From zero to 116k/mo in 6 months with email marketing

Think email marketing is gone in 2025? Not even close. It’s still the best-performing marketing channel, delivering an average ROI of $42 for every $1 spent.

And here’s the proof: David Wardenga from WeMailYourBrand scaled a brand from $0 to $116,000/month in just 6 months using email marketing.

In this article, we break down exactly how he did it and, more importantly, how you can replicate the same.

You’ll discover the tactics, timing, tools, and strategies he used to go from zero to 116k/mo in 6 months with email marketing.

So, you can skip the guesswork and start implementing what works.

The Backstory: Losing Revenue With a Cold List

In January 2023, WeMailYourBrand partnered with a Shopify-based food & beverage brand that had strong repeat purchase potential. They were already making $376k/month without sending a single email.

By June, revenue hit $612k, with $116k directly from email marketing.

• The advantage: A huge email list of 125k contacts from past purchases.
• The challenge: The list had never been actively engaged, segmented, or nurtured. Deliverability was at risk, customer relationships were cold, and there was no existing email infrastructure. No templates, email automations, or content plan.

10 Email Marketing Steps That Drove $116K/Month

They implemented a data-driven strategy that consistently works for any e-commerce business focusing on email marketing.

Here are the 10 steps that increased sales to $116k/mo

• Competitor Analysis
• Email List and Segmentation
• On-brand Email Templates
• Setting Up High-Impact Email Automations
• Scheduled Email Campaigns
• A/B Testing
• Installing Integrations
• Actively Ask For Feedback
• Use Data to Re-engage Inactive Customers
• Track and Adjust Based on Your Results

Related Reading: 19 Effective Email Marketing Strategies for 2025

1. Competitor Analysis

Analyzing the current market is indispensable to e-commerce marketing. They did it with 3 main tools. The backbone of their email marketing strategy is data.

They’ve analyzed the competitor’s strategies and the integrations and plugins used by their competitors.

• What competitors were doing well
• Which integrations and plugins they relied on
• How their design and messaging connected with customers

Tools used for competitor analysis:

• BuiltWith – To uncover the tech stack of competitor stores, including email tools, review platforms, loyalty programs, and other integrations that might be worth testing.
• Facebook Ads Library – To study competitor ad creatives, offers, and messaging angles.
• Figma – To compile the insights into a visual mood board, helping align email design with broader brand aesthetics.

2. Email List and Segmentation

One of the most common mistakes in email marketing that can destroy deliverability is sending campaigns to the entire email list.

In this case, the brand had been doing exactly that. As a result, open rates and click rates had steadily declined, and many emails were landing in spam folders.

They resolved it by creating engaged segments, ensuring campaigns only went to subscribers who had opened or clicked an email within a defined period.

Takeaway: A smaller, engaged list will consistently outperform a massive, unengaged one.

Tool: Retainful

• Offers segmentation templates, static lists, and dynamic segments that auto-update based on the provided conditions.
• You can segment your mail list based on various criteria like demographics, location, language, and even behavioral segmentation.

3. On-Brand Email Templates

Every email template needed to reflect the brand’s identity. The email design had to match the overall look and feel of all the brand touchpoints.

While there are many nuances to great email design, the key principles applied here included:

• Visible and clear CTAs that encourage clicks
• Appealing above-the-fold content to capture attention instantly
• Short, compelling subject lines that drive opens
• Careful use of dynamic content such as first names, dates, personalized codes, and variable images.

Resources used for finding email design inspiration: Milled and ReallyGoodEmails.

4. Setting Up High-Impact Email Automations

Email automation is one of the most overlooked opportunities in e-commerce marketing.

For this project, the team implemented a full automation suite, including:

• Welcome email sequence
• Abandoned cart recovery
• Thank You Email Series
• Win Back Emails
• Birthday, Anniversary, and special discount emails
• Back in Stock Email Sequence
• Product Review Request Emails
• Cross-sell / Re-sell / Upsell Promotion Emails
• Transactional Updates

The Welcome Series consistently ranks among the top three best-performing automations

5. Scheduled Email Campaigns

Next to automations, email campaigns present one of the biggest revenue opportunities in any email account. When account health is stable, automations and campaigns typically contribute equally to attributed revenue.

For this brand, the agency implemented a consistent campaign schedule of three emails per week:

• One tailored to investors
• General customers Email
• VIP customers Email

Takeaway: VIP campaigns consistently outperformed the others. Segmenting and tagging high-value customers enables both marketing and customer support teams to prioritize them effectively.

Campaign Strategy: Blend of brand updates, subtle discounts, and an exclusive email newsletter for VIPs.

Related Reading: What is Behavioral Targeting (Examples + How to do)

6. A/B Testing

Finding what kind of content, email cadence, offers, and email designs work best for your customers is crucial. To do this, you’ll need to closely monitor your key email marketing metrics.

Here are the email elements you need to split test :

• Subject Lines & Preview texts – KPI: Open Rate
• Template Designs – KPI: Click Rate
• Offer – KPI: Placed Order Rate
• Segmentation Relevancy – KPI: Unsubscribe & Marked as Spam Rate
• Automation Timing – Overall Performance
• Automation Email Count – Overall Performance
• Send time – Overall Performance
• Capture Design – KPI: Signup rate

Related Reading: Why are my emails going to spam? ( 11 Reasons + How to fix)

7. Installing Integrations

The agency ensured that the email automations are in sync with the existing systems. They’ve integrated a Loyalty and engagement platform and ticketing systems with the email marketing platform.

Tools they used: LoyaltyLion and Zendesk

For a more affordable tool stack for e-commerce, you can opt for WP Loyalty and Retainful. Retainful has various sets of integrations, like Zapier, and even CRM solutions like HubSpot.

8. Actively Ask For Feedback

Customers want to feel heard. When you actively seek and implement their feedback, you build trust and increase loyalty.

How to Gather & Act on Feedback Effectively

• Use Multiple Feedback Channels:
  • Post-purchase surveys: Sent 7–14 days after delivery.
  • On-site widgets: A floating button for real-time input.
  • Social polls/comments: Engage followers casually.
• Focus on quick surveys or one open-ended question. Prioritize ease and mobile-friendliness to answer questions.
• Publicly share improvements: Announce changes via email, blog, or social posts.
• Follow up individually: If someone shares in-depth feedback, let them know how you used it. That personal touch can earn a loyal customer. You can even offer an incentive to them.

9. Use Data to Re-engage Inactive Customers

Some customers will inevitably stop purchasing from your business. However, an inactive customer is not a lost cause. Create targeted campaigns to engage them.

How to create an effective win-back email series:

• Segment Your Audience: Identify the customers who have not engaged or purchased for 60–90 days. Segment your customers based on the purchase date, order value, and product categories.
• Send personalized emails: Based on the segments, create a re-engagement email series with personalized messages and discounts.
• Create a multi-step funnel: Instead of just a single message, send 2-3 emails with SMS messages.
  • Email 1: Light reminder (Day 1)
  • Email 2: Stronger offer (Day 7)
  • Email 3: Final chance with urgency (Day 10–14)
• Monitor your key email metrics to optimize your campaigns.

10. Track and Adjust Based on Your Results

Customer retention isn’t something you do once and forget. It’s an ongoing process of keeping an eye on what’s working, what isn’t, and improving along the way.

Focus on key metrics like:

• Repeat Customer Rate (RCR): Repeat customers refer to how many of customers who come back to buy again.
• Customer Lifetime Value (CLV): how much revenue a customer generates over time.
• Net Promoter Score (NPS): how likely customers are to recommend you.
• Customer Churn Rate: how many customers stop buying from you.

Wrapping Up!!

The journey from a cold list generating zero revenue to a high-impact channel driving over $116,000 per month is not a matter of luck. It’s the result of an in-depth understanding of their customers.

They’ve implemented a segmentation strategy based on engagement. This way, they can handle different stages of the customer journey effectively. Moreover, dynamic content is used to hyperpersonalize every interaction.

The success of this case study proves that email marketing is far from dead. If used in the right way, email marketing is the most cost-effective marketing and communication channel.

Also Read:

• 10 Best Email Marketing Software Comparison and Review
• How to make money with Email Marketing (10 Proven Ways)
• How Much Does Email Marketing Cost in 2025?

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