10 Back in Stock Email Best Practices to Drive Sales ( with Examples)

Writing back in stock emails is an essential step in a restock campaign. Its goal is to not just notify the comeback of out-of-stock items. Creating a series of effective emails for this campaign brings valuable opportunities to re-engage customers and transform their interests into successful conversions. You can even take advantage of these emails to introduce more products to customers.

Today, we’ll show you how to design back in stock emails that get people to open and purchase. Please keep reading to explore back in stock email best practices, examples, and tips.

Why Are Back in Stock Emails Important?

Quite a few customers said that product stockouts left them with a negative shopping experience. If you do nothing to retain customers, they’ll leave your store, and may never return because of the disappointment they experienced. Recognizing customer dissatisfaction, many store owners implement back in stock campaigns to deploy stock-outs as a means to build customer loyalty.

Statistics from Brarilliance have shown that the highest open rate gained from back in stock emails is around 65%. Meanwhile, according to Eaglemoss, the conversion rate of a back-in-stock email campaign can achieve up to 12%.

To understand more about how back in stock email campaigns benefit you, please read this article.

In case stockouts occur in your store, what will you do then? A restock campaign is a solution worth considering. This is a step-by-step guide on how to set up back in stock notifications. In this article, we only focus on the top elements that help create the best back in stock emails.

10 Back in Stock Notification Email Best Practices

Nowadays, email marketing is fully utilized to promote products and services in every field. Therefore, to persuade customers to take action, you need to make your email concise and compelling as well. Now we’ll let you see which elements will contribute to creating a successful email campaign.

Practice 1: Crafting Compelling Subject Lines

Every morning, when the mail is opened, our inbox may contain dozens of unread emails. As usual, people tend to prioritize checking work emails first and don’t want to spend much time reading sales emails. For this reason, it is important to create a captivating subject line that stimulates people to open these emails. There are three key elements you cannot miss in the subject line, including:

• Back in stock product name
• Creative ways to express its status in stock. Some popular words include back in stock, come back, available again.
• A sense of urgency, like “Be quick!”, “Hurry!”, “Last chance to buy…”

According to Invesp studies, 69% of people mark emails as spam when seeing subject lines. It is necessary to bring positivity and satisfaction to customers, but don’t overstep the boundary of what should be included in a subject line. In other words, while you are encouraged to use persuasive and powerful words to capture customers’ attention, it’s prudent to avoid spammy words that might make exaggerated or unrealistic statements and promises. Try checking your subject line using an email subject tester tool before sending the email.

Examples

• Your Wait Is Over: [Product Name] is Back in Stock!
• Get It Before It’s Gone Again: [Product Name] is Back!
• Hurry! [Product Name] Is Back and Ready to Ship
• Our Bestseller is Back: [Product Name] is in Stock Now
• Back by Popular Demand: [Product Name] is Available Again
• You Asked, We Delivered: [Product Name] is Back!
• Rejoice! [Product Name] is Back and Better Than Ever!
• Guess Who’s Back? [Product Name] Just Restocked!
• Back in Stock with a Bang: [Product Name] + 15% Discount!
• Missed Out Before? [Product Name] is Back with a special 20% Off!

Practice 2: Keep content simple and to the point

After being successful in increasing open rates with a compelling subject line, you need to keep customers reading your email. This is a decisive step to lead them back to your store. Integrating CPQ solutions can streamline the purchasing process, ensuring customers can easily transition from interest to action when their desired products are back in stock.

When opening sales emails, people usually quickly grab which message the email sends to them. Even, compared to other types of sales emails, back in stock ones should be shorter. It’s because the product is not strange to customers. Previously, they found and intended to buy it in your store. Therefore, don’t waste your time writing lengthy product descriptions or listing a range of features.

Instead, you should focus on carrying out the main task of a back in stock notification email. It should cover the following points:

• Letting people know the availability of out-of-stock items
• Providing a CTA button linking to the product page
• Other elements can be product reviews, a special offer, or an introduction to related products

The whole text should not exceed 5 sentences while every sentence should be clear, straight, and stimulating. Besides, you use a single image to show the restocked product. Use some of the best email templates to help you achieve all of the above-mentioned so that you save time and energy and achieve maximum results at the same time.

Examples

Right now, we’ll show you two back in stock email samples that work so effectively. With an HTML email builder, these types of emails can be easily created, combining efficiency with visually appealing designs. Such tools simplify the process, enabling the crafting of responsive emails that effectively communicate restocked items to customers, without needing in-depth coding knowledge.

Please look at the email by Everlane first.

Everlane’s email is a typical example that follows Practice 2. It is a simple design with a product image, brand name, short sentences, and a call-to-action button. It emphasizes the restocked product as a bestseller and urges customers to “get it before it sells out again.”

The second example is the email by Chefwear.

In this email, to highlight the return of the restocked product, the “Back In Stock” status is sized so big compared to other parts.

Below is the line “Limited Time Only” which is aimed at creating a sense of urgency and encouraging customers to act quickly.

Next, the two sides of the product image are the two bold words showing the most outstanding features of the shirt, “functional” and “casual”.

Although the description has only one sentence with some words like “relaxed”, “thoughtful”, and “fashion-conscious”, it is descriptive enough to highlight the product.

Like the first example, the email offers a “Shop now” button to take customers to their shop.

The last example is the simplest back in stock email.

There are only two short sentences in this email. The first sentence is to notify customers of the product availability while the second one shows urgency.

Different from the two examples above, this email lets customers see the price and insert the “Add to Cart” button right here. Then, people can buy the item without navigating to the shop.

Practice 3: Personalization and Segmentation

Personalized emails are encouraged to be used not only for back in stock emails but also any sales emails. Calling customers by their name creates an immediate sense of connection and shows that you value them as an individual. Recipients will feel personalized content is more relevant to them, increasing the likelihood of reading and engaging with the email.

Customer segmentation is always an essential task for email marketing strategies. Before sending back-in-stock emails, you should collect customer data to divide customers into different groups. When you send emails to the right people, there will be a higher chance to re-engage customers.

To make this process run smoothly, you should use a back in stock notification tool like Callback. This add-on helps set an email subscription form on out-of-stock product pages. This form is for those who want to wait for out-of-stock products to come back. This smart add-on will automatically save data and send customers an email once the products are restocked. You’ll set up the emails right in the add-on. Additionally, when implementing eCommerce email marketing best practices, it’s essential to consider email authentication strategies to enhance deliverability and security.

Practice 4: Focus on a single product

Every online store has inventory with many different restocked items, but you cannot bring all to a back in stock email. It is recommended to show only one product for each email. Do you wonder why that is?

The less-is-better effect can be applied in this case. As mentioned in Practice 2, a back in stock email should be simple, short, yet impressive. So how can you add several items while keeping the content as the standard set? It is impossible. It is better to spend space highlighting the best things about a single product.

Not to mention, giving many options will make customers confused. When falling into that state, they may buy nothing or even generate unsubscriptions. Therefore, don’t be too greedy. Presenting different products per restocked email does more harm than good. It would help if you only focus on the product customers want to buy before that. At best, you should insert an additional link to other items or show their images at the end of the email.

Examples

You can refer to the email sample created by Uniqlo. It’s short and compelling with little text.

The email notifies the return of a sweat pullover long-sleeve hoodie with an attention-grabbing phrase, a product image and name, and a limited stock alert. The hoodie is the only item the email wants customers to consider buying. Below the main section are two images as links that lead customers to the main shop, not any other specific restocked products.

Practice 5: Clear and Enticing Product Presentation

As mentioned in Practice 2, a product presentation should be less than 5 sentences. So how can you create a presentation that is brief, yet enticing?

You need to select the words that most precisely convey your ideas. Use some concise words to highlight your product’s features. Also, emphasize why the restocked items are loved by people. Many items such as shoes, shirts, and trousers come in different sizes and colors, some of which are sold out more quickly than others. Then, please let customers know their status.

Examples

We want to introduce you to a back in stock email by Frank And Oak.

Below the product image is a bold phrase expressing the connection between the business and customers, “Your wish, our command”. Frank and Oaak’s product presentation has only 2-3 lines, but it clearly shows outstanding features and functions of the product, such as “made from organic cotton” and “for summer’s sake”. A discount program is also disclosed in this comeback.

Practice 6: Urgency and Scarcity Messaging

It is also often known as FOMO in marketing campaigns. It is especially suitable for back in stock emails. Let me explain the reasons.

Those listed to be sent back in stock emails previously missed the opportunity to own the product because of out-of-stock status. That means they were already interested in your product, but the item didn’t belong to them. This event more or less creates a fear of missing out (FOMO) when customers see the item again. And you should take advantage of this point to influence their psychology. Apart from notifying customers of product availability, you emphasize that it is a “hot” item that will be sold out faster than other ones and urge them to hurry up to avoid missing out again.

You can add FOMO elements anywhere in your email. It can be placed on the subject line, product description, or call-to-action button.

Examples

• The urgency message “This Will Sell Out” is placed right on the call-to-action button.

• “Grab … before it’s gone” alerts that the item will be out of stock again for a short time, then customers should get it as soon as possible.

• “Hurry, availability is guaranteed only when checkout is complete” claims that the product availability is limited.

Practice 7: Call to Action (CTA) that Drives Action

Call to action (CTA) is a must in almost all sales emails – and the same goes for back in stock emails. It is often placed somewhere below the product presentation. Its task is to redirect customers to the product page. “Shop now” is a simple, popular text for the CTA button. But you can use other phrases that move customers to action.

Examples:

Apart from ‘Shop now”, there are many other CTA phrases that convert your customers.

• This Will Sell Out creates a sense of urgency

• Check availability focuses on the return of the product

• View Item will take customers to visit the product page while the Add to Cart button can motivate customers to make a purchase.

Practice 8: Exclusive Offers for Back-in-Stock Customers

For each email campaign, offering a discount is considered the best way to increase sales. It will work more effectively when you target the right customers. It’s because they already showed interest in your product and waited for it to come back. When it comes back with a special discount, they are likely to be happy to buy it without considering anything.

Many store owners follow this practice as a way to please customers for the out-of-stock status before that. Therefore, the discount program is not only for sales increase but also relationships with customers.

Examples

A 10% discount combined with the FOMO element “Before they sell out again”, as the example below, is persuasive enough with customers.

Practice 9: Social proof

Another effective way to gain customer trust is by letting them see reviews and testimonials. Your product has the advantage of having previously been of interest to customers. Then, adding positive reviews of the item will further make customers sure of the product’s quality, thus motivating them to take action.

Examples

It is noted that as an additional section to build customer trust, social proof should be placed at the end of the email.

You can look at some examples below to see how reviews are shown in a back-in-stock email.

Practice 10: Try upselling/cross-selling

You can leverage back in stock email for upselling and cross-selling. Why not?

It is a great idea to offer product bundles, which is also known as upselling. You get a chance to sell more at the same time, while customers will most likely be happy to buy more at a discount. As long as you design this part cleverly, it won’t cause any irritation.

Another way to ensure sales opportunities is introducing similar items, also known as cross-selling. Applying this sales technique, you can give customers more options so that they can select the one that best suits their demands. More choices, more chances to gain conversions.

Examples

You can refer to an example of product bundle offers.

A special point of this back in stock email is that it notifies the comeback of NOT ONLY ONE item. By providing numerous combo discounts, it may be successful in encouraging customers to buy.

Bonus: 5 Pro Tips for a Successful Back in Stock Email Campaign

1. Allow customers to register the back in stock form

For out-of-stock products, you should create a form that allows people to register to receive the news when products come back. This will help you target the right people when you run the back in stock email campaign.

Here is an example of a back-in-stock notification form created by the Woostify Callback add-on.

Watch this video to see how this back-in-stock form is created by Woostify.

2. Creating an Email Sequence

To entice customers to convert, you can not use a single email alert. Instead, you need to set up an email sequence. You are recommended to send 3-4 emails for the campaign. Each email should be sent at the right time to bring the best results. You can consider following this sequence:

• Initial Announcement: Send the first email as soon as the product is back in stock. This is the primary notification to inform subscribers of the restock.
• Follow-Up Reminder: If the product is still in stock after a few days, consider sending a follow-up reminder to those who didn’t open the initial email. This helps capture those who may have missed the first notification.
• Last Chance Alert: Send a final email indicating that the product is in high demand or has limited availability. This creates a sense of urgency and can encourage quicker purchases.
• Post-Purchase Thank You: After a customer makes a purchase, follow up with a thank you email. This not only shows appreciation but can also provide an opportunity for further engagement or product recommendations.

3. Monitoring and Analyzing Results

For a back in stock email sequence, it is important to track email campaign performance. Take a look at metrics like open rates, click-through rates, and conversions to see if your campaign is progressing well. You have to do that while the email sequence is implemented as well as after the sequence is completed.

Collecting the metrics after each email of the sequence is sent helps segment customers more effectively. Meanwhile, metrics obtained after the campaign ends might be useful for other email campaigns in the future.

4. A/B Testing for Optimization

If you are in a dilemma between two options, it is advisable to run two campaigns at the same time. Then, you can measure and compare the metrics of different subject lines, CTAs, designs, and content.

5. Mobile-Friendly Design

Over 60% of subscribers open emails on mobile devices to check their inboxes; therefore, it is essential to create a layout that adapts seamlessly to various screen sizes.

For the final word,

Running a back in stock email campaign gives you a chance to recover lost sales and increase revenue. To have a successful campaign, you should create an email sequence and focus on noticeable elements in each email, including subject lines, call to action, and product description. Besides, it is important to take notice of monitoring and analyzing results during the campaign.

Hope that the best practices & tips mentioned in the article will be helpful for your back in stock email campaign. But it is noted that you unnecessarily follow them. Getting creative with other new things may bring success.