Seven Email Design Examples from the Travel & Leisure Industry that Engage Subscribers

4 minute read

Upland Admin

With 83 percent of Travel & Leisure companies rating email ROI as ‘excellent’ or ‘good’ (2016 Email Industry Census – Key Sector report), we thought it would be good to share some of the best examples of email campaigns we’ve seen in the industry.

Without further ado…

Romantic getaway for Valentine’s Day – Stoke Park

Valentine’s Day is a popular occasion for a short city break and what better way to promote your offering than using animation? In this example from Stoke Park, they used multiple animated images showcasing the romantic atmosphere, a simple and short email and mobile-optimized calls-to-action to persuade subscribers to book.

The results? A 14 percent click-to-open rate which translates to a 213 percent increase in room revenue. Vive l’amour! 

Got everything you need? – Reservation Desk

You’ve packed your bags, found your passport, checked-in to your flight, all you’re missing is the hotel information. Wouldn’t it be great if you received a reminder email with everything you needed including hotel name, address, check-in and check-out times? You can with Reservation Desk and Reservation Counter.

Winning our Campaign of the Month in November 2016, this hyper-personalized email not only delivered great customer experience but helped the company up-sell additional days for the same bookings.

Booking from any device – Air Charter Service

With a complex set of options targeted at a multi-lingual audience, Air Charter Service needed their cargo availability email to quickly help subscribers find what they’re after and make a reservation. Using the look and feel of a departures board to show what is essentially a table of data, and adding a cutting-edge solution that works on the ‘hover’ state of a link on mobile by using touch, Air Charter Service gets on the list for top customer experience!

Pass the parcel – Cafe Rouge

Cafe Rouge is a chain of restaurants in the UK and it earns a mention on our list for excellent mobile experiences. This hospitality example starts with a compelling subject line ‘Café Rouge passed you the parcel…’ (for those who don’t know, ‘pass the parcel’ is a popular children’s game also known at ‘hot potato’). Upon opening the email, an animated GIF shows a curtain drawing to reveal potential prizes all tied with a gold ribbon with the call-to-action ‘Play to win’.

Upon clicking the viewer is subject to a great mobile experience where they have to ‘swipe to unwrap’ (as opposed to ‘click to unwrap’ on a desktop). And that’s how I earned myself a two for one breakfast in the name of email research!

Encouraging day dreaming with dynamic content – Virgin Holidays

This example was shared by one of our partners, Movable Ink in one of the Inkredible 5 lookbooks. In an effort to get consumers thinking about their holiday, Virgin Holidays let the difference in weather forecasts do the persuasion. By using dynamic content, they were able to compare the weather in cold, rainy London with that of hot, sunny Orlando. This attracted great email engagement and social feedback.

The inverted pyramid structure in email – Travelocity

In this example shared by Email Design Workshop, Travelocity use the top part of the email to present the subscriber with a problem they can identify with – ‘Love finding top travel deals, but hate the hunt?’.

Then they built anticipation with the benefits offered by Travelocity, the travel areas they specialize in and the three simple steps needed to start taking advantage of their services. Finally, the call-to-action ‘Get Started’ contrasts with the rest of the email to drive sign-ups. Short and simple!

Personalization and animation all-in-one – Princess Cruises

Similar to the Air Charter Service email above, Princess Cruises also used a departure board to present their special offer of free flights with a cruise booking. To stand out in the inbox, they used animation which would flick the letters on the board to reveal the offer and first name personalization with the recipient’s name.

What examples of great email design in the Travel & Leisure industry have made you think twice?

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