Email campaigns are a powerful way to promote sales or special offers with clients and those that viewed your collections. With Pixieset, you can send personalized campaigns and track their performance right from your Client Gallery.

Note: Email campaigns are currently in early access. Support for all accounts is coming soon. 

On this page:

• What can I use email campaigns for?
• Building your marketing audience
• Creating an email campaign
  • How recipients are counted
• Best practices for campaign content
  • Avoid common spam triggers
  • General campaign tips
• Reviewing campaign performance
• Frequently asked questions (FAQ)

What can I use email campaigns for?

If you want to stay connected with clients and keep your business top of mind, email campaigns help you reach your audience with less effort. Here are some ways you can use email campaigns for your photography business:

• Announce store sales: Promote products in your collections’ integrated store, such as photo albums, wall art, or digital downloads.
• Promote new sessions: Announce limited time services like seasonal mini sessions. Link directly to your booking site and share a discount code to incentivize repeat bookings.
• Celebrate client milestones: Remind clients of upcoming anniversaries, birthdays, and significant moments with a personalized offer.
• Request reviews to grow your reputation: Invite clients you worked with recently to share a testimonial.

Building your marketing audience

Your marketing contact list is made up of visitors who choose to receive emails by selecting a consent checkbox in supported gallery flows. The checkbox must be explicitly selected by visitors to ensure valid consent. It can be shown in the following places:

• Email registration: When visitors enter their email to access a collection.
• Store checkout: When clients enter their email while purchasing products.
• Photo and video download: When visitors enter their email before downloading files.
• Favorite sign-in: When clients sign in via email to create or view their favorites.

To manage where the marketing consent checkbox appears:

1. Go to Marketing > Settings.
2. Under Gallery Marketing Opt-in, select the gallery flows where you want the consent checkbox to appear.

Visitors who check the consent box in their collections are added to your marketing audience and can be included in future email campaigns.

Note: The checkbox will only appear if the related feature is enabled in that collection. For example, enabling marketing opt-in for email registration will only apply to collections where email registration is turned on.

Creating an email campaign

Important: The structure and content of your email campaign plays a critical role in its success. For tips on improving placement and engagement for your campaigns, see Best practices for campaign content below.

To send an email campaign:

1. Go to Email Campaigns and click New Campaign.
2. Choose a template or start from scratch.
3. Enter a campaign name.
4. Under Email, customize the email content (title, cover image, message, and button).
5. Under Recipients, build your audience from visitors who have opted in to email marketing through your collections.
6. Click Send Now to send immediately, or schedule the campaign for a later date.

How recipients are counted

When you select an audience, Pixieset automatically calculates how many recipients your campaign will be sent to. You can click the recipient count to review the exact email addresses included.

Only eligible contacts are included in the total. The following contacts are excluded from the recipient count:

• Unsubscribed contacts: Anyone who has opted out of marketing emails.
• Cleaned contacts: Email addresses that were identified as invalid (e.g. “gnail.com”) are automatically excluded to help protect your campaign’s reputation.
• Duplicates across collections: If the same contact appears in multiple collections, they are linked to their most recent collection and counted only once.

Note: For scheduled campaigns, the recipient list stays the same unless you edit the campaign. Contacts who unsubscribe or are deleted before the send time will still be removed automatically.

Best practices for campaign content

Well‑written email content plays a critical role in whether your campaign reaches the inbox and how clients respond to it. Email providers (such as Gmail or Outlook) automatically evaluate the content of your email, and poorly structured or overly promotional emails can be filtered as spam even when sent for legitimate purposes.

Following the guidelines below can help improve inbox placement, open rates, and engagement with your campaign overall.

Avoid common spam triggers

Certain patterns can increase the chance that a message is filtered as spam or ignored by recipients. To improve deliverability:

• Focus on one clear topic per campaign. A single‑purpose email (such as announcing a seasonal promotion) is easier for recipients and spam filters to understand.
• Use clear subject lines and avoid overly promotional language. A subject like "Free shipping on all prints" performs better than exaggerated titles like "BUY NOW!!!". Emails that feel aggressively promotional without helpful context are more likely to be filtered or ignored.
• Avoid link‑stuffing and link shorteners. Too many links in a single email can look suspicious to spam filters. Focus on your primary call to action instead of adding multiple competing links.

General campaign tips

Following these practices can help your campaigns perform better and encourage clients to engage with your message.

• Send campaigns occasionally, rather than too frequently. Nonstop campaigns can lead to lower engagement and more spam complaints. Send campaigns when there is something meaningful to share, such as a seasonal promotion or session announcement.
• Focus on one primary call‑to‑action. Highlight a single action such as "View your gallery" or "Book a session" so recipients clearly understand what to do next.
• Keep your contact list up to date. Make sure your collections and contacts reflect current clients and valid email addresses.
• Respect client preferences. Avoid sending excessive emails and always honor unsubscribe requests (i.e. do not manually resubscribe visitors who opt out).
• Test your campaign before sending. Use Send Test to review formatting, links, and messaging to ensure everything appears correctly.

Reviewing your campaign’s performance

You can click into any sent campaign to track its performance. Analytics include the open rate of your campaign and insight into each recipient’s activity, organized into the following categories:

• Sent: The email was delivered to your client but it has not been opened yet.
• Opened: The email was delivered and opened by your client.
• Rejected: The email was ‘bounced’ by the recipient’s email server and was not delivered. A bounce can be temporary or permanent depending on the recipient’s email address. Learn more here.
• Unsubscribed: The email was delivered to your client and they clicked the unsubscribe link in the email.

Frequently asked questions (FAQ)

• Can I email all my past or existing clients?
• Can the marketing consent checkbox be auto-checked or disabled?
• Can clients unsubscribe from campaigns?
• Can I send multiple emails in one campaign?
• Why is my business address required?

Can I email all my past or existing clients?

Email campaigns can only be sent to contacts who have explicitly opted in their collections to receive marketing emails. Pixieset records this consent when a visitor selects the marketing checkbox in supported gallery flows.

Even if someone is a past or existing client, they must opt in before they can receive marketing emails. This helps ensure compliance with email marketing and anti‑spam laws.

Can the marketing consent checkbox be auto‑checked or disabled?

The marketing consent checkbox must remain opt‑in and cannot be pre‑checked or automatically enabled. This ensures that contacts give clear, affirmative permission to receive marketing emails, which is a requirement for many email marketing and anti-spam laws.

Can clients unsubscribe from campaigns?

Yes. Every email campaign includes an unsubscribe link at the bottom of the email, as required by anti-spam laws.

Can I send multiple emails in one campaign?

Each campaign consists of one email. You can create a new campaign if you want to send a follow up or related email. To save time, we recommend duplicating your previous campaign to replicate your original campaign’s recipients.

Why is my business address required?

We automatically display your complete business address at the bottom of each email in order to comply with anti-spam laws. You can complete or revise your address before sending your email campaign in your profile settings.