To YSL’s Email Marketing: Hey, Hey, Are You Okay?
Email is not dead, but Yves Saint Laurent’s email marketing is in need of resuscitation.
As with anything new, first impressions matter. So when I first signed up for the newsletter of Yves Saint Laurent, I was keen on observing the user experience from the beginning when consumers opt-in to receive emails from the French luxury brand. Unfortunately, I encountered more red flags than I had hoped.
Red Flag #1: Unresponsive ‘Send’ Button
After a second or two of opening YSL’s website, a pop-up appears inviting you to subscribe to their newsletter. There are some green flags here because the pop-up was non-intrusive and there are two ways to exit the window: the small X on the upper right corner and a “continue to site” button.
The problem, however, is that when you’re ready to sign up and have typed down your email address, the “send” button doesn’t work.
Simply put: you can’t sign up.
The only way to be able to submit your email is to scroll down at the bottom of their homepage, click “subscribe to the newsletter” and then the same pop-up appears but with the “send” button working this time around. This is very problematic as you would want to make the sign-up process as easy as possible. Anything that is too complicated or takes too much time and effort will only discourage consumers.
Red Flag #2: Delayed Welcome
After you’ve signed up, on the same pop-up window, a message confirming your subscription will immediately appear. The “welcome” email, on the other hand, was not as prompt and arrived about 5 minutes after signing up. This is one of the rare times that I’ve experienced this because more often than not, as soon as I subscribe to a brand’s newsletter, I immediately receive an email from them, as if there was no moment to waste!
This is another problematic point because, as a consumer, I was left wondering for five minutes if my subscription really went through and if I even put the correct email address in the first place. Again, the sign up process should not take too much time, and it’s the brand’s job to make sure that the experience is positive for the consumers all throughout.
Red Flag #3: Not-So-Welcoming Welcome
When I finally received my “welcome” email, I was disappointed to be greeted by a welcome that is far from warm, and far from welcoming. As a matter of fact, the word “welcome” was not used once! It was a nondescript email that feels like something your boss would send you after accomplishing a deliverable.
Starting from top to bottom, the subject of the email was “YOUR NEWSLETTER SUBSCRIPTION” — this alone sets the tone for the rest of the email. It was not enticing and did not care for any creativity at all. The body of the email only included text and didn’t have any sort of images, designs, or colors. There are also no elements of personalization of any kind and there wasn’t much content either. It was straight to the point but it didn’t offer any value for consumers. Lastly, to top it all off, they sign off with “kind regards” which adds even more to the formality and “coldness” of the email.
Any Last Words?
Despite the disappointing first impression, I wanted to give YSL’s email marketing another chance — two, as a matter of fact. First, a day after subscribing, I wanted to test out if they had any sort of triggers. To test this, I added an item to my cart, pretended to check out until before making the actual purchase, and waited for an email about abandoning my cart with a call to action to complete my purchase.
Nothing.
Secondly, I waited another few days to see if I would receive any more emails from the brand. I was hoping that their “welcome” email, or rather, confirmation email, was an outlier and that the next ones would be better.
Nothing.
At this point, I have nothing else but to conclude that Yves Saint Laurent’s email marketing is in dire need of improvements. This tool is powerful and has been proven to be effective; by 2023, it is expected that its global revenue will be close to $11 billion. The track record of success combined with the overwhelmingly positive predictions says it all — email is not dead and YSL needs to catch up.
As much as I had hoped for better results, this is proof that brands, no matter how big they are and regardless if they are in the luxury industry, still fail to execute some marketing tactics successfully. However, all is not lost for YSL as they can still improve on their email marketing in a way that will be for the betterment of both the consumers and the brand.
Do you subscribe to any brand’s newsletter? How is your experience different from mine with YSL?
Thank you for reading this week’s blog, and I’ll catch you on the next one!
