# Send Loyal Buyers and Lapsed Subscribers Different Black Friday Emails Canonical page: https://sunlocke.com/articles/black-friday-email-segmentation Page type: article ## Summary This plan splits a small business email list into four groups for Black Friday and Cyber Monday. It sets the offer, timing, and number of emails for each group, and names the subscribers who should get none. The same discount means something different to a loyal customer, a subscriber who clicks but has never bought, and someone who bought once three years ago. Each should get a different email. One Black Friday email to the whole list treats a recent buyer and a subscriber who stopped clicking months ago the same. Grouping subscribers by what they have bought and clicked gives each group its own timing and offer. ## Article details The same discount means something different to a loyal customer, a subscriber who clicks but has never bought, and someone who bought once three years ago. Each should get a different email. ## Main point One Black Friday email to the whole list treats a recent buyer and a subscriber who stopped clicking months ago the same. Grouping subscribers by what they have bought and clicked gives each group its own timing and offer. Author: Chris Martinez Section: Strategy Post type: Playbook Story format: standard ## Article content Four groups and one exclusion cover most Black Friday lists. Recent and repeat buyers get early access and the most messages. Engaged subscribers who have not bought get the main offer and a reason to trust you. Lapsed customers get one or two messages that remind them why they bought. New subscribers get a welcome first and the sale second. Everyone who has stopped clicking and buying gets nothing during the sale. Build and test the segments in the first half of November. This plan covers one weekend; for splitting a list the rest of the year, start with the [email segmentation guide](/articles/email-list-segmentation). ## Build segments from behavior you can verify Opens are a poor signal for building segments. When an Apple Mail user turns on Mail Privacy Protection, the app loads message content in the background, so an open can register without a reader. Build the Black Friday segments the way [the list cleaning guide](/articles/clean-email-list-before-black-friday) defines engagement, from records that require a real action: * Orders, bookings, paid invoices, and gift card purchases, with dates. * Clicks in email, with dates. * Signup date and the form or offer that brought the person in. Most store platforms and email platforms hold the first two. Service businesses often keep purchase history in a booking or invoicing tool that is not connected to the email platform. Exporting a list of customers with their last visit date and importing it as a field is usually enough for one weekend, and it is worth doing in the first days of November. Connecting the systems properly can wait until January. Segment the cleaned list, not the whole database; the people who should get no holiday promotions come out first. ## The four Black Friday email segments ### Recent and repeat buyers These are customers who bought in the last year, or who have bought more than once. They already know and trust the business, which makes them less likely than other subscribers to report a holiday email as spam. Give them early access. In the week before Thanksgiving, send a message that opens the offer to them first. Early access rewards loyalty without requiring a deeper discount, and for a store with limited stock it lets the best customers buy before sizes or colors sell out. Recent buyers can also tolerate the most frequency over the weekend, but once someone in this group buys during the sale, remove them from the remaining promotional reminders. Two more emails urging a purchase they already made give a good customer a reason to unsubscribe. ### Engaged subscribers who have not bought These people click but have not purchased. The main Black Friday offer goes to this group on the public start date, with the reasons a first purchase is safe: reviews, guarantees, return or rescheduling terms, and clear delivery or booking dates. Frequency should be moderate. A reasonable pattern is a launch message, a reminder sent only to people who clicked the launch but did not buy, and a last chance message before the offer ends. A store with an abandoned cart flow should check that it still runs during the sale; the [abandoned cart email guide](/articles/abandoned-cart-emails) sets out how many reminders make sense. ### Lapsed customers These customers bought once but not for a long time, beyond your normal buying cycle. Some have forgotten the business, which makes them riskier to email than recent buyers, though a past purchase still makes them more valuable than a stranger. Send them fewer messages, and start earlier: one during the early access window that reminds them what they bought and what is new. Those who click it get one more on Black Friday; those who do not are left out of every later send. A lapsed customer who comes back during the sale moves into the recent buyer segment for future messages. ### New subscribers People who signed up in the weeks before Black Friday often joined for the sale itself, sometimes through a popup offering a discount. Their first emails set expectations for the relationship, so a welcome message that explains who the business is should arrive before a run of promotions. Check how the welcome series and the Black Friday campaign interact. A person who signs up on November 25 should not receive three welcome emails and four Black Friday emails in the same five days. Shorten or pause the welcome series during the sale, and make sure any signup discount does not stack with the Black Friday offer unless that is intended. ## Early access without spoiling the main offer Early access works only if it feels exclusive and the public offer still feels worth announcing. Three rules keep the segments from undermining each other: * Use a separate link or code for early access, so a forwarded email does not open the sale to everyone early. * State when early access ends and when the public sale begins. * Keep the core offer the same for all segments, and vary access, timing, and extras instead. Giving lapsed customers a deeper discount than loyal ones rewards the customers who stayed away. Google asks senders to keep promotional content separate from transactional messages and to use a consistent From address for each category, so early access belongs in a promotional email, not tucked into a receipt. A service business selling gift cards or prepaid packages can use the same groups, offering packages to recent clients and gift cards to past clients who buy for someone else, and can design those offers with [Black Friday promotions for service businesses](/articles/black-friday-for-service-businesses). ## Frequency per segment through the weekend One hypothetical schedule for a small store, from early access through Cyber Monday: * **Friday, November 20.** Early access to recent and repeat buyers and one message to lapsed customers. * **Black Friday.** Public launch to recent buyers who did not buy during early access, engaged non buyers, new subscribers who have finished or skipped the welcome series, and lapsed customers who clicked the early access message. * **Saturday or Sunday.** One reminder only to recent buyers, engaged non buyers, and new subscribers who clicked earlier messages and have not bought. Lapsed customers do not get it. * **Cyber Monday.** Last chance to engaged non buyers and recent buyers who did not buy during early access, with the end time stated. No one on that schedule receives more than four promotional emails from early access through Cyber Monday, and most receive fewer. Yahoo asks senders to honor the frequency a list promised when people signed up, so a business that normally emails monthly should stay at the low end. Text messages follow different rules and are planned separately, in [how many Black Friday texts to send](/articles/black-friday-sms-frequency). Before sending to the larger segments, confirm the domain has been sending steadily in the weeks before. A list that has received little mail since summer needs the steps in [warming up the email list before Black Friday](/articles/email-warm-up-before-black-friday). ## Measure each segment separately Total revenue for the weekend hides what each group did. After Cyber Monday, compare the segments on revenue or bookings per recipient, unsubscribes, and spam complaints. Recent buyers will probably lead on revenue. The useful finding is whether lapsed customers or new subscribers earned their place, or produced complaints out of proportion to their sales. Use that comparison to set next year's early access list. Source: Google: Email sender guidelines Google's published guidelines for anyone sending email to Gmail accounts. They tell senders to mail only people who opted in, keep promotions out of transactional messages such as receipts, use the same From address for each category of message, and avoid sudden volume spikes. Reference: https://support.google.com/a/answer/81126 Source: Yahoo Sender Hub: Sender best practices Yahoo's best practices for email senders. They ask senders to honor the sending frequency a list promised and warn that mailing people who are not reading hurts delivery and reputation. Reference: https://senders.yahooinc.com/best-practices/ Source: Apple Support: Mail on Mac, protect email privacy Apple's guide to the Protect Mail Activity setting in Mail on Mac. It says remote content is downloaded privately in the background when a message arrives, which is why an open no longer proves someone read the email. Reference: https://support.apple.com/guide/mail/mlhlp1205/mac ## Related services * [Email & SMS Marketing](/email-sms): Follow-up that runs while you work