There are a lot of emails you can automate. Welcome sequences. Nurture sequences. Onboarding sequences. Post-purchase follow-ups. Birthday emails. Re-engagement campaigns.
If I could only implement one automated email for a business that currently has none, I know exactly which one I’d choose.
The 30-day re-engagement email.
Here’s how it works and why it matters.
Thirty days after someone joins your email list — if they haven’t taken any meaningful action (clicked a link, replied to an email, visited your website, made a purchase) — they receive a single email that does one thing: asks if they’re still interested and makes it easy to take the next step.
This email serves multiple purposes simultaneously.
First, it reactivates the people who joined your list with genuine interest but got distracted before taking action. Life happened. Your emails got buried. They meant to check out the thing you were offering. A single, direct, personal-feeling email at the thirty-day mark re-opens the conversation at the moment when they’ve had enough time to clear their initial distractions but before they’ve completely forgotten who you are.
Second, it gives the disinterested people an easy way to leave. This is counterintuitive but important. Someone who’s on your list but never opens your emails is hurting your deliverability. Gmail and other email providers watch engagement rates. A list full of non-openers tells the algorithm your emails are not worth delivering to inboxes. Making it easy for the genuinely disinterested to unsubscribe keeps your list clean and your deliverability high.
Third, it provides intelligence. The people who re-engage tell you something about what moves them. The people who unsubscribe tell you something about your messaging or your audience targeting. Both pieces of information are useful.
The email itself is simple. A short, personal-feeling note. Something like: “Hey — you joined my list a month ago and I want to make sure I’m actually adding value. Here’s the most useful thing I have for someone in your situation right now: [link to your best resource]. If this isn’t what you were hoping for when you signed up, no hard feelings — unsubscribe link is below. But if it is, here’s what I’d recommend as your next step: [specific action].”
One email. One month. Runs automatically forever.
Build this before you build anything else.