4 tips to drive conversions with ads in email

Let’s face it. Conversions get all the credit.

Sure, awareness puts people in the funnel and consideration keeps them moving. But when it comes to measuring the true success of a campaign, conversions provide the hard proof: sign-ups, downloads, trials, and purchases. So, naturally, it’s easy to get excited about measuring conversions.

Still, it’s important to remember that each advertising channel is different and can yield conversions in different ways. Meaning you can’t drive and evaluate email conversions the same way you can search or social conversions.

That’s where we can help.

LiveIntent has spent over a decade delivering 6 billion ads to more than 240 million people across 2,500 publishers and brands. Based on that experience and data, we’re serving up four tips you can use to drive conversions with ads in email.

1. Improve performance with display ads and Dynamic Audiences

Email is a unique beast. Since it’s HTML-driven, it doesn’t support rich media formats like autoplay videos or pop-up ads. But that’s actually a good thing. Compared to endless social media feeds and overstimulating web pages, email offers a much less noisy and disruptive content experience.

It’s also curated and intentional. People subscribe to emails to receive specific content at a designated cadence, like daily, weekly, or monthly.

Example of dynamic audiences

Brands can use display ads, coupled with our powerful Dynamic Audiences, to drive conversions on their site. With Dynamic Audiences, brands can reach people with relevant product ads based on the person’s web behavior — like items they’ve browsed or added to their cart — and encourage them to complete a purchase.

2. Build relevant and mobile-friendly landing pages

The best way to drive conversions with ads in email? Make it as easy as possible for a customer to say “yes” to your offer.

Meaning, don’t make consumers go searching for the product they want — the product you advertised. Make sure your ads lead to relevant and easy-to-use landing pages, creating a seamless and cohesive user experience. If consumers are simply sent to your homepage, for instance, they’ll be left fumbling to find what they’re looking for. And you’ll be left with decreased conversion rates.

It’s also important to remember that people are increasingly browsing and buying products on mobile devices. As eMarketer predicts, mobile commerce should account for 43.4% of all eCommerce sales in 2023 — up from 41.8% in 2022. So keep those dedicated landing pages mobile-friendly and optimized for smartphones and tablets.

3. Leverage CRM data to target unique audience segments

Since email is a logged-in environment, you can use your first-party CRM data to target custom audience segments in your campaigns. You might target inactive customers with re-engagement campaigns, for example. Or you might reach loyal customers with special perks and bonus offers.

When a leading auto brand was having trouble getting customers to renew their leases, they targeted them with specific ads across publishers’ email newsletters. As a result, the brand saw a 41% increase in the number of lease renewals, which led to 13,000 incremental lease assignees. That’s the power of using first-party data to drive conversions.

4. Use the LiveConnect tag to measure true conversions

Measuring true conversions over email is easy with LiveIntent’s LiveConnect tag. By placing this web tag — a simple piece of code — on your site, you can automatically track conversions like product purchases, email signups, and asset downloads.

How do we know these conversions are accurate and true? Because they’re all tied back to the email hash — an encoded email address for data privacy. Meaning you can trace those website conversions back to the people who actually saw your ads.

So, yes, conversions might get all the credit for campaign success. But it’s for good reason: They’re a measure of how close you are to reaching your end goal. And now, with these strategies, you can more effectively generate and track those conversions over one of the most trusted and engaging channels on the web: email.