The perfect marketing email formula for your festive events

As we roll (hurtle?) towards yet another festive season, event creators are no doubt looking for ways to make their Christmas and New Years Eve events stand out from the crowd. 

Because, of course, from an attendee’s point of view – there are a seemingly infinite array of dazzling, glitter-laden events to attend. Here’s what you need to know about honing your email marketing tactics to get the ticket sales flooding in this festive season.

🎄 The perfect time to harness email marketing

Stats show that one of the most effective ways to stay in the forefront of potential attendees’ minds is to send regular marketing emails in the run up to your event. In fact, a 2023 Hubspot report showed that marketers saw a 77% increase in email engagement over the 12 months leading up to the survey. And that a third of marketers send out weekly emails. 

The takeaway? Email marketing is still very much alive and kicking. And it could just be the thing to tip your festive events into the sell-out successes they deserve to be. 

🧑‍🔬 It’s all in the formula

Just slinging together any old announcement won’t do, though. A strong marketing email needs to be carefully put together bearing a range of core principles in mind if it’s to stand a chance of being opened, and engaged with. 

Let’s take a closer look 👀.

What makes a great marketing email?

A great marketing email is one that:

• Engages the reader instantly – for example, through a carefully crafted subject line.
• Keeps the reader's attention – for example, through concise, clear, and relevant email copy.
• Prompts the reader to do the required next step – so, for event creators, that might be to buy tickets or sign up for pre-sale. 

There are certain factors that make all of this 👆much more likely. These include:

• Personalisation – this study suggests that segmented personalised automated email messages get an average of 46% higher open rates. So, instead of sending a blanket email to all your contacts, you’d send tailored emails to different groups. For example, you’d use different wording in an email to people who’d already attended your events before, than those who have yet to attend one.
• Clarity – it is crucial to make sure the contents of your email are crystal-clear. Only then should you think about making things more ‘catchy’. (Basically, don’t let your message get lost among the bells-and-whistles).
• Actionable language – certain elements of your email should be written in actionable language for the best chance at success. For example, a subject line that prompts the reader to do something (“Don’t miss…”, “Take your chance to…”, “Discover…”) can be more effective than a subject line that doesn't use actionable language. 

The perfect marketing email formula

Combine all these elements to create the optimal marketing email:

A recognisable ‘From’ name

The first detail to get right when it comes to the perfect marketing email formula is simple but important: the name of the account the email is coming from. 

This should be recognisable and relevant. For example, if a person subscribes to receive emails from a certain brand – let’s say, Nike – they expect to see emails coming from ‘Nike’, not ‘Joe Bloggs’. 

It’s important not to try to fool readers into opening your emails by sending them from an inconspicuous name rather than the main name of your event/s, as relevancy is everything here. 

Ultimately, you want to make it crystal-clear who you are the minute you land in a person’s inbox. That way, you have the best chance at grabbing the attention of people who are genuinely interested in your festive events.

A relevant, enticing subject line

The subject line is the first big make-or-break element of any marketing email. Fail to get users past this, and the rest of your email is irrelevant. We’ve written a whole guide to writing email subject lines for better open rates, which is well worth checking out. But a few key points to bear in mind are:

• Pick your most important email takeaway – whatever the main purpose is of your email, aim to encapsulate this in your subject. For example, ‘Get X tickets from 5pm today’.
• Make sure it matches the contents of your email. If it’s misleading in any way, you’ll likely end up with disgruntled recipients who hit that ‘unsubscribe’ button.
• Use actionable language (see our point on this above 👆).
• Use a relevant tone of voice – once you’ve got your clear messaging sorted, think of ways to make the tone more relevant and enticing. Say, you’re aiming to appeal to a younger audience. Using an emoji or two could help make your subject feel more relatable and appealing. For example: 

Get X tickets from 5pm today could be turned into something like:

It’s on : Grab your X tickets from 5pm!🕺

An enticing preheader

An unopened email’s preheader is the small preview of text shown underneath the subject line. For example:

It’s on : Grab your X tickets from 5pm!🕺

OOO’s at the ready… party season has landed.

In this example, the bold text is the subject line, and the italicised text underneath is the preheader. Essentially, it provides another opportunity to engage recipients and inject some more brand personality into your email’s preview. Don’t waste these precious extra characters by coming up with a preheader that feels exciting and relevant. 

Concise, benefits-focused email copy

The main body of your marketing emails should be brief and clear. While it can be tempting to write paragraphs about why your festive event is going to be the best of the season – it’s crucial to keep things as short and to-the-point as possible, as longer emails tend to lose people’s attention pretty quickly. 

You want readers to grab the most crucial information as easily as possible. And you want to make sure they are able to glean what the benefits for them are within a few seconds, too. For example: 

No more worrying about what to do this NYE – your 31st Jan is officially sorted.

👆Notice how this copy instantly offers a solution to a common problem; the dreaded ‘how to make sure NYE isn’t a flop’ dilemma. Instead of simply talking about what a great event it will be, a clear benefit is highlighted for the reader, which has a better chance at hitting a chord with them.

A clear call-to-action (CTA) 

Finally, make sure your marketing emails each contain a clear call-to-action (CTA) – for example, that might be a button to ‘Buy tickets now’ or ‘Book your place’. This should be displayed prominently on your email so recipients don’t have to waste time figuring out how to take that important next step (remember, most will be scanning your email for important details, so won’t want to have to hunt for hidden links or instructions).

Your festive event marketing emails sorted

We hope this guide has been useful! By nailing these five core marketing email elements, you’ll be in a good position to not only grab the attention of your contacts, but convert them into real-life event attendees. All the better for a sparkling, sold-out festive season. Good luck! 💫

• Check out Ticket Tailor’s Broadcasts feature, which lets you email all your event attendees at the click of a button when you need to send important updates😌.
• Head over to our apps and integrations page to link up with email marketing platforms like MailChimp. 
• Not sorted your ticketing yet? Find out how Ticket Tailor can help you run your best festive events yet with a whole host of feature-rich ticketing tools.