How to Rock Email Marketing in France

Are you thinking of launching an email marketing campaign in France? Well, hold your horses! Before you rush in, let me tell you that it's not as easy as it seems.

All your efficient content, your high-value marketing strategies and your gratifying consumer feedback might not work in the French market.

Let’s dive together into the main issues faced by businesses, and how to overcome these challenges to succeed in the French market.

The numbers

Marketing emails in France have a median open rate of 26.13%, which is higher than in Germany, Spain, and especially the United States.

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The highest open rates in France are found in government-related emails, with an open rate of 28.77%. Emails sent by hobbies entities come in second, with a 27.74% open rate

The email open rate for the education industry is 28.5%, the highest percentage across all industries. The email open rate for the retail industry is 17.1%, the lowest percentage across all industries

Advertising & Marketing has an open rate of 20.5%, with a click-through rate of 1.8% and a click-to-open rate of 9.0%. Agriculture, Forestry, Fishing, Hunting has an open rate of 27.3%, with a click-through rate of 3.4% and a click-to-open rate of 12.5%. Consumer Packaged Goods have an open rate of 20%, with a click-through rate of 1.9% and a click-to-open rate of 11.1%.

These are very encouraging numbers, showing that the number of emails sent in France is on the rise, with companies sending 142.16 billion emails last year.

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So why do I insist that email marketing is not working in France?

Because it’s not working the same way it works in any other market.

To make it effective, you need to adjust to the French market.

Now, what does that mean?

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The best practices

Spam filters

Many companies have erected efficient barriers to wall your emails out: Anti-spam policies are a hot topic in France. Many companies also implement a “work-life balance”-policy by blocking professional emails outside working hours. Oh, and these filters are mandatory in most companies as part of their data protection policy. And to top it all, French people are trained by their companies not to share their personal information at all. As a result, incoming emails are filtered out and will probably not even show up in your prospect’s inbox – especially outside the working hours!

Work around that by getting your readers to choose your newsletter instead of cold-mailing them, and by choosing the best possible time: Tuesdays and Thursday at 10AM for business newsletters and Wednesday at 3PM for commercials and promotions.

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Language

France & languages… Yes, you got it: fail to speak a clean and nice French and you’re out. English content won’t do the trick! Also, the smallest typo may send your text straight to the recycle bin. This is not only a social preference: France even has laws to prioritise the French language above any other one.

To overcome this barrier, you need to consider your English content as a mere starting point for your French content – don’t make do with a simple translation! Most often, the marketing argument that will seduce an American or Indian user will not at all work with a French one. Hire a French market expert to convey your message in the most efficient way, and that might mean changing your copy and even your visuals.

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Competition

French mailboxes are often clogged with newsletters of all kind. To differentiate your own campaign, make sure you send them at the right time: Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Fridays, at 10h or 15h.

All the usual best practices in email marketing for any country also apply to the French one: offer valuable content, use an engaging copy and attractive visuals, tailor your content to your target, etc.

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Trust

France has a legally binding opt-in approach, based on the free, fair, and informed consent of your prospects, as opposed to the countries where opt-out approaches are in use. This law shows how much French people value their privacy!

Take this into account and go even further by getting your readers to choose your newsletter rather than being forced into it. Avoid automatic subscriptions if they download a freebie from your website or if they join one of your webinars. At any rate, you should never use the Indian strategy of changing the sending address to by-pass user-defined filter-out rules: This is the quickest way to unsubscribing and blacklisting. Remember, French people value autonomy, freedom and privacy.

Law

By collecting email-addresses, you also fall under the CNIL law: you must send a declaration to the National Commission for Data Protection and Liberties, stating which data you collect and why, where you store them and what your privacy policy looks like.

You also must delete any personal information upon request from the user and send back a legally binding confirmation that you have done so. You are restricted by law to transfer these data to anyone or to use them for any other reason than the offer your user subscribed to. This would not only be a breach of trust, but is also illegal in all of Europe.

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Use alternatives

?E-mail marketing is an effective way of connecting with your audience – IF your readers have purposefully chosen to subscribe. If not, then you’re pushing yourself to them, and you are doing your brand a disservice, as French users have a strong dislike for this kind of techniques.

Make them choose you willingly and happily through more direct channels. Here are 3 very effective options to replace or boost your email-marketing strategy.

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Chat & direct lines

Offer a real-time chat with humans on your website. Of course, this option would have to be paired with a chatbot to filter out the most obvious answers, but your client should be able to get directly in touch with you anytime from 9-6PM.

You can and should also foster trust by offering a clear contact option with a direct phone line or at least a visible email address. French consumer protection groups have repeatedly warned that most scams come from untransparent websites with no direct contact option: this is now a deeply ingrained information in most French users. Lift the veil, be transparent, be available.

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Social Media

French users love direct contact and hate having to wait: social media are your perfect playground! They are also a great alternative to the human chat on your website and quite reassuring to your users, as they know for sure they have an option to air their feelings should something go wrong in your business relationship.

As a business in the B2B green energy space, your prospects are most likely on LinkedIn and Twitter. As a B2C business, you might want to try for Facebook and Instagram. TikTok is growing big right now, don’t forget it either!

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Business events

Nothing is more efficient than direct contact. The very best way to grab your prospects’ attention is to talk to them, and business events are the perfect setting! You can either book your own booth on a French fair, or stroll through the halls and meet them on the go. It goes without saying that you definitely need to speak French well enough to joke and mess around. If you don’t, hire someone who can engage with your prospect at eye-level!

As alternatives to these fairs, organise a “behind the scene”: send out special invitations to your best leads and welcome them with food and small talk. Then open your doors wide and show them unsuspected places no one gets to see otherwise. Make them feel privileged and be as transparent and straightforward as possible. If you are currently working on some issue with one of your products, use this opportunity to explain your feedback loop and quality insurance process. Lifting the veil on these processes will make you more human and foster trust.

Don’t forget the ones you couldn’t make the trip! Offer them a 360° tour of your site(s) with a drone, a video presenting your teams in a informal way and some behind the scene reels. You can add some snippets of the actual “behind the scene”-day, snapshots and short videos to show them what they missed. Send it all in a personalised email to make them feel special.

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Find inspiration

There is no one-fits-all rule to crack a market. All my tips above are general and can be useful as baseline for your marketing strategy in France. We can work together in two different ways: I can fine-tune a tailored strategy to find a direct line to your specific audience, or I can analyse your existing strategy and make adjustments for efficiency.

Alternatively, you can look at the top 10 brands with the highest email-CTOR in France and dig out interesting insights and ideas for you own product or service, even if you’re not working in the same field.

I recommend subscribing to at least 5 of them and checking their frequency, tone of voice, visuals, etc.

Here are these 10 top performers:

1.????Birchbox, Clear & concise

2.????Carrefour, Immediate value & tailored communication

3.????Boursorama, Engaging CTA & perceived value

4.????Oasis, Newsjacking & fun

5.????Netflix, Relatable & “your good friend”

6.????Lego, Fun and highly personalised

7.????Rolex, Exclusive & “you’re unique”

8.????Alloresto, visuals & aesthetics

9.????Nintendo, visuals & fun

10.?Samsung, perceived value & exclusive newsletter offers

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Email-marketing in France works, and it works even better than in most European countries. But you definitely need to understand this specific market with its stringent expectations and regulations.

Bonne chance en France!

#ChooseFrance