How I save hours every week with these email automation tricks

As we navigate working in a digital age, with social media channels thriving and people spending more time online, businesses often avoid the cost-effective tool they have sitting in their pocket.

I’ve been working in email for a decade now and want to share some of my experience to help small business owners take the hassle out of email marketing – on a budget.

Here are my top tips for how you can set up email for your business – including five email automations you can get started with today to save you time and money.

Send the right email at the right time

No matter what industry you’re in, email is going to be a key part of your strategy to make sure you’re reaching your audience at the right time, with the right message.

Technology and automation can make make it easier and faster to get your messages out to your customers. This will help you reach your customers and make more sales without the manual process.

5 email communications you can automate

Below are five examples of automated campaigns that you can set up and send at specific times throughout your customer journey. This is how you’ll start making money more quickly and build customer relationships.

1. Welcome emails
2. Abandoned cart emails
3. Order confirmation
4. Product recommendations
5. Review requests

1. Welcome series

A welcome series can go a long way in nurturing your customers and keeping you at the forefront of their minds. These emails give you the perfect opportunity to introduce your brand, products, and services.

Example

For example, let’s say you run an online shop selling printed t-shirts. Someone signs up to your mailing list, so you send them emails welcoming them to your brand.

Email	When	Purpose
1	Real-time	Introduce who you are and a special discount
2	2 days later	Showcase popular products and delivery options
3	3 days later	Showcase customer testimonials and ratings
4	4 days later	Send a reminder about a discount and a date when the sales offer ends

2. Abandoned cart

On average, over 70% of online shoppers abandon items in their cart before completing the checkout process, according to the Baymard Institute. And nearly 43% of these abandon because they’re “not ready to buy”. 

Sending a personalised email between two and four hours after they leave your website can be a great way to bring them back. Plus, offering a special discount can help encourage someone to make a decision to buy from you now.

Example

You’re an electrician offering EV charger installations. A customer clicks on your page about this service but leaves your website before contacting you. Here’s a series of emails you could set up:

Email	When	Purpose
1	2 hours later	Still looking for [service]?
2	5 days later	Benefits of [service] and a discount

3. Order confirmation

When someone has bought a product or booked a service with you, send them an order confirmation in real-time to thank them. List the product/service they’ve paid for and any tracking details.

Example

You run a domestic cleaning service and someone books you online. You send them an email straight away confirming their booking. This email should include:

• service booking details
• payment information
• details of how to change or cancel a booking
• an ‘add to calendar’ link (optional)

4. Product recommendations 

Keeping customers coming back time and again is vital to any business for sustainable growth. Sending an email about other products or services related to the item they’ve just bought is a quick-win to retain your customers. This is known as ‘cross-selling’. 

Example 

You run a brick-and-mortar store in your local high street selling baby items. A customer comes in and buys a swim rash top in size 6-9 months.  At the point of sale, they sign up to receive your emails:

• automated email (two weeks later): share sun hat and swim shoe recommendations for size 6-9 months

5. Review requests

Once a customer has made a booking or bought something on your website and you’ve delivered it, send a review request as a simple way to build your brand’s reputation. 

How long you wait to send a request may depend on your trade, for example:

• coffee shops: 24 hours after the visit
• online retailers: 3-7 days after delivery
• freelancers: 2-4 days after the project has finished

Example

An automated email to request a review could make these key points:

• your feedback helps us keep improving and makes sure every [visit/product/service] is as good as it can be
• please leave us a review on [platform, e.g. Google], or if you have an specific thoughts then feel free to drop us an email
• we have a monthly prize draw for people who write us a review (if you want to offer an incentive)

How to use AI for planning and writing emails – saving you time and stress

Writing content for email marketing doesn’t have to be a long process. And if you’re just starting out, you don’t need a full content team to create it. 

AI can be a great tool to help you write your emails and plan when to send them – just make sure you write a detailed prompt. 

Whatever tool you’re using – from Gemini and Claude to ChatGPT – a good prompt for drafting marketing emails will include:  

• what the email is being used for (e.g. sales, product recommendations, or a review request)  
• how many emails you need
• target audience (who is your product or service aimed at)
• frequency (how often do you want to send each email in a series)
• Goal (what do you want to get from your email? E.g. brand awareness or more sales/bookings)
• tone of voice (supportive and knowledgeable or playful and lighthearted) 
• call to action (what you want the customer to do next)
• product/service information

Read more about free AI tools you can use for your business. 

Final thoughts

Email marketing remains one of the most cost-effective ways to reach your target audience and cut through the noise of your competitors. Inboxes get busy, but if you send the right message at the right time then you’ll capture attention and hopefully make a sale. 

And setting up just a few of these automations and using AI to help write your emails means you can spend less time on admin and more time on higher-priority tasks. Automating what you can means you’re still communicating with your audience at key moments without taking time out from running your business. It’s the secret to making money while you sleep. 

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