Email Tear Down: Red Dress Boutique

Last week I walked into a shoe store and became an annoying customer. I monopolized the salesperson’s time, and no, it wasn’t on purpose. There were 15 different styles of the same shoe — I.Kid.You.Not. I was overwhelmed…do I go with my tried and true neutral or do I try one of these other tantalizing prints or colors?

Apparently, my experience isn’t uncommon.

For years, psychologists have studied the effect of having many choices. According to a New York Times article, “the presence of choice might be appealing as a theory, but in reality, people might find more and more choice to actually be debilitating.”To learn how a top brand handles the overwhelming bounty of choice, I decided to explore the email strategy of one of my new favorite fashion brands — Red Dress Boutique.

Why Red Dress Boutique?

Started as a small brick-and-mortar clothing store in Athens, GA, Red Dress Boutique has a devoted fashion influencer following and a vibrant Instagram presence. The founders, husband-and-wife team Diana and Josh Harbour have an eye for playful, and trendy clothing that has brought them an appearance on Shark Tank and a company that’s rapidly growing beyond $15M in revenue.

What I Did vs. What They Did

What I did

To find out if this company was doing everything that they could to provide the most relevant and engaging emails, I did just a little bit of detective work, including subscribing to their newsletters, abandoning a shopping cart full of goods, and buying a super cute pair of earrings.

Here’s what I purchased

Red Dress Boutique’s Nothing Like It Black Tortoise Hoop Acrylic Earrings were the perfect accessory for date night with my husband.

What they did

I received a very informative welcome series email, promotions, trend updates, back in stock notifications, and new product announcements.

See the complete teardown

Why Red Dress Boutique?

The average office worker gets 121 emails a day, and that’s just on their work account. In a world where everything moves quickly and attention spans are short, it can be difficult to capture someone’s attention. As a marketer, you try to get your emails to stand out from the crowded inbox. The core ingredients to successfully do that — right audience, right content, right time, should also now include right design. A minimal and personable email design can create high converting emails. Klaviyo makes it very easy to create these emails and have successful email marketing via our powerful features and in-house help experts.

Red Dress Boutique is an online women’s fashion store with a strong fashion influencer following and a huge Instagram presence. I wanted to see if their email marketing strategy would be as vibrant as their products and if there’s anything that they could be doing better. To find out, I signed up for emails with Red Dress Boutique, took a few actions, and watched to see how the experience unfolded.

The backstory of Red Dress Boutique

Red Dress Boutique, a trendy women’s clothing store, started as a small brick-and-mortar clothing store in Athens, GA. Husband-and-wife founders Diana and Josh Harbour quickly added an ecommerce store, and after an appearance on Shark Tank have found themselves at the helm of a $15M and growing company. On creating the concept, Diana says, “ I also wanted to create this place that would bring color and confidence and happiness to a woman’s day.” Their brand is heavily recognized and applauded by fashion influencers and bloggers everywhere.