Fix email fatigue with retention-first, AI-driven strategies (for SaaS & e-commerce)

We recently sat down with Nikki Elbaz (catch the full conversation here if you missed it), widely known as the Queen of Emails, to dig into what’s really undermining email marketing today. What surfaced wasn’t another set of tactics or platform hacks—it was something deeper: most email programs are built on borrowed playbooks that have never been tested against their own customers’ needs.

“Best-practice” fatigue… AI buzz without strategy… Discounts that erode margins… Lists that look engaged but are quietly burning out… 

These aren’t new challenges, but in 2025, they’ve reached a breaking point. And email leaders are left asking the same pressing questions: 

• How do we prove incremental value under tighter budgets? 
• How do we retain customers when acquisition steals the spotlight?
• How do we harness AI without sounding like every other brand?

For many senior marketers, these challenges explain why emails aren’t converting at expected levels. Left unaddressed, small gaps snowball into broader email strategy problems that hurt retention and growth.

Today’s post builds on our chat with Nikki, adding context and examples to help you drop outdated tactics and craft strategies that convert.

The “best practices” trap: Retention left behind

The industry conditions us to seek shortcuts through “best practices” like timing, subject lines, and name tags, but none address the real question: “What job does this email do in the customer’s decision-making process?

As Nikki pointed out, the fundamental flaw is assuming what worked for Brand A will also work for Brand B.

So, let’s start with the common email strategy problems we see seasoned marketers make when they try to emulate winning strategies from others.

Common mistakes when replicating “Best Practices”

• Copying outcomes without considering the “drivers.” For example, replicating a competitor’s email campaign while missing that its success came from an exclusive influencer partnership.
  
• Reusing another brand’s send frequency without mapping to your own journey. Like adopting a daily cadence from fast fashion in a luxury niche.
  
• Confusing surface-level personalization with true relevance, like sending a browse-abandon email after a single page view that was likely a mis-click.
  
• Borrowing tactics without matching data or ops maturity, such as sending “exclusive” emails to one or two-month-old non-purchasers.
  
• Optimizing for past behaviors instead of evolving habits. Like clinging to discount-heavy emails when customers have shifted to value-driven buying.
  
• Benchmarking against myths, not true competitors (peers). For example, chasing “industry average” open rates and over-emailing as a result.

These are often hidden email mistakes that silently erode performance. The strongest brands see best practices as starting points, running email performance audits to test assumptions and craft strategies competitors can’t replicate.

The acquisition-retention imbalance

Nikki’s observation that roughly 98% of her client requests focus on acquisition alone reveals a resource allocation failure with compounding costs. 

Here’s the structural problem: Acquisition has clear channel attribution. You can point to Facebook and say, “This drove 500 new customers.” Retention is multi-touch, diffuse, and harder to defend in budget meetings. As a result, marketing dollars flow while retention gets leftover resources.

However, this creates a leaky bucket dynamic. You’re paying premium CPAs to acquire customers, but then losing 60-70% of them after the first purchase because you’ve under-invested in the post-purchase experience. It doesn’t add up! 

Ditton when neglected win-back email campaigns let half your lapsed customers slip away, doubling acquisition costs just to hold revenue steady.

Strategic framework for rebalancing

Retention may not be flashy, but it is transformative, and therefore a much better e-commerce email marketing strategy. 

Strong email retention strategies boost revenue, margins, and stability while lowering constant acquisition costs. In SaaS and e-commerce alike, retention-first programs often solve deeper email performance issues better than another acquisition push.

Source: Shopify

Nikki’s recommendation to add conditional win-back messaging to existing campaigns is tactically sound. Strategically, it’s also a low-risk pilot that can generate proof points for larger retention investment. In this connection, we suggest checking out our in-depth blog on building effective win-back email programs.

She also recommended building a VIP program where best customers get rewards.

Now, here are a few more ways we suggest you can optimize email flows for a proper balance between acquisition and retention:

• Audit current state: Map your email team’s time allocation. If over 80% goes to welcome flows, cart abandonment, and lead nurture, you have a structural problem.
  
• Establish retention KPIs with equal weight: Most marketing dashboards lead with new customer metrics. Add repeat purchase rate, time-to-second-purchase, and 90-day retention rate to your executive dashboard. What gets measured gets resourced.
  
• Build the business case: Model shifting 30% of acquisition spend to retention. If repeat purchases rise 10 points, what’s the LTV gain? Show your CFO before asking for resources.
  
• The maturity model question: Early-stage, high-growth companies may rightly spend 70–80% on acquisition. By Series B or when profitability matters, shift to 50–50 or 40–60. Know your stage and set expectations.
  
• Align incentives across teams: If acquisition and retention are owned by different leaders, realign OKRs so both functions share accountability for LTV contribution, not just top-of-funnel volume.
  
• Rebalance campaign-to-automation ratio: If most of your team’s effort is tied up in ad-hoc batch campaigns, shift toward automated lifecycle programs. This allows retention marketing scale without proportional headcount increase.
  
• Financial framing of churn: Recast customer churn as a revenue leakage line item in reporting. Leaders tend to act faster when retention is framed as “x million lost revenue per quarter” instead of a soft engagement metric.

These shifts reflect a broader set of email strategy problems: sustainable growth in today’s environment requires more than optimizing funnels and dashboards—it calls for a deeper reorientation of how you think about customer value.

The hidden cost of zero customer research

Nikki shared a case where a client blamed price, but a one-question survey showed customers viewed them as premium, comparing them to higher-end competitors. The messaging strategy was tackling the wrong problem—a mistake we see repeatedly, as teams optimize tactics based on false assumptions, driving avoidable email conversion mistakes. 

For Nikki, customer research is the be-all and end-all in email marketing.

That’s not a hyperbole. Nor is her insistence that copy problems are almost always research problems in disguise. Just like the “average American” is a statistical and conceptual fiction, in the absence of customer research, you risk sending emails to a made-up audience or getting stuck fixing email performance issues that stem from wrong assumptions rather than reality.

How to conduct customer research for more effective copy & relationship-building

The more anonymous the feedback, the more accurate it is. People are generally more truthful when their identity is not revealed. Additionally, people often say one thing but mean another. As a researcher, it is important to read between the lines to uncover what the customer truly intends to communicate.

Asking customers directly is one of the most useful ways to know about them, as Nikki pointed out. 

Here are a few additional tips we recommend for gathering customer insights:

• Start with the next step: Before writing copy, identify the reader’s next action. Research the linked page—its core message, stories, benefits, and offer—so your email serves as a compelling introduction to the full message.
  
• Reddit and Amazon reviews: Use Reddit for candid, anonymous feedback and Amazon reviews to see detailed opinions on products in your niche.
  
• Communities: Join private or public communities where your target audience congregates.
  
• Audience surveys: Survey your email list to gather information from existing customers and subscribers.
  
• Talk to your client/founder: Often, the founder has a deep understanding of the problem because they experienced it themselves.
  
• Act as a customer: Go through the purchasing process with competitors to experience the market firsthand.
  
• Social media: Look at what people are saying about specific topics in your niche on social media platforms.
  
• YouTube comments: Study niche creators’ comment sections, focusing on replies where people share personal stories or explain why content resonates. 
  
• Talk directly to customers: Incentivize customers to have a conversation with you via phone or Zoom to ask them strategic questions. Or you can just ask them directly. Check out the following email from Hard Jewelry, for example.

Source: Inbox

Without research, you risk designing campaigns for a made-up customer and amplifying existing email performance issues. Copy that “sounds right” but doesn’t connect is often the root of why emails aren’t converting.

AI’s role: Augmenting judgment, not replacing it

The AI conversation in marketing has devolved into two camps: enthusiasts who think it solves everything, and skeptics who dismiss it entirely. Both miss the strategic opportunity. Nikki’s insight—that AI excels at research and strategy support but fails at original creative work—points toward the right framework.

The smart move is to treat AI as an amplifier, not a replacement. 

Use tools to speed data analysis, uncover audience insights, and draft ideas—but let humans provide the final judgment, voice, and storytelling, grounded in brand, context, and customer emotion. For tech brands in particular, relying on AI-generated copy can pose risks in a SaaS email marketing strategy.

Common mistakes while using AI for email marketing

The following are some of the most frequent missteps we have seen marketers tend to make when integrating AI into their email programs:

• Delegating strategic judgment to AI instead of using it to sharpen your own.
  
• Treating AI as a creator, not a catalyst for better human ideas.
  
• Letting AI output define brand voice instead of reinforcing what makes you distinct.
  
• Confusing automation speed with strategic advantage.
  
• Relying on AI’s “best practices” instead of testing what drives actual customer decisions.
  
• Using AI to replace insight work instead of accelerating leadership focus on what matters.

Senior marketers who use AI to scale research, speed testing, and sharpen decisions capture real value—while those who let it take the wheel risk diluting their brand.

For help, check out our post on agentic AI tools for email marketing.

How discount dependency self-implodes

Discount dependency builds fast: launch a promo, see a lift, repeat, train customers to wait, erode margins, and need bigger discounts for the same results. 

Eventually you’re a promotional brand competing on price, not value.

Source: The Good

The unit economics of discount-trained customers

A 20% discount isn’t just cutting into your margin—it’s quietly eroding future revenue.

Sure, you lose $10 profit per order upfront, but customers trained on discounts start buying 25–30% less frequently and churn faster. That $10 loss quickly balloons, wiping out 40–45% of their lifetime value. By unconsciously conditioning them to expect sales, the brand becomes valuable to them only on discount, creating a hard-to-reverse pattern.

That’s why strong email retention strategies and non-discount engagement become vital. 

How to get around the discount trap?

Nikki acknowledged that moving away from promotional-focused emails will hurt short-term, but it creates a much healthier business in the long term.

Driving engagement without discounts requires a value-driven strategy: know your audience, focus on what matters, and leverage key advocates. Here’s how to dial back discount reliance as an e-commerce email marketing strategy:

• Align campaigns with true customer urgency: Promotions and flash sales can only simulate urgency. Real engagement comes from aligning campaigns with the customer’s own goals, pain points, and priorities.
  
• Emphasize problem-driven impact: Identify the challenges your audience faces and highlight how your solution or content addresses them. Messaging tied to meaningful outcomes naturally motivates action.
  
• Frame pricing as strategic trade-offs: Never just lower the price. Frame any change as a trade-off—e.g., lower cost means reduced value, like a shorter warranty or different materials—so customers see price and value together.
  
• Upsell to a higher tier: A customer’s price objection may reflect low perceived value, not cost. Offering a higher-tier option with more benefits can shift their focus, making the extra spend feel worthwhile.
  
• Clarify and prioritize decision criteria: Help your clients articulate and prioritize their purchasing criteria beyond price, including ROI, total cost of ownership, and other value-driven factors.
  
• Leverage internal champions strategically: Identify internal advocates, partners, or loyal customers who can amplify your messaging and validate your value proposition.
  
• Apply deep business and financial acumen: Grasping a company’s pricing, CapEx vs. OpEx, and total cost of ownership enables confident, value-focused conversations with goal-oriented stakeholders like CFOs.

Creating a sustainable content calendar

According to Nikki, content calendar issues show up in two extremes: last-minute scrambles and rigid 90-day plans—both fail, but for different reasons.

• Last-minute planning: Sparks constant firefighting, blocks QA, stifles creativity, disrupts team alignment, lowers quality, and burns out staff.
  
• Over-planning: Breeds rigidity; when competitors move, cultural moments arise, or product issues surface, a fixed calendar traps you in outdated messaging.

How to create a content calendar for email campaigns?

Nikki recommends a three-layer content calendar framework: use seasons and holidays as the skeleton, add brand-relevant niche moments, and mine customer reviews for content angles that reflect how your audience talks about their problems and your solutions.

Here are a few additional strategies we recommend that you apply.

Organize your content mix

To avoid overloading subscribers with promotions, structure your email campaigns into clear categories:

• Promotional/Special Offers: Sales and discounts.
  
• Holidays & Events: Black Friday, Christmas, or seasonal campaigns.
  
• Product Launches: Announcements for new releases.
  
• Product Highlights: Spotlights on bestsellers, gift guides, or problem-solution use cases.
  
• Social Proof: Reviews, user-generated content, or press features.
  
• Value-Based: Blogs, how-to guides, or myth-busting content.
  
• Company Updates: Brand news, founder stories, or unique selling points.

The above matrix is particularly useful for the technology industry. You can add it to a SaaS email marketing strategy framework as well.

Balance discounts

Protect your brand value by limiting discount-heavy emails. Aim for at least 5 non-discount emails for every discount, with 10:1 being ideal.

Set the right frequency

Cadence isn’t one-size-fits-all. You need to optimize email flows for your revenue level and segment behavior:

• Under $50K/month → 2–3 campaigns per week
  
• $50K–$200K/month → 3–4 campaigns per week
  
• $200K+/month → 4–5 campaigns per week

Always monitor open and unsubscribe rates. High engagement and low churn mean you can increase frequency.

Plan around key events

• Start with major holidays and company milestones (e.g., launches).
  
• Layer in value-based content to add relevance.
  
• Fill remaining slots with highlights, social proof, and updates to keep variety.

Segment for impact

• Tailor your campaigns for different groups so each message feels personal and effective. Exclude recent purchasers from promotional campaigns to prevent buyer’s remorse.
  
• Use a combination of design-based emails and plain-text emails, as the latter can have higher deliverability and are more likely to land in the primary inbox.

Stay organized

Use tools like Notion, Asana, Trello, or Google Calendar to map campaigns. The best tool is the one you’ll use consistently.

Omnichannel without cannibalization

Most brands often fail at cross-channel marketing. They either annoy customers by blasting the same message everywhere or completely silo their channels, missing out on crucial synergy.  

One of the most relatable instances of this is pricing discrepancies across channels. As a result, while 90% of consumers expect a seamless experience, only 29% of businesses deliver one.

Source: Wiser

To overcome this, Nikki recommends a three-point strategy:

1. Grasp the difference between “push” and “pull” platforms.
   
2. Make zero-party data a priority.
   
3. Use strategic repetition that is properly timed and modified for each channel.

Along with these, we recommend these additional omnichannel strategies.

Strategic insights into omnichannel marketing

• Monitor and forecast channel atrophy—when once-effective channels lose impact from saturation, tech shifts, or changing preferences—and plan to revitalize, retire, or invest in emerging channels.
  
• Include scenario-driven contingency plans for omnichannel disruptions (e.g., regulatory changes, tech outages, geopolitical shifts). This includes tactical pivots in channel reliance, messaging tone, and data strategy to adapt rapidly.
  
• Explore how certain behaviors in one channel influence responsiveness in others (behavioral reciprocity). For example, a positive response to an email might predispose higher engagement on SMS or push notifications, but an ignored message in one channel could predict lower response elsewhere. (For a comprehensive guide, read our post on the cross-channel marketing wedge.)
  
• Innovative omnichannel attribution that captures multi-touch, time-decayed, and engagement-weighted contributions across email, social, offline, and emerging channels uncovers hidden revenue drivers.
  
• Architect “reverse omnichannel” flows—systems that fluidly respond when customers choose to switch channels or interrupt journeys unexpectedly (e.g., replying to an email with a phone call).

Wrapping up: From tactics to strategy

Ultimately, Nikki’s insights push us to see email not as a broadcast channel but as a research-driven, retention-focused revenue engine. 

The way forward calls on senior marketers to make three key commitments:

1. Prioritize retention with the same rigor as acquisition—measure it, resource it, and celebrate it.
   
2. Make customer research non-negotiable, embedding it into quarterly planning, monthly optimization, and weekly content creation.
   
3. Question every “best practice.” Understand the principle behind it, then validate it against your audience using your own data.

If you haven’t watched the full conversation with Nikki yet, catch it here. 

At Mavlers, we partner with email marketing leaders to move from best-practice guesswork to research-backed strategies that measurably drive retention and revenue. If you’re ready to transform email from a promotional channel to a strategic revenue engine, connect with us for a 30-min no-obligation call!