Imagine that you met someone on an online platform. Because you liked their profile, you decided to start a conversation. Everything went well, so you wanted to initiate the infamous first date. This first date is pretty critical for the future of the relationship because it is the first physical touchpoint between you and your "soulmate." Even though your "soulmate" may come to the first date, that doesn't mean they will stick up with you. You need to make a good first impression to convince them that you are worth their love and time.
SaaS welcome emails are the first dates of the SaaS businesses. They are the backbones of your company, ensuring that you give the best first impression to your customers. In this article, we are going to look at 11 welcome email examples to boost your email marketing and enhance your customer satisfaction.
SaaS welcome emails (onboarding emails) are the first engagement that you establish after your customers purchase your product or service. They are the basis of powerful communication and marketing tools that enhances the relationship between you and your customers. Since they reassure your customers that they are not alone in their journey (of using your product/service), they act as behavioral emails.
The two main goals of welcome emails are appreciating and thanking your customers for their purchases and directing them in the correct direction about what to do next. By making your customers feel special through these emails, you build loyalty and trust between you and your customers. Similarly, by showing them how to use your product both effectively and actively, you ensure that your customers are using your product to its full potential, guaranteeing customer satisfaction and user engagement.
Even though welcome emails seem like simple ways to engage with your customers, they are as important as first dates. With these emails, you set the tone for customers' experiences, onboard them to the next step, and preserve the customer journey. Therefore, it is vital to know and execute key features of best welcome emails:
It is also important to keep in mind some useful questions while writing your welcome email:
By considering these key aspects of welcome emails and questions, you can write the best welcome email and impress your customer on the "first date." However, even though the steps to write an email looks easy, sometimes executing them is not as easy as it looks. Thus, together, we will look at some examples of welcome emails to understand that what makes them the best.
If you want to get inspired for your next customer success email sequences, check out our top 15 customer success email examples article!
Asana is a web and mobile application that aims to assist teams to organize, track, and manage their work.
One of the most effective strategies that Asana uses is that in the beginning, without further continuing the email, they create a sense of family between the product and its customers by celebrating the purchase and emphasizing "yours" and "ours." This reassures the customer that Asana cares for them and will be ready if they would encounter any problems.
To look at the email as a whole, even though it contains very little text, it conveys the ideas easily because it is concise and precise. It doesn't confuse the customer with unnecessary information and verbosity. The main focus of the email is on tasks, which is Asana's core value proposition. By putting the focus on the most important factor of the product, Asana ensures that the customer can use the product to its fullest potential, guaranteeing the value its customers are getting is matching their expectations.
The three tips that Asana provides at the end of the email help the customer to understand what their next steps are and provide them with clear instructions. This sets them up for success from the beginning and gives the customers a reason to stay with Asana.
Squarespace is a website building and hosting company.
Squarespace's email is a good example of a "providing critical information" welcome email. It clearly displays the login details of the customers, eliminating any misunderstanding. By not putting distracting images or icons and not writing unnecessary sentences, Squarespace ensures that its customers smoothly complete the first step without further help. Since the customers can start using Squarespace with a free trial, the welcome email also encourages and lets them update to a paid account. This propels the customer into the next step in their journey and allows the flow of customers.
At the end of the email, Squarespace provides a direct link to a support page, which can help the customers when they are having problems or don't understand a certain feature. By putting the direct link, Squarespace shows that they care about their customers' problems and gives them to tool to learn everything about the product. This allows the customers to get answers to the questions that initially pop up in their minds and to learn the product thoroughly.
Hootsuite is a social media management platform that helps its customers to control and navigate their social media presence.
Hootsuite's welcome email looks wordier than the previous two examples, but, still, it is precise and concise. First, they reassure that the customer is in safe hands and tell that they are in the same boat with "more than 12 million people" (12 million customers who are using Hootsuite). This establishes a sense of belonging and makes the customer feel special. In addition, to show their worth, Hootsuite does not use pompous and hard-to-understand words but rather chooses simple words and precise sentences.
In the last part of the email, Hootsuite encourages its customers to immediately start using the product by directing them into the next step, which is log in and dashboard setup.
Airfocus is a product management tool, aiming to help teams to navigate, organize, and collaborate.
The best thing about Airfocus's email is that even though it is concise, it doesn't lack visuals and icons. Sometimes visuals can make an unnecessary distraction for the reader and hinder the intention of the email. However, in this case, the image at the top adds color and playfulness while also emphasizing the aim of the Airfocus (organizing and managing). Similarly, the icons below the image help the customer to understand the tasks and act accordingly.
This email sets the customer for success because it clearly pinpoints three initial and main tasks the customers need to complete. By helping the customer to find the next steps, Airfocus saves the time and effort of its customers, which increases customer satisfaction. Also, Airfocus provides login information at the very end of the email. This reminder is both useful and helpful for the customer to keep track of its email and ID.
Calendly is a software company that helps you to book meetings.
Before further giving information about the product, Calendly establishes ethos, showing why they are the right choice. This reassures its customers that they decided on the best product and will get the best service possible. It also saves time for its customers by giving a direct link to possible integrations and partners. This reminds its customers both all the opportunities that they can benefit from and helps them to easily navigate the product.
In the next portion of the email, Calendly presents its commonly used features, giving tips and tricks to how to get the best out of Calendly. By engaging the customer through tips and the "Video Tutorial Series" link, Calendly supports its customers, beginning from the first touchpoint. This also indicates to the customer that Calendly will be one link away whenever they need help and support.
BrowserStack is a cloud web and mobile testing platform, helping its customers to test their websites and applications across on-demand browsers and operating systems.
BrowserStack chooses a clear and bold template to convey their main message: They are the number one in their market, and you, as a customer, choose the right choice. Even though the customers are hooked to your product, using a welcome email strategy like the one BrowserStack helps you to completely gain the trust of your customers. Seeing that "2 million+ developers" are using the same product (BrowserStack) as you, also, creates a sense of family, which enhances the trust and loyalty between you and your customers. Also, the email is sent from a team member, which also enhances the sense of family theme that BrowserStack wants to achieve.
In the next part of the email, the email provides links to test your website or mobile app. This helps the customer to quickly see the service that BrowserStack provides and to easily start getting value out of it. The big and simple font also enables the customer to take action without any support, saving them time and energy.
Evernote is a note-taking app that helps you to organize, manage, and archive your notes.
The first thing that catches the eye of the customer when they open the welcome email is that it is sectioned into different categories/features/tasks by using subheadings and images. This helps the customer to easily locate what they are looking for and directs them quickly into using the app. Another thing that makes Evernote's welcome email one of the bests is in the beginning, it clearly celebrates the purchase and appreciates the customer. Making the customer feel special is crucial for the success of welcome emails, and Evernote achieves this by using a welcome quote with a slogan. This is a fun and engaging way to hook the customer.
The email is also aim-focused, meaning that the intention of the email is clear, concise, and precise: Convince the customer to download the app and show them its benefits on their efficiency and productivity. It is also not heavy on writing with hard-to-understand sentences and words. This helps the reader to keep their focus on the email and enables Evernote to achieve its intention.
Grammarly is a cloud-based writing assistant, helping you to review your grammar, punctuation, clarity, engagement, and delivery mistakes.
The welcome email of Grammarly is a great example of how to show your product's/service's personality in just a few sentences. Grammarly bases its content marketing on its playful and witty language, creating a relationship that is based on friendship. When a customer opens the email, the first they feel is how light and cheerful the message is. Since welcome emails are part of the behavioral marketing/behavioral emails, the style and content of the Grammarly email cheer up its customer, indicating that "if you continue to use Grammarly, you will be happy and content."
At the beginning of the email, Grammarly emphasizes what its customer can achieve by using the features and tools, which also affects the customer's "conversations, accomplishments, and relationships." This gives Grammarly the ability to be more than just a writing assistant for the customer, but a friend and coach. Even though this is not the ultimate goal of the company, by doing this they strengthen the connection and loyalty of the customers to the product.
Headspace is a guided meditation app that helps you to achieve a happier and healthier life both mentally and physically.
When you look at the email, even without reading the content, it is easy to understand this email belongs to Headspace. The reason for that is the powerful and bold brand identity achieved by unique cartoons. This is a great example of content marketing, which is something that you should think about before starting to promote your product/service and establish a customer base. These cartoons help the customer understand the personality of the app and give them an idea of what waits for them throughout their journey.
The content of the email is clear and precise, which is highly appreciated by the customers because long and hard-to-understand emails waste time and effort to read. The email simply tells customers how the trial works and leads them to upgrade plans, which is the ultimate goal of Headspace. By directly offering the different types of plans, Headspace quickly attracts the customers without giving them a chance to try the competitor apps.
InVision is a visual collaboration platform that helps teams to work cooperatively and smoothly.
Visuals are important aspects of welcome emails. They can help you to convey your message without using any words, but they can also hinder your point, confusing and distracting your customers. InVision perfectly sets an example of how to use visuals for your favor. The email highlights showing, not telling philosophy, meaning each visual serves a purpose and clarifies any questions for the consumers. For example, the videos InVision provides help for customers to learn and understand the product, which improves user engagement and customer satisfaction.
InVision also sets ethos by highlighting well-known brands that are working with them. Since these brands are admired and experts in their areas, this helps InVision to maintain trust and credibility. As I said in the introduction, purchasing the product does not mean that the customer will continue to use that product. Therefore, by establishing a strong connection through trust and loyalty, InVision aims to make a good first impression and propose something that convinces its customers to stay with them for the long term.
Mode is an analytics platform that aims to help people who are working with data to analyze, visualize, and share data.
The welcome email of Mode starts with a welcome quote and a fun little visual to engage the customer. This is an effective way to hook your customer to the email and convey your message easily. Mode also does not confuse the customer by giving examples of too many features and tools. It simply gives attention to two of the most important features that the customer needs to know before starting to use the product. By not dividing the attention of the customer, Mode achieves to help its customers with concise and simple sentences.
At the end of the email, Mode provides a two-minute video, which shows what Mode does for you and how can you benefit from all the features it offers. This video is a clever and engaging way to clarify any misunderstanding about the product and make a good first impression. This can, in the long run, help you to convince your customers to buy additional services from you or upgrade their plans.
How do you know if an engagement email sequence actually improved product engagement? With HockeyStack's marketing attribution software, you can track and improve your welcome emails.
HockeyStack is an end-to-end analytics tool for SaaS companies. You can track and analyze data from the product, sales, subscription revenue, and marketing in one tool and get access to hidden insights, such as the LTV of a piece of content, or the churn rate of each marketing channel along with users’ reasons for churn.
Even though writing a perfect welcome email seems an easy task to complete, it requires you to know some key aspects of welcome emails. Mastering these can help you to actively engage with your customers after their purchases and to give a good first impression.
The welcome emails are the first dates of the SaaS world, helping you with SaaS marketing. Therefore, while you are writing your own welcome email, always keep in mind the ways you can show your appreciation to your customers and ways to both impress and convince them to stay with you. The examples we have looked at can give you a general idea of how different types of businesses choose different templates to achieve their intentions. These templates, however, are not the ultimate answer to "how to write a perfect welcome email." For example, a visual-heavy template might work for companies like Headspace, but it may not work for companies like Squarespace. Therefore, you need to examine and learn different templates and think about what you want to gain with a welcome email before starting to write them.
Why welcome emails are important?
SaaS welcome emails (onboarding emails) are the first dates of the SaaS world. They help you to appreciate your customers for their purchases and to make a good first impression. Therefore, an engaging and effective welcome email can convince your customers to continue using your product after the purchase.
What are the basic rules to write a welcome email?
The best examples of welcome emails are always precise, concise, and clear. You need to eliminate any unnecessary information and words to keep the focus of your customers to your message. The emails also should be celebratory since you need to show your gratefulness for your customers' purchases. This can make the customer feel special, which increases loyalty and trust. Last but not least, a good welcome email should show the personality of your company. Thus, without even seeing the product name, a customer can understand which company send it.
How does Grammarly engage its customers?
Grammarly engages with its customers in their welcome emails with playful and witty language. By lighting up the mood and cheering the customer, Grammarly makes a good first impression.
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