A live conversation with ethical email consultant and strategist, Yuval Ackerman. She’s the founder of Ethical Emails, a done-for-you email agency that helps B-Corp and other ethical businesses get significantly better results from their email marketing efforts.
Reading time: 4 minutes
Here’s what we’re discussing in this post:
- tips for standing out in overwhelmed inboxes
- tips to stop worrying about what to send
- tips for sending the right content to the right people
- how to delight your subscribers with automations that are usually transactional in their nature
- tips for using your email service provider in unique ways to delight customers
- do you need a double opt-in?
- links to learn more
<-- Click the logo to add this article to your Flipboard
Yuval (and those who joined us!) shared so many gems about how to use email differently to get better results for you AND your audience.
So dig into this recap and grab the nuggets that’ll help you see a bigger ROI from your email marketing efforts!
Tips For Standing Out In Overwhelmed Inboxes
Ok, we're diving into the deeper questions now for #FernTalk! Q1: How can an ethical brand STAND OUT in today’s overwhelmed inboxes?
— Mollie | 🌿Fern CX and CRM | Activist, Founder, Ally 🍉🥥🌴 (@ferncxandcrm.com) April 23, 2025 at 8:24 AM
[image or embed]
The resounding message was to “sound like a damn human,” as Sarah Moon put it. Which Yuval wholeheartedly supported and added these details:
Adding to what Sarah commented: remembering that there are human beings reading your emails, not walking wallets. Respecting their decision-making processes and acknowledging that they won't happen when you, the brand, necessarily want them to happen. And a few other ideas…
— Yuval | Ethical email consultant (@ethicalemails.bsky.social) April 23, 2025 at 8:30 AM
She goes on (in the threaded comments) to say:
“Tapping into your values + USP, and avoiding overpromising and underdelivering. Because to be honest, even the best email strategy will fall flat if the product/service is bad.”
“Treating subscribers differently, depending on where they’re at in their journey with your brand. Simplest example: someone who just bought your solution needs to get a totally different inbox experience than someone who hasn’t opened an email from you in the last 6 months.” ~ Yuval
Tips To Stop Worrying About What To Send
One of my favorite brands to get emails from is Sarah Moon Co and now I know why: She thinks of emails to her list as a group hug.
If more brands thought of it this way, they’d be less worried about what to send and see a bigger ROI from their efforts.
When asked to elaborate, Sarah added:
“Let me know about your background, how you got here, what you’re up. Like in last week’s email, I drew on personal experience. I tell people to include a story, stat, or (case) study subtly in most of their content to build connection and legitimacy.” ~ Sarah
Tips For Sending The Right Content To The Right People
Yuval recently sent an email to her list that addressed the problem a lot of brands have ~ sending emails, but not getting the expected results (usually sales.) In that email she said the key is to speak to the right audience:
So I asked her, based on this, what kind of content “speaks to the right audience”? She replied:
“Getting saucy, qualitative data and “voice of customer” is really key here.”
“You need to know how your ideal clients talk, what they care about, which solutions they’ve tried, and how you can turn things around for them.
As always – go to the source, your audience. They hold the answers to these!” ~ Yuval
I’ve heard copywriting expert Ashlyn Carter repeat this same mantra over and over again too. There’s no escaping it! Every expert will say the same thing. You need to actually talk to your best-fit customers and listen to what they say!
How can you delight your subscribers with automations that are usually transactional in their nature?
(Think: post-purchase, abandoned cart/check-out…)
I looooooove this topic because this is one of the many customer touchpoints we optimize for our Fern CX clients. And Yuval’s answer did not disappoint!
“…it’s all about keeping communication customer-centric rather than brand-centric. Those automations are coming at high points of intent and engagement, and therefore, possible buyer’s remorse. Catering to the excitement and reducing anxiety is super important.” ~ Yuval
Sarah Moon chimed in with another great tip which Yuval celebrated as an “unscalable yet hyper-personalized and meaningful twist” that delights the human on the other side of the screen:
“Extremely unexciting but in every transactional email I remind them that Josh and I are available—all they need to do is reply and one of us will help them if they’re confused, lost, or just need some guidance. I’ve had people comment that they appreciate it.” ~ Sarah Moon
This is one area I really like to “pattern interrupt” with our Fern CX and Fern CRM emails. Most people expect the formulaic receipt, abandon cart email, or payment notification.
I like to drop something totally delightful and surprise the shit out of them at these touch points!
In fact, Sarah Moon even screenshot our payment reminder email and shared it to her Instagram stories months ago because she found it so refreshing:
Tips For Using Your Email Service Provider In Unique Ways To Delight Customers
Yuval suggested this question for our conversation, this was not me trying to shameless plug Fern CRM! But of course it’s one of my favorite topics, since I think Fern CRM has some amazing features you won’t find in other email marketing tools.
And, as usual, Yuval’s answer was a combination of customer-centric human-ness and technological curiosity:
“It’s a combo of getting to *really* know your ESP’s capabilities + hearing from customers/clients what would make them happy. For example, if your ESP offers built-in quizzes, and your audience engages well with them (AND you can gather good data that way), def use it.”
“It’s really a matter of thinking about meaningful ways to personalize the inbox experience – sometimes in non-scalable ways (yes, I know).”
For brands using Fern CRM, there’s a “math” operation available (in automations, in quizzes, in surveys, etc.) that can calculate all kinds of cool things. And I don’t see a lot of people using it, except for creating calculators (like, to calculate how much house you can afford based on different variables.)
We use the math feature A LOT to instantly calculate:
- how much of the purchase price will be donated
- how much carbon will be offset
- how many trees will be planted
And then we SHOW that impact to the customer (in emails, in their Fern CRM dashboard, on the order confirmation page, etc.) so they can instantly see the difference each purchase makes!
Use technology to delight.
Do you need a double opt-in?
I genuinely thought Yuval would be Team Double Opt-In, based on her usual stances on ethical email practices and major emphasis on consent. But she surprised me with this response:
Definitely depends. If you don't have a lot of traffic (specifically bots), you probably don't need a double opt in. If the subscribers coming your way are quality subscribers and you're not bombarded by bots, a single opt in could be enough.
— Yuval | Ethical email consultant (@ethicalemails.bsky.social) April 23, 2025 at 8:58 AM
Which led to a deeper conversation about which clicks are coming from bots, Apple’s (and other companies’) privacy tools, and more. Click on the embedded post to see the full conversation (or click here.)
It says “1 reply” but it’s one reply with a whole threaded conversation of replies. Because of some users’ settings, you may have to be logged into Bluesky (or any other AT Protocol app) to view all the replies.
Links To Learn More
Yuval Ackerman, founder of Ethical Emails
Learn more about Yuval and Ethical Emails here: https://www.ethicalemails.co/
And subscribe to her email list to continue learning from her expertise and experience: https://ethicalemails.co/subscribe
Follow her on Bluesky here: https://bsky.app/profile/ethicalemails.bsky.social
Sarah Moon
Learn more about Sarah Moon Co here: https://sarahmoon.net/
And sign up to get emails that sound like a damn human here: https://hey.sarahmoon.net/
Fern CX
Click the links at the top of this page to read more blog posts from Fern CX and CRM and/or follow us on Bluesky here: https://bsky.app/profile/ferncxandcrm.com
More info about 🌿Fern Talks:
You can click on any of the embedded Bluesky posts above to see the full post/conversation.
You can also go here ~ https://bsky.app/hashtag/FernTalk ~ to see a record of all our 🌿Fern Talks.