Email Strategy Teardown: Red Dress Boutique

April 10, 2019

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