Email marketing is a powerful way to connect with your audience during the holidays. It can keep you at the top of your customers’ minds, strengthen your existing relationships, and increase revenues for Q4.
Effective email marketing requires consistency. You maintain customer awareness by regularly showing up in their inboxes. It’s a foundational part of an always-on marketing strategy.
As you brainstorm the emails to craft for your holiday campaign, turn to this list for inspiration. We’ve gathered 12 types of messages that would be impactful additions to your email calendar.
Read on for an overview of the categories, plus holiday email examples for each.
12 best holiday email examples
These brands use email marketing to promote their businesses over the holidays. Use what they’ve done and iterate new versions to fit your own holiday marketing strategies.
1. Gift guide promoting your products
Gift shopping can be stressful. Creating a helpful guide that points customers toward the ideal items for everyone on their list is a win-win. It lightens the mental load that comes with managing a long shopping list—a win for your customers—and it helps them find the perfect gift with you rather than your competitors.
When you create your gift guide email, keep it simple. Let your readers know you’ve put together a list to cover everyone on theirs, then provide a link out to your entire guide.
Build out your gift guide within your ecommerce platform to make it incredibly easy for your customers to see something they love, add it to their cart, and ship it to their loved ones.
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2. Holiday-themed seasonal newsletter
Not all emails you send to customers should be sales-focused. Of course, generating revenue is your goal. But sometimes, the best way to achieve it is by being a helpful guide rather than a salesperson.
Seasonal newsletters allow you to share your expertise and appear regularly in your subscriber’s inbox, all while eschewing the hard sell. During the holidays, there are dozens of topics to explore.
Businesses of all stripes—big and small, consumer-facing or B2B—can send a helpful newsletter. Fill it with timely wisdom and actionable advice your subscribers can use to have a happier holiday season. Doing so will position you as a go-to resource and strengthen your relationship with subscribers.
3. Splashy holiday sale reveal
During the holidays, sales are a potent source of revenue for many businesses. The season kicks off with Black Friday—a day when US retailers brought in $9.8 billion in revenue in 2023.
Then, there’s Small Business Saturday, which encourages shoppers to patronize their local retailers and restaurants. And for e-commerce brands, it doesn’t get bigger than Cyber Monday, which now outpaces even Black Friday as the biggest shopping day of the year.
Shoppers expect brands to take part in these sales. Over 60% of consumers research sales in advance and map out their shopping day accordingly. Sending a big announcement about your holiday sale plans can help you land on consumers’ lists.
Increasingly, brands are expanding beyond Black Friday and Cyber Monday, offering deals ahead of Thanksgiving to get the sales rolling early.
Sending a great offer before the holidays may just entice your subscribers to open your email and stop by your store ahead of their turkey feast.
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4. Small Business Saturday promo email
Small Business Saturday generated an estimated $17 billion in revenues for small businesses in 2023. The day is a celebration of the local community and entrepreneurs, and it’s a great time for small businesses to remind their neighbors to show their support.
A survey from SCORE found that 72% of consumers will spend more to get the quality service they feel local businesses provide. That means you don’t need to compete with the big box stores, offering deep discounts and splashy promotions.
Your Small Business Saturday email can be as simple as reminding your local audience that you’re here and offering them a modest discount.
5. Special holiday products and services
The fear of missing out is real. By creating seasonal products that are only available for a limited time, you can spark that FOMO and drive up sales among your loyal customers.
The email from RXBAR below unveils the brand’s seasonal flavors, including gingerbread and pumpkin spice. If you’re already an RXBAR fan, chances are you’ll be eager to try these fun, holiday-themed flavors. This email gives consumers the chance to buy them now or alerts them to the products so they can keep an eye peeled on their next grocery run.
6. Holiday hosting help
The holidays are a time for gathering with loved ones over a delicious meal. These occasions are often joyous, but if you’re the one hosting, they can become stressful.
Restaurants, specialty food stores, and caterers who assist with hosting can stand to win big during the holiday season. Whether your business offers beautifully prepared food to go or hosts dinners at your place (or both!), be sure your email subscribers know about your offerings.
Email well ahead of the holidays so customers can factor your offerings into their seasonal plans. Then, make it easy for them to click through and book a table or place an order.
7. Heartfelt thank you to customers
Sometimes, the best message you can send during the holidays is a simple expression of thanks. Business leaders know they wouldn’t be anywhere without their loyal customers. Expressing that gratitude is not only a kind thing to do—it also endears you to your customers. People like to feel appreciated!
Your heartfelt holiday message can be a thank you from your leaders, or it may invite customers to get to know your team a little better, as this example below does. No matter how you choose to frame it, keep the focus on gratitude to make this holiday email type work for you.
8. Extra surprise for subscribers
Another way to show appreciation for your loyal email subscribers—besides that thank you email above—is to provide them with a little gift.
This holiday email tactic is more about the gesture than the gift value. You don’t need to manufacture an Oprah-style “You get a car, and you get a car!” moment.
Instead, craft a thoughtful offer you know your audience will appreciate. This might be free, expedited shipping. Or it might be an additional discount code.
In the example below, Sonos offers readers $100 off a top-selling item for a limited time at the start of the holiday season. This discount makes subscribers feel special while also encouraging them to shop early.
9. Year-end synopsis that generates buzz
Few marketing-manufactured cultural moments outpace Spotify Wrapped. The annual round-up of app users’ top musical artists, genres, and songs has become a cultural phenomenon. In 2022, 156 million app users engaged with Wrapped.
Not every brand can create an event that will be as anticipated as Spotify’s. But the general idea of presenting your customers with a year-end synopsis is compelling. People love to reflect on what they’ve done in the previous year, and a recap of their engagement with your business can be a welcome year-end message from your brand.
This is a popular tactic for SaaS providers that already have that customer data on hand. A project management tool might let a subscriber know how many tasks they’ve completed in the past year, while a video editing platform might create a highlight reel of each subscriber’s creations. But you can use the same tactic for almost any repeat customer.
10. Last sale of the year
In 2023, 65% of consumers made a plan to shop between Christmas and New Year’s Day. By hosting a sale that week—and promoting it via email—your business can do one last sales push before the New Year’s ball drops.
An end-of-year sale also allows you to clear out old stock and make room for next year’s inventory. Consider offering even steeper discounts on those items you’d like to get rid of and start the new year with your fresh products.
11. Ask for customer feedback
The end of the year is a great time for self-reflection. If you’re wondering how your business did in 2024 and what you can do to make your next year even better, ask your customers for feedback.
Open your email by wishing your customers a happy holiday season and thanking them for their loyalty. Then, invite them to share their open, honest feedback on your business.
12. New Year’s resolutions email
The holiday season ends with New Year’s Day—a time for reinvention and recommitment to goals.
Some industries are ideally suited to using New Year’s resolution-related messaging. Fitness and wellness brands are classic examples.
But it’s truly a theme any business can tap into—even if your way of engaging with the topic is by stating why your brand eschews resolutions altogether.
Holiday email examples to bring joy to your customers’ inbox
Holiday email marketing isn’t just about the hard sell (though there is certainly ample opportunity to promote a sale or new product!).
Instead, the best holiday email examples serve up a mix of gratitude, connection, support, and—yes—some overt sales messaging.
By sending subscribers a diverse range of messages, you’re more likely to find a topic or subject line that catches someone’s eye and compels them to open. Once someone opens an email, clever copy, arresting images, and a persuasive call to action work together to boost your click-through rate.
Use this list of email examples to keep your holiday email campaign fresh:
- Gift guide promoting your products
- Holiday-themed seasonal newsletter
- Splashy holiday sale reveal
- Small Business Saturday promo email
- Special holiday products and services
- Holiday hosting help
- Heartfelt thank you to customers
- Extra surprise for subscribers
- Year-end synopsis that generates buzz
- Last sale of the year
- Ask for customer feedback
- New Year’s resolutions email
