Email newsletters help start, grow, and maintain relationships with your customers. And it’s those relationships that keep them coming back for your products or services. But after the fun of summer emails, generating fall newsletter ideas can feel challenging.
The good news is, fall is the perfect time to build connections with your audience. As the weather turns, people stay in and spend more time on their devices. This gives you a unique opportunity to catch their attention.
This fall, find ways to start the conversation and build strong relationships with your customers. Read on to find out which holidays and special events, marketing tips, and creative content could boost your open rates, clicks, and sales this fall.
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Fall holiday newsletter ideas
Engage your readers this time of year by celebrating their favorite fall holidays. From Labor Day to Thanksgiving, find out how to stand out from your competitors and attract that holiday spend.
1. Labor Day
Labor Day marks the end of summer and the start of fall. It’s the final chance for cook-outs, parades, and beach days before the weather turns. Send a Labor Day email with an exclusive promotional code or discount to tap into the holiday spirit and help your customers make the most of the last warm days. Becca marks the occasion with up to 25% off their beauty products.
2. Back to school
The back-to-school, college, or university season can be a period of stress and change for parents and students alike. Make that first day back a little easier and you’ll earn their loyalty for life.
Solve their problems and earn their trust with a discount or freebie on a service geared toward students. Or design a two-for-one deal to fill a school backpack. Use cheerful graphics and warm copy to create an effective back-to-school email subscribers will want to click.
Because your audience is kids and parents, feel free to use an eye-catching emoji or two in your back to school email subject lines.
For more back to school campaign ideas, check out our back to school marketing guide.
3. Sports season
Fall marks the start of sports season, including soccer, football, ice hockey, field hockey, and basketball. If your brand is sports-related, this is a golden opportunity to connect with your subscribers.
Patricia Lopez is the founder of Dirt Pitch Apparel. She says, “As a soccer-inspired brand, we optimize our fall newsletter by matching important events from Major League Soccer with promos and discounts.”
“Another key element in our strategy is segmenting our audience according to the soccer team they support.” Patricia then sends out targeted emails to each segment. “This has proven effective for us, bumping our conversion rates by almost 20 percent.”
4. Halloween (October 31, 2023)
No list of October newsletter ideas is complete without Halloween. This spooky holiday is America’s favorite after Thanksgiving and Christmas. Luckily, it lends itself to fun and humorous content with a big visual impact.
Photos and other visuals trigger emotions and memories. Add high-quality media of your Halloween-inspired items to increase chances of making a sale.
In this LendingTree email, fun graphics and playful wording give even a serious topic like money-lending a lift.
For more creative Halloween ideas, check out our post on Halloween email marketing and our list of 100 Halloween email subject lines.
5. Thanksgiving (November 23, 2023)
The holiday season is here and customers are reaching for their wallets. Last year, 55% of Americans expected to spend between $50-149 on Thanksgiving. Feature your products in Thanksgiving-themed photos and videos to appeal to your customers and earn a place at their Thanksgiving table.
New Signature Homestyles puts its products front and center in its Thanksgiving email, which plays on the desire to impress guests with festive fall decor.
Created with Brevo
An alternative approach to your Thanksgiving newsletter campaign is to give thanks yourself. Consumer insight bodies note the growth of gratitude amongst consumers since the pandemic. So it feels timely and authentic for brands to say “thank you” at this special time of year too.
6. Black Friday (November 24, 2023) and Cyber Monday (November 27, 2023)
In 2022, U.S. consumers spent $9.12 billion on Black Friday and $11.3 billion on Cyber Monday. That’s a lot to play for. And with 38% of shoppers discovering deals through email, it also means stiff competition in your customer’s inbox from other brands looking for a slice of the pie.
Build up to the big day with reminders, promo previews, and exclusive offers for subscribers. Timed sales and codes add a sense of urgency as consumers rush to avoid missing out. Onsen does this well with their line, “Hurry – it’s our best deal of the year!”
7. Veterans Day (November 11, 2023)
The military veteran population in the U.S. stands at over 18 million. Pay your respects on Veterans Day to show your values, impress existing customers, and earn new ones.
Soylent showed their support with a special discount and respectful newsletter.
8. Early Christmas
Christmas comes earlier every year. After Thanksgiving, customers look for fall sales to get a head start on their gift lists.
Use this time to build excitement for the upcoming holiday season with special promos and sneak peeks.
This email from Moment invites customers to get ahead in their holiday shopping with early deals on photography gear.
Further reading: 8 Christmas Newsletter Ideas to Wow Your Subscribers
Fall sales
Your big sale this season will likely be Black Friday and Cyber Monday. But that doesn’t mean you can’t get creative with mini sales and promotional events in the meantime.
The fall season is often the time for stock changeover as old summer items make way for new season products. Amplify this scarcity in your marketing campaigns to clear out the last bits of stock. Use phrases like “Flash sale” and “Get your favorites before they’re gone.”
Fall newsletter themes
Beyond the holiday season, craft relevant and engaging fall email campaigns by taking inspiration from fall experiences your readers will relate to. Offer well-timed information or promotions to improve your customers’ lives as they leave summer behind.
Colder weather
As the temperature drops, thoughts turn to retreating indoors, cozy clothing, and getting the house winter-ready. An apparel store could release a fall fashion report. A plumber could offer weatherproofing tips. A landscaper could offer autumn gardening advice.
New beginnings
With students going back to class and the fun of summer fading from memory, fall is a time when many people turn over a new leaf.
They might start a new exercise routine or begin learning a language. It could be as simple as wanting to makeover their looks or home.
Find a way to tie in this trend with your products and send out a promotional email to help get your subscribers’ new habits off to a flying start.
New collections
Use the start of a new season to launch a brand-new collection. Contrary to popular belief, fall collections aren’t just for fashion brands. Many businesses can use the fall season to add new products and services to their list of offerings.
If you’re launching a new collection in the fall, your fall newsletter is a great place to announce it.
Fall newsletter content ideas
You’ve scheduled your back-to-school email campaign and planned your cold-weather newsletter. Great work! Here are more content ideas to fill those fall newsletter templates and maximize your sales this season.
Make it useful
Keep readers coming back to your newsletters by making them useful. You can offer activities, advice, recipes, tips, to-do lists, or gift guides. Think about the problems you can solve for your customers and how you can tie them back to your products.
This email from Panna plays on the pressure to cook a fantastic Thanksgiving meal. It offers new and exciting recipe ideas, both traditional and non, to help make the reader’s Thanksgiving a success.
Add video
No doubt you’ve seen how effective video can be on social media. The same is true of newsletters. Adding video to your email can increase click rates by 300%.
The best way to insert video in your email is to include a static image or still with a link. This makes sure your email gets delivered and that all readers can view your video regardless of the email client they are using. With Brevo’s email builder, just add an image using the drag-and-drop editor.
If you’re a fashion brand, showcase your fall collection in an on-brand promo video. For other businesses, try these ideas to inspire and engage your customers:
- A video of your latest products
- A customer testimonial interview
- A sneak peek of your HQ, workshop, or team
Run contests and giveaways
Contests and giveaways generate two rounds of content.
- An initial round promoting the competition
- User-generated content as readers enter and win
Create community spirit with a spooky giveaway, a Halloween costume competition, or a Thanksgiving greeting card design contest. Generate buzz around your brand by offering your products as prizes.
Use customer reviews
Build interest in your products and boost your credibility by sharing customer reviews in your fall email newsletters.
Prepare a couple of editable email templates and have them ready in your drafts folder. Then, next time there’s a lull in your content creation, drop in your latest customer reviews and hit send.
Still waiting for your first reviews? Start the conversation. Send a segmented email to customers who have purchased your products recently. Ask them for feedback. You could offer an incentive such as a percentage discount or money off their next purchase. The reviews will feed future emails, web content, and social media posts.
Add personalization
With the power of segmented email lists, you know where your customers live, whether they have kids, and which holidays they celebrate.
Use this to your advantage by sending personalized emails to segments of your subscriber list. Unlike mass-market, generalized emails, these feel more personal, more relevant, and have a higher success rate.
At this time of year, there are lots of local parades and celebrations. Business owner Alan Harder adds, “If you’re targeting a regional market, incorporate local parades into your campaign.”
Of course, effective email segmentation relies on having the data you need. Update your subscriber questions to make sure you’re targeting the right ones.
With Brevo, it’s easy to send personalized content to your subscribers.
Show you care
Stand out from the crowd by showing a little heart in your newsletter. If you don’t already support a cause, choose one that feels relevant to your brand and offer support in the form of donations, product gifting, or labor.
October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month. This is an excellent opportunity to show support and raise awareness of an important issue.
Another way to spread some good is to run a Giving Tuesday campaign on the Tuesday after Thanksgiving.
Design fall newsletter templates
When it comes to fall emails, newsletter design is just as important as content.
Spice up your campaigns with fall colors, fall-themed visuals, and photos that evoke the change of seasons.
This email template design from Elum Designs ticks off autumn leaves, fall hues, pumpkins, and cozy hot beverages.
Created with Brevo
Fall email subject lines
Chelsea Cohen, co-founder of SoStocked, has a tip to help you captivate your customers — add an element of urgency and help solve their problems.
“Use hooks like ‘X products you have to see before fall,’ or ‘The X things that helped me get through the fall,’ taking inspiration from blog post headings.”
Make the subject line more eye-catching by using one or two emojis that match the theme of your newsletter.Here are a few examples to spice up your fall email subject lines:
- Fall into savings and get 25% off
- Your autumn shopping guide 🍂
- Fall in love with these cozy knits
- This Halloween, we’re treating you! 🎃
- Are you ready for pumpkin spice season?
- New fall styles have arrived
- Don’t miss out on our fall sale! ⏳
- Flash sale: 20% off fall favorites
- Fresh looks for fall
- Get ahead on holiday shopping with our fall gift deals 🎁
Related: 101 Summer Email Subject Lines to Spark Conversions This Season
Final tips for fall newsletters
Your content planner is full of autumn newsletter ideas. You’re ready to add value to your customers’ lives with useful content from Veterans Day right through to Cyber Monday.
Before you hit send, remember to:
- Engage with customers on topics that interest them
- Always include a call-to-action (CTA) to let your subscribers know what to do next
- Plan ahead and schedule your newsletters to save time
Planning your fall newsletters
From Labor Day to Thanksgiving, this season is packed with holidays — and each holiday is the perfect time to send your fall newsletter!
We’ve put together a holiday marketing calendar filled with insightful tips and tricks to help you make the most out of every major holiday during the fall season and beyond.
