Email Marketing For Clothing Brands: Why Your Email List Is Essential

Whether you’re a new, aspiring, or seasoned clothing brand owner, you’ve probably heard about email marketing. For some, it can seem scary or overwhelming. For others, it might seem like a waste of time (spoiler: it’s not!). As a professional in the clothing industry with 15+ years of experience, and over $29 million in sales, I’m here to tell you that email marketing for clothing brands is absolutely essential. Not only will you get to connect with your ideal customer, but you’ll also make more sales compared to marketing on social media alone. 

In this post, you’ll learn the value of email marketing for clothing brands, essential vocabulary terms, my top recommended email service provider for clothing designers (+an exclusive discount!), and more.

Key Takeaways Ahead:

1. Why is email marketing for clothing brands important?
2. The long-term value of an email list
3. What is a double opt-in?
4. What is a welcome sequence?
5. What is a nurture sequence?
6. 14 additional must-know terms: email marketing for clothing brands
7. My top recommendation for an email marketing service provider (+exclusive discount!)

Why Is Email Marketing For Clothing Brands Important?

In order to vastly expand and scale your clothing brand, you need to have two important components in your business:

1. A platform that you own to sell your products 
2. A reliable way to communicate with your customers and followers

Even if you’ve got a large social media following, or if you currently sell your products on a 3rd party platform (Etsy, Amazon, other social media), I highly recommend that you transition those elements onto a platform that is yours. 

You don’t own Etsy, or Instagram, or Amazon. What would happen if those platforms suddenly shut down? Or if your account got hacked and deleted? How would you get in touch with your loyal customers?

That’s exactly why you need an online space that is completely your property (a website and an email list). 

The Long-Term Value Of An Email List

An email subscriber is actually worth money for your business, assuming you’re using an email marketing strategy to keep your customers engaged (more on that below). When someone joins your email list, they consent to you selling to them. They realize that you’ll most likely be sharing exclusive offers, discounts, sneak peeks, and sales through your emails. 

On average, research shows that for every $1 spent on email marketing, around $36 is made in return*. Over time, the Customer Lifetime Value (CLV) can grow. In my business, I’ve seen customers from my email list spend tens to hundreds of thousands of dollars on my products. I’ve had my email list for many years now, so I can recognize which people are returning customers. This is why it’s worth offering a discount on your clothing in order to gain an email subscriber. For example: offering a 15% off coupon if the customer signs up for your email list. 

Though I do recommend using both, your followers on social media aren’t as valuable as email subscribers, and engagement rate with your emails is also typically higher than engagement rate with your content on social media. 

→ Research shows that 59% of consumers say marketing emails influence their purchasing decisions*, and 80% of small & midsized businesses report email marketing to be their most important online tool for customer retention**!

Email Marketing Strategy: What Is A Double Opt-In?

Of course, you want people on your email list who are actually opening your emails, engaging with your content, buying your products. If you build an email list of 30,000 people, but only a few hundred engage, that’s a major problem. Not just for your business, but for your credibility and rankings as an email sender. 

Google can actually identify when a large portion of your emails go unopened. This can cause your emails to land in your subscribers’ spam folders, which we definitely don’t want!

So, in order to ensure that your new email subscribers genuinely want to be there, you need to set up a “double opt-in” process on your email service provider. When someone opts into your email list for a lead magnet, the first email asks them to confirm their subscription. Once they click “confirm”, it automatically sends the second email with the freebie inside, kicking off your welcome sequence.

Email Marketing Strategy: What Is A Welcome Sequence?

A welcome sequence is an automated series of emails. The goal is to welcome your new subscribers and connect with them on a personal level. You are essentially “showing your customer around” your brand.

I like to compare an email welcome sequence to walking into a store and getting greeted by an employee. What if you walked into a clothing store and nobody said anything to you? Nobody asked you if you needed directions, or help finding something, or any recommendations? 

You’d probably feel lost, maybe confused, and probably not willing to stick around very long. This is what you need to imagine for your email subscribers. Don’t just let them join your community and then ghost them. Welcome them with kindness, helpful resources, and joy!

Email Marketing Strategy: What Is A Nurture Sequence?

A nurture sequence is an automated series of emails that a new subscriber receives after opting into your email list to receive a free resource (a lead magnet). This series of emails educates your new subscriber and provides valuable content. You might share additional resources or point the subscriber to a certain place on the brand’s website. The intention here is to nurture your new lead so they stick around for more content! 

You want to offer value and be a company they want to interact with. Building their trust is key.

→ If you’d like more guidance with setting up your email marketing system & building a strategy that is right for your business, check out my signature coaching program for fashion designers, Fruition. I walk you through each and every step of crafting your email marketing strategy, creating your Flodesk account (use my code CORINNE50 for 30 FREE days + 50% off your first year at Flodesk), setting up your email sequences, and so much more. Check out Fruition if you need a fashion design mentor who’s been through it all!

14 Additional Must-Know Terms: Email Marketing For Clothing Brands

1. Click rate: The percentage of total recipients who clicked on a link within your email.
2. Click-through rate (CTR): The percentage of recipients who click on a link in your email compared to the number of recipients who received your email.
3. Click-to-open rate: The percentage of recipients who click on a link in your email compared to the number of recipients who opened your email.
4. Open rate: The percentage of total recipients who opened your email.
5. Conversion: When a lead turns into a paying customer or client after interacting with your email sequence, or when someone signs up for your freebie.
6. Full-page form (landing page, opt-in page): A separate page with its own URL.
7. In-line form: A simple email sign-up form that can be embedded into your website or blog to collect email addresses without impacting your visitor’s experience. 
8. Pop-up form: An email sign-up form that suddenly appears and hovers above your website content, often triggered by time spent on the website or cursor movement.
9. Lead magnet (freebie, downloadable, content upgrade): A free resource delivered in exchange for someone’s email address. 
10. Soft bounce: When an email reaches the recipient’s email server but cannot be delivered to their inbox. 
11. Hard bounce: When an email cannot be delivered to the recipient because their email address is invalid.
12. Marked spam: When a subscriber flags your email as spam because it was unsolicited (meaning they didn’t give permission for email correspondence), don’t remember opting in to your list, or find your content irrelevant.
13. Re-engagement sequence (cold subscriber sequence): An automated series of emails sent to inactive subscribers who have not opened your emails or clicked on links in a while.
14. Workflows (email sequence, email series, email automation, drip marketing): A predetermined series of automated emails delivered to a segment of your subscribers that’s triggered by an action or data.

My Top Recommendation For An Email Service Provider

As a designer, I’ve found Flodesk to be the perfect email service provider for me. It’s easy to use, has beautiful pre-made templates, and offers enough flexibility for me to build my own pretty emails. I highly recommend giving it a try, even if you’ve been using a different email marketing provider until now.

If you’re interested in trying Flodesk for your email marketing service provider, you can use my code (CORINNE50) to get 30 days FREE + 50% off your first YEAR of Flodesk! 

Discount link for Flodesk

Resources: “40+ Email Marketing Statistics You Need to Know for 2025” OptinMonster*