5 Unique Ways to Use Animated GIFs in Email

An add-on fun, interactive nature and the capability of enticing more readers taking them to the most awaited ‘Clicks’! This is the reason email marketers love animated GIFs.

With the shift in email marketing trends where content has become more than text, animation proves to be more engaging when infused in an email the right way. It’s everywhere and still appeals with a sense of something unique – a bit of extra.

So what is a GIF?

In simplest terms, GIF or Graphics Interchange Format is an image file format of a sequence of various animated images or frames into a single file.

Source: Giphy

If you are a marketer thinking of pushing the boundaries of your email marketing strategy with GIFs, here I have summed up 5 creative and practical ways of doing it right:

1. GIF aligned with the story:

GIFs are a fantastic short-way of storytelling and readers are more likely to get allured by a GIF than a plain text or an image. Second, the story being conveyed with attractive movements tends to remain for a long time in the memory of the viewer.

So, make sure that the GIF you are adding into your email speaks of a story about your products or services. As you have just a few seconds to convey the story, focus more on content and storytelling techniques. This is how your GIF can serve the purpose of your email.

Here’s one brilliant example of steeping your services or solutions in a single GIF:

Source: obsessedcreativeagency

2. B2B ‘Event inviting’ with GIF:

Event invitation emails are a great opportunity to introduce your brand to your audience and to turn them as your future attendees. Knowing the relevance of invite emails, B2B marketers keep it indispensable to their email marketing strategies.

Again, GIFs bring something extra to the ordinary. A few seconds of GIF provides exclusivity to the event leading to a quick positive response.

Have a look at SiGMA’s event invite GIF that displays the entire event:

Source: eegaming

3. GIFs in welcome emails:

A genuine welcome email in response to the subscription of your newsletter can show-up as an important step in winning your customers. However, as many brands are up on the strategy, customers find a welcome email quite ‘used-to’, and thus the whole purpose of the email remains untouched at the very first move.

GIFs, when inserted in a welcome email, bring a quirky fun to the beginning of the user-buyer relationship.

The below allbirds’ GIF in welcome email illustrates it perfectly.

Source: SEMrush

4. CTA asks for seriousness, seriously:

And that is actually meant! The whole purpose of an email marketing campaign is to take your readers to the call-to-action button. A well-structured GIF with a clear CTA can do it nicely.

Thus, craft a story on and around the product or services and imbibe a short and specific CTA button in the GIF. Let it be the part of the communication flow and give the receivers a strong reason to click on that.

Source: Giphy

5. Let the GIF go with the ‘season’:

As an email marketer or business personnel, it’s as essential to keeping your marketing campaigns seasonal as to learn and incorporate the advancing technologies of the digital world.

So, give your GIFs a seasonal touch. Know your targeted customers, their surroundings, and their festive seasons and add it in your emails; such as during fall, just add some leaves dropping down in an animated GIF and this extra element will insist your target prospects to know more about your brand. Similar traits can be added to the promotional emails of other seasons or festivals.

Source: Blue Mail Media

Wrap up:

GIFs are everywhere, easy to use and undeniably helpful in increasing customer engagement leading to maximum conversions. As almost every brand is implementing GIF in their email marketing strategies, an out-of-the-box creative level is a must to possess.

Instead of piling your emails with GIFs, do some homework on your targeted prospects and then solicit with the above ideas.

Let us know how these worked for you, and if you have some more ideas, we would love to learn from you!