What is Email Marketing?

Kelly Chan

September 15, 2025

7 min read

Email marketing is a digital marketing strategy where businesses use email to connect with potential and existing customers.

It helps build brand awareness, nurture customer relationships, and increase sales through cost-effective and measurable campaigns.

When done correctly, email marketing combines personalization, automation, and data-driven insights to deliver high ROI and long-term customer engagement.

In this article, we’ll discuss how email marketing—and the use of promotional emails—can help you grow your business. We’ll also explore how AI-powered email marketing can streamline and optimize your workflow, enabling you to create more effective campaigns with greater efficiency. Plus, we’ll share practical tips to help you get started with a successful AI-integrated email marketing strategy.

What Is Email Marketing?

At its core, email marketing is a form of direct marketing. Instead of relying on third-party platforms, businesses directly reach users in their inboxes. With the help of automation and marketing tools, marketers can:

Increase brand visibility
Generate new leads
Maintain customer relationships
Automate personalized campaigns at scale

What Is AI Email Marketing?

AI email marketing leverages artificial intelligence to automate and optimize the entire email outreach workflow. It can identify leads, collect verified contact data, and automatically send multi-day email sequences—eliminating manual effort and saving time.

With AI email marketing tools like Email Marketer, you can:

Find leads automatically: Use natural language queries (e.g., “Find AI startups in Germany with business emails”) to search public sources like company websites or Crunchbase.
Store structured data: Leads including company name, email, website, and source are saved in a structured database for easy management.
Automate outreach: Trigger pre-configured multi-day email sequences to selected leads, controlling timing, filters, and content.
Customize workflows: Adjust queries, data sources, skills, or email content to target different lead types or messaging strategies.

A Brief History of Email Marketing

1971: Ray Tomlinson sent the world’s first email.
1978: Gary Thuerk sent the first commercial email, generating about $13 million in sales.
1990s: The rise of the internet led to the rapid growth of email advertising.
Regulatory updates: Laws such as the UK’s Data Protection Act introduced opt-out policies to protect users.
2010s: Early automation tools like Mailchimp and Constant Contact allowed marketers to schedule emails and segment lists, laying the groundwork for AI integration.
2015–2017: The concept of AI-powered email marketing began emerging, with platforms introducing machine learning features such as subject line optimization, content personalization, and predictive send times.
2018–2020: AI email marketing gained traction, offering predictive analytics, automated segmentation, and personalized content generation to improve campaign performance.
2021–present: With the rise of generative AI, marketers can now automate the entire email marketing workflow, from drafting copy to optimizing delivery and engagement, significantly boosting efficiency and ROI.

This history highlights how email marketing has evolved from simple messages to sophisticated, AI-driven campaigns, transforming the way businesses engage with their audiences.

Types of Email Marketing Campaigns

Different types of emails serve unique purposes in engaging your audience and driving action. Key email marketing formats include:

Welcome emails – Greet new subscribers and introduce them to your brand, often including trials or bonuses.
Newsletters – Share updates, blog posts, articles, reviews, and resources to keep your audience informed.
Promotional emails – Announce discounts, product launches, and sales to maintain awareness and boost engagement.
Lead-nurturing / re-engagement emails – Guide interested users through a series of targeted messages to convert or reconnect inactive subscribers.
Transactional emails – Confirm purchases, sign-ups, or account changes, ensuring users that their actions were successful.
Feedback / survey emails – Collect customer opinions to improve products, services, and overall experience.
Milestone emails – Celebrate birthdays, anniversaries, or customer achievements to strengthen relationships.
Dedicated emails – Send targeted campaigns to specific segments, like new members, recent buyers, or inactive users.
Event / invite emails – Promote webinars, workshops, or product launches to increase participation and awareness.
Seasonal emails – Engage customers during holidays or special occasions, such as Christmas or Valentine’s Day.

This approach ensures every email has a clear goal, improving engagement and overall campaign performance.

Advantages of Email Marketing

Email marketing remains one of the most powerful digital marketing channels because it allows businesses to engage directly with their audience in meaningful ways. Key advantages include:

Encourages recipient action: Every email prompts the recipient to open, read, or respond, keeping your brand top-of-mind.
Builds stronger customer relationships: Personalized content helps nurture loyalty and trust over time.
Drives traffic to your platforms: Emails can guide recipients to your website, blog, social media channels, or specific landing pages.
Enables segmentation and personalization: You can target audiences based on demographics, behavior, or preferences—AI-powered tools can automate this process for even greater precision.
Supports A/B testing and optimization: Test subject lines, content, and calls-to-action to identify what resonates best, with AI analytics offering insights to maximize engagement and ROI.

Disadvantages of Email Marketing

While email marketing offers many benefits, there are some challenges businesses need to consider:

Spam risk: Emails may be marked as spam or ignored if they appear irrelevant, promotional, or poorly targeted, reducing their effectiveness.
File size issues: Large emails with heavy images or attachments can load slowly, causing potential recipients to lose interest before viewing your message.
High competition: With countless emails arriving in users’ inboxes daily, standing out requires strong copy, attractive offers, or innovative strategies.
Low engagement or unsubscribes: Subscribers may sign up initially but may stop opening emails over time, leading to high unsubscribe rates or low click-throughs if content isn’t consistently valuable.
Design and device inconsistencies: Emails may display differently across devices, browsers, and operating systems, which can affect readability and visual appeal.
Costs: While some platforms offer free options, expenses can arise from premium features, template design, list management, or AI tools for personalization and optimization.

What Does an Email Marketer Do?

An email marketer is responsible for creating and managing campaigns that engage audiences. This includes writing, designing, testing, and analyzing email performance. The role requires creativity, data analysis skills, and sometimes technical knowledge such as HTML or automation workflows.

Email Marketing Jobs and Salaries

If you’re interested in pursuing a career in email marketing, there are several key roles to consider, each with distinct responsibilities and salary ranges:

Email Marketing Coordinator

Average US Salary: $66,879
Role Overview: Coordinates and manages email campaigns, oversees a team of content creators or marketing specialists, and monitors performance metrics to report results to stakeholders.

Email Marketing Specialist

Average US Salary: $76,687
Role Overview: Focuses on executing email campaigns, crafting content, designing graphics, managing email lists, and leveraging automation tools to optimize campaign effectiveness.

Email Marketing Manager

Average US Salary: $103,076
Role Overview: Leads the strategic planning of email marketing initiatives, manages a team of professionals, and collaborates with designers, product managers, and content writers to deliver cohesive, results-driven campaigns.

According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), while there is no specific salary data for email marketing roles, related positions provide a useful benchmark: market research analysts earn a median annual salary of $76,950, advertising and promotions managers make $126,960, and marketing managers earn $161,030. These roles share overlapping responsibilities with email marketing, making them a relevant reference for career prospects and compensation.

Benefits of Email Marketing for Businesses

Email marketing offers numerous advantages for businesses aiming to enhance customer engagement and drive revenue. Recent industry statistics show why email is essential:

By 2027, people worldwide will send over 408.2 billion emails daily.
52% of marketers saw their ROI double with email campaigns.
5.7% of marketers achieved a fourfold ROI.
On average, businesses earn $36–$44 for every $1 spent on email marketing.
Email marketing is up to 40 times more effective than social media for customer acquisition.
About 52% of consumers have made a purchase directly from an email.
Automated email campaigns can generate up to 30 times higher returns compared to one-off emails.
Global email marketing revenue is projected to reach $46.1 billion by 2033.

Email Marketing Best Practices and Tips

Creating a successful email marketing campaign requires careful planning and execution. Focus on delivering messages that are relevant, timely, and valuable to your audience. By engaging both existing and potential customers with thoughtfully crafted emails, you can drive action, strengthen relationships, and achieve your marketing objectives.

To succeed, follow these email marketing best practices:

Craft eye-catching subject lines to boost open rates.
Structure your message strategically—put key info at the top.
Keep your design simple with clear branding and CTAs.
Only email people who opted in to stay compliant and improve engagement.
Send emails at the right time with automation tools.
Monitor and test campaigns to optimize performance.
Build your list ethically with lead magnets, not purchased lists.
Follow international laws like CAN-SPAM, CASL, and GDPR.
Engage subscribers with surveys, thank-you notes, and cart reminders.
Maintain a clean list with double opt-in and by removing inactive users.

Top Email Marketing Platforms and Tools

Marketers use professional tools to design, send, and track campaigns. Popular email marketing platforms include:

Bika.ai– An AI-powered email marketing tool designed for automation and personalized campaigns.
Brevo – A comprehensive email marketing platform offering automation, analytics, and multi-channel marketing.
Mailchimp – A widely used platform that provides email templates, automation, and audience management tools.
Omnisend – An e-commerce-focused email and SMS marketing platform with easy-to-use automation features.
GetResponse – An all-in-one online marketing platform for email campaigns, webinars, and marketing automation.
Constant Contact – A user-friendly platform for creating professional emails and managing contacts.
Active Campaign – A robust email marketing and CRM platform with advanced automation and segmentation capabilities.

Email Marketing Glossary for Beginners

Some common terms you’ll encounter:

Acceptance rate – % of emails received by servers
Bounce rate – % of undeliverable emails
Open rate – % of opened emails
Subject line – Text preview seen in inbox
CTA (Call-to-Action) – Links or buttons encouraging clicks
CTR (Click-through rate) – % of users who click a link
Conversion rate – % who complete a desired action (purchase, signup)
IP warming – Gradual increase in email sending to build reputation
Opt-in/opt-out – Subscribing or unsubscribing from a list
Nurture sequences – Automated email series for new subscribers

Email Marketing FAQs

How do I get started with email marketing?
Getting started with email marketing is easier than ever. Platforms like Mailchimp, Brevo, and ActiveCampaign allow you to create a free account to experiment, then upgrade as your list grows. You can choose from a wide variety of pre-designed templates or leverage AI-powered email marketing tools to automatically generate content, suggest subject lines, and optimize send times for maximum engagement.
Why is the email subject line so important?
The subject line is the first thing your recipients see, and it often determines whether your email gets opened or ignored. A weak or generic subject line may land your message in the spam folder or be deleted unread. Crafting a compelling, relevant, and personalized subject line—especially with the help of AI tools—can significantly improve open rates and engagement.
How can I effectively connect with my audience?
To truly connect with your audience, your emails must provide clear value. Share updates about new products, services, promotions, or helpful insights that are relevant to their interests. Using AI-driven personalization, you can tailor content to each recipient, segment your audience automatically, and send messages at the optimal time to maintain attention and foster loyalty.
Why is email marketing valuable for business?
Email marketing keeps your brand top-of-mind, encourages repeat engagement, and drives conversions. When executed strategically—especially with AI enhancements for workflow efficiency and content optimization—email campaigns can lead to measurable actions from your customers, helping you achieve both short-term sales and long-term loyalty.

Conclusion: Why Email Marketing Matters

Email marketing is one of the most powerful digital marketing tools available today. It keeps your brand top-of-mind, builds lasting customer relationships, and drives measurable results. With the right strategy, tools, and execution, email marketing can significantly boost conversions and long-term business growth.

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