You’re wasting ad spend if you’re not running remarketing campaigns — and I don’t mean those lazy display ads that follow people around for weeks like a bad date.
I’m talking about strategy-driven remarketing built to convert now, not someday. If you’ve ever watched a potential customer click through your site, add something to their cart, and vanish without a trace, you’re not alone — 97% of first-time visitors leave without buying. That’s revenue walking out the door.
Here’s the good news: you can get it back. I’ve run campaigns in which remarketing can help bring in three times more conversions at half the cost of cold traffic. The catch? You can’t just “set it and forget it,” and that’s where most marketers go wrong.
This article cuts through the noise and gives you exactly what works, tested on accurate budgets across Singaporean markets. If you’re ready to stop throwing money into the void and start winning back customers who actually want what you’re selling — you’re in the right place.
Key Takeaways
- Remarketing campaigns let you re-engage warm leads who already know your brand — the lowest-hanging fruit in your funnel.
- Email remarketing helps you recover abandoned carts, recapture browsing visitors, and follow up with laser-focused content based on user intent.
- Treating every lead the same is costing you sales. Custom follow-ups based on specific lead magnets dramatically increase conversions.
- Real-world strategies, such as content-specific email flows and behavioural segmentation, are proven to drive results (e.g., a 50% lift in conversions, or 760% more revenue).
- If you haven’t used remarketing yet, you’re leaving qualified money on the table—this isn’t optional in 2025.
What is Remarketing?
Image Credit: CustomerLabs
Let’s cut through the jargon: remarketing is the strategy of re-engaging people who have interacted with your brand, whether they visited your website, watched a product demo, or abandoned their cart. These aren’t random users. They’re warm leads, and you’d be mad not to follow up. If you’re still spending most of your ad budget on cold audiences, you’re bleeding ROI. You need a remarketing strategy, and you need it now.
Remarketing vs Retargeting
Now, let’s address the elephant in the room: remarketing vs retargeting. It’s the same thing, right? Not quite. The terms are often used interchangeably, but there’s a distinction worth knowing if you want to get results.
- Remarketing (traditionally) refers to re-engagement through email, like sending reminders to users who abandoned their carts.
- Retargeting is serving ads to users based on their online behaviour. For example, Facebook, Google Display Network, or LinkedIn ads chase your site visitors.
But here’s the kicker: platforms like Google Ads call their display-based strategies “remarketing” — so the lines are blurred. What matters is this: whether it’s an ad or an email, your goal is to bring qualified users back into the funnel with intent-focused messaging.
Personally, I treat remarketing as the umbrella — a full-funnel strategy that uses multiple channels to re-convert warm traffic. That might mean retargeting past website visitors with an upsell ad and following up with a dynamic email sequence.
When you integrate both, that’s when it clicks. But in this article, let’s concentrate on running remarketing campaigns to win back customers through email marketing.
What Is Email Remarketing?
Image Credit: Omnisend
Email remarketing is your second chance to close the deal— and unlike most digital channels, you control the conversation. When someone visits your site, adds to cart, browses your service page, or even signs up for a newsletter but doesn’t convert, email remarketing lets you follow up with personalised, timely messages that reignite their interest.
You’re not cold emailing strangers — you’re re-engaging people who’ve already shown intent. That’s what makes it powerful. I’ve seen abandoned cart emails with dynamic product content drive over 20% recovery rates for e-commerce clients — all automated, all measurable. Plus, check out these other statistics on how successful email remarketing can be:
- Automated email flows outperform manual blasts. You’re looking at 42.1% open rates, 5.4% click rates, and nearly 2% conversion rates on average— significantly higher than non-automated campaigns. Translation? Set it up once, and let your funnel do the heavy lifting.
- Cart abandonment emails convert like crazy. Almost 50% of people who click on them end up buying. That’s not a maybe — that’s a margin you can bank on. If you’re not following up with shoppers who ghosted at checkout, you’re burning potential revenue.
- Automation = more money. Automated campaigns drive 320% more revenue than non-automated ones. I’ve seen clients triple their email-driven revenue just by switching to trigger-based remarketing flows.
Bottom line? If you’re not using automated, personalised remarketing emails, you’re leaving conversions, revenue, and ROI on the table. This isn’t “nice to have” — it’s your unfair advantage.
Why You Should Use Email Remarketing
You’re already paying for traffic. The real question is — are you making the most of it? Email remarketing isn’t just a tactic. It’s the most profitable follow-up you’ll ever automate. You’re re-engaging the right people at the right moment, based on what they actually did on your site. Let’s get specific.
#1: Turn Abandoned Carts Into Immediate Sales Opportunities
Image Credit: MailModo
Cart abandonment rates in Singapore can reach up to 82.6%, depending on the industry. That’s a massive chunk of revenue walking away — but here’s the kicker: most of those users aren’t saying no. They’re saying, “Maybe later.”
Here’s how it works in the real world: A clothing retailer saw a 23% increase in recovered sales by implementing a three-step abandoned cart email flow:
- First Email (1 hour after abandonment): A gentle reminder with a clear call-to-action (CTA) to return to the cart.
- Second Email (24 hours later): Product benefits and customer reviews to re-engage the shopper.
- Third Email (72 hours later): A limited-time discount to create urgency.
By deploying this sequence, they saw 5% of those who abandoned their carts return and complete the purchase. You could recover a portion of that 75%—imagine how that would impact your bottom line. If you’re still sending one reminder email and hoping for the best, you’re leaving cash on the table. The solution isn’t louder emails—it’s more brilliant flows.
Segment By Intent
Not all abandonments are equal. Someone who dropped off on the shipping page isn’t the same as someone who never clicked “Add to Cart.” Tailor your messaging. If they abandoned a specific product, follow up with that product’s image, benefits, and reviews.
| User Action | Intent Level | Email Strategy + Example Subject Line | Tone & Content Focus |
| Viewed product pages only |
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| Added to cart but didn’t start checkout |
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| Started checkout but didn’t finish |
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| Abandoned after the discount was shown |
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| Returning abandoners (didn’t convert) |
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Trigger Within the Golden Hour
You’ve got a 60-minute window to win them back — use it or lose it. That first hour after cart abandonment isn’t just a nice-to-have follow-up period. It’s your highest-converting opportunity. According to SaleCycle, cart recovery emails sent within the first hour can achieve open rates of over 45% and click-through rates of nearly 20%, significantly outperforming those sent later.
But here’s the truth most brands miss: timing alone won’t save you. What you say in that golden hour makes or breaks the conversion.
Here’s how to maximise your “golden hour” impact:
- Keep it frictionless: Don’t bury your CTA. Use a clean, mobile-friendly design that leads with a button like “Complete Your Purchase” — no fluff, just action.
- Use dynamic content: Personalise the email with the exact product(s) left behind. This isn’t just nice UX — it increases conversion likelihood by over 20%.
- Add urgency, not pressure: I do not like scare tactics. Instead, include phrases like “Limited stock available” or “We’ll hold your items for 24 hours” to create natural urgency without overwhelming the user.
- Send from a real person: Instead of blasting from a generic brand name, test using a first name from your team. One of our clients saw a 12% lift in open rates just by switching the sender to “Melissa from [Brand]”.
#2: Re-Engage Window Shoppers Before They Disappear
Not everyone adds to their cart. Some just window-shop — but that doesn’t mean they’re not interested. With tools like Klaviyo or ActiveCampaign, you can trigger browse abandonment emails based on product page views or time spent on-site.
Here’s how you can leverage this: A skincare brand implemented a browse abandonment email flow that was triggered two hours after a user viewed a product but didn’t make a purchase. The email reminded the user of the exact product they browsed, with the added incentive of free shipping.
The results? A 31% open rate and an 8% click-through rate, significantly higher than their usual performance.
This kind of follow-up taps into interest right when it’s still fresh, keeping your brand in front of the user and driving them back to your site to complete the purchase.
Here’s how you do it:
- Track page views and dwell time: Use tools like Klaviyo or ActiveCampaign to monitor what pages your visitors spend time on — even if they don’t click “Buy.” This lets you trigger browse abandonment emails within a set window—time matters. Trigger too late, and they’ve already forgotten you.
- Strike while the intent is warm: One skincare brand I worked with set up a browse abandonment flow that triggered two hours after someone viewed a product but didn’t purchase it. The email reminded them of the exact product they browsed and sweetened the deal with free shipping. The results? A 31% open rate and an 8% click-through rate—significantly outperforming their standard campaigns.
- Make the follow-up feel relevant, not robotic: Don’t just say, “We saw you looking.” That’s lazy and borderline creepy. Instead, use context: “Here’s what others love about this product,” or “Why this might be exactly what your skin needs.” Use dynamic product blocks, reviews, or even a related blog link.
- Add a soft nudge: Include a subtle bonus — limited-time shipping, a low-stock notice, or an easy way to compare products. You’re not hard-selling. You’re helping them take the next step with confidence.
When done right, browse abandonment flows can deliver serious returns. I’ve personally run campaigns in which re-engagement emails based on viewing behaviour lifted repeat visits by over 35% in under a month—and that’s without a single discount. The takeaway? You don’t need a cart to start remarketing. You just need a signal — and a system smart enough to act on it.
#3: Customise Follow-Ups That Match Exactly What Each Lead Wants
Image Credit: BotPenguin
You’re losing leads—not because your product isn’t good, but because your follow-ups don’t match your prospects’ expectations. If you’re still sending duplicate nurture emails to everyone who joins your list, you’re leaking revenue. Tailoring your follow-up emails based on the exact lead magnet or content a subscriber engaged with is one of the smartest, most underutilised strategies in email remarketing.
It’s not just about segmentation — it’s about sending the right message at the right moment to the right person.
Here’s how I approach it — and how you should too:
- Segment based on content type: Not all lead magnets signal the same intent. Someone who downloaded your productivity checklist is in discovery mode. Someone who downloaded your pricing guide is shopping. Split those flows. Don’t lump them together.
- Build content-specific sequences: A SaaS company implemented this and saw a 50% lift in conversions. Why? Because their emails spoke directly to what the lead wanted.
- Checklist downloaders got workflow hacks, time-saving tips, and blog articles on optimising teams.
- Pricing guide downloaders received ROI case studies, client testimonials, and invites to product demos — emails built for buyers.
- Checklist downloaders got workflow hacks, time-saving tips, and blog articles on optimising teams.
- Move leads down the funnel by giving value first. Whether it’s an eBook, a free report, or a how-to guide, the goal of your follow-up isn’t just to sell — it’s to match content with intent.
I’ve run similar sequences for Singaporean B2B brands using Klaviyo and Mailchimp, where the first two emails educate, the third delivers a small win, and the fourth drives a CTA. That pacing works. Every. Single. Time. And the data backs this up. Segmented campaigns based on user behaviour can boost revenue by up to 760%. That’s not a typo. That’s the power of relevance.
This isn’t a tactic — it’s a strategy. And if you don’t implement it, you can bet your competition will.
Email remarketing isn’t just about sending automated messages. It’s about sending the right message at the right time. The real power lies in using personalisation and segmentation to meet your customers exactly where they are in their journey. You’re leaving money on the table if you’re not leveraging this.
How to Start Running Remarketing Campaigns Via Email
Image Credit: WordStream
If you’ve made it this far, you already know the value of email remarketing — now it’s about execution. Don’t overthink it. Start simple: audit your existing email list, identify your highest-intent segments (cart abandoners, pricing page viewers, lead magnet downloads), and build tailored email flows for each group. Focus on delivering real value before pitching, and watch your engagement and conversions climb.
But if you’re serious about doing this right — with data-backed strategy, smart automation, and zero guesswork — then it’s time to bring in experts who live and breathe digital performance.
Work with MediaOne, Singapore’s trusted digital marketing agency, to unlock the full power of remarketing campaigns via email marketing that drive results, not just opens.
Frequently Asked Questions
How do I build an email subscriber list for remarketing?
Start by adding sign-up forms to your website, offering incentives like discounts or free content.
What are the best practices for writing remarketing emails?
Keep your emails concise, with a clear subject line, engaging body, and a strong call to action.
How do I segment my audience for remarketing?
Segment your audience based on behaviour, demographics, or interests to deliver personalised and relevant remarketing emails.
How do I measure the success of my remarketing campaigns?
Track metrics like open rates, click-through rates, and conversion rates to evaluate the effectiveness of your remarketing efforts.
How can I integrate remarketing with other marketing channels?
Combine email remarketing with retargeted ads on platforms like Facebook and Google to reinforce your message across multiple touchpoints.
