BFCM.
December Holiday Email Campaign Calendar
Week 1: Cyber Monday ((2-3x emails/day)
Week 2-3: Shift the focus to gifting
Week 4: Holiday + NYE emails
Add urgency by sending emails around shipping cutoff times.
After Christmas, send no-discount campaigns focusing on how your product helps achieve new year’s resolutions.
How to retain customers past Black Friday
Fact: Most brands struggle to retain BFCM customers.
A lot of brands bring in new customers with their biggest offer—and then… crickets.
For profitability’s sake, you want these customers to come back for at least one more purchase.
Below are a few tips to retain more holiday shoppers:
Deliver a great experience
Day 0–30 post-purchase is all about fulfillment.
No bad surprises is the theme here.
All it takes is one bad experience, and the new customer is gone for good.
What you don’t want is for the customer to place an order but not receive their package – especially if it’s meant as a gift – on time.
Or if there are issues with the product itself.
Your CS must be responsive to solve any issues, and you can use email marketing to support it.
Depending on what you sell, you can offer product usage tips here. For example, for one client who sold leather wallets, we sent a free leather care guide PDF as a quick post-purchase email.
It builds goodwill, and makes shopping with you a memorable experience.
Introduce other products
Day 31–60 is when you should start introducing the customer to other products.
If you sell fashion, can you sell the same item but in a different color?
If you sell a consumable, can you cross-sell it in a different flavor?
You should use both email and Meta ads to do this e.g. take your recent buyers segment and use it as a Meta re-targeting audience.
Test direct mail
PostPilot recently launched a direct mail report where they disclosed which types of brands are crushing it with physical postcards.
TL;DR… if your target audience is millennials in the US, and you sell baby goods, F&B, or luggage, it might be worth a try and re-target BFCM customers offline.
Run a secret clearance sale in January
Finally, if you have any unwanted stock available, you can hold a (secret) clearance sale in January. I wouldn’t make this sitewide — rather market it as an exclusive offer to drive repeat purchases from your email list.
Conclusion
Now you know how to do email marketing during Black Friday.
It’s all about building momentum in September/October, and then cashing in during late November/December.
Good luck!
