Perfectly Framed: Building an Email Marketing Program for an Architectural Photographer

ryanm@newbrightonmarketing.com (Ryan McGibben) — Mon, 29 Jun 2026 22:58:41 GMT

Client Overview

A Phoenix-based client was ready to get serious about email marketing, and it was a great project to dig into. Starting from the ground up, the engagement covered everything from building and organizing their contact list to designing branded monthly campaigns with strong calls-to-action driving traffic back to their site. The result: open rates hovering around 50%, well above industry averages.

Unique Opportunity

One thing that stood out early was an opportunity to segment their audience by market sector. Their contacts spanned both residential and commercial property, and sending everyone the same message wasn't going to cut it. A tagging system was built out to separate those audiences, allowing campaigns to reach the right people with the right content. Fewer irrelevant emails in the inbox, more meaningful engagement from the ones that landed.

Commercial - Does not include TBD/Potential were contacts that worked and commercial real estate companies.

Residential - Does not include TBD/Potential were contacts that worked at residential real estate companies or independent agents.

Potential were potential clients. There may have been some ongoing discussions about contracting Michael. We used this as an exclusion list so that the ongoing discussions didn't get muddled with new information.

TBD was sort of a catch all list for contacts the client was unsure about emailing.

We excluded both Potential and TBD from email sends, and excluded them both from the Commercial and Residential lists for reporting purposes.

This meant that recipients often received only emails with property types that were relevant to them. If a particular project warranted either due to size, scope of shoot, or other interesting feature, the client could decide to sent an email to both residential and commercial even if the property wasn't the primary interest type.

Clean, Easy to Use Template

We needed to get the foundation right. That meant redesigning the email template to align with current brand standards, reconfiguring platform integrations to support automation triggers, and rebuilding the tagging logic so contacts could enter and exit workflows cleanly based on their own actions. Once the infrastructure was solid, the automations were rewritten, tested, and relaunched with fresh copy and a clear monitoring process in place.

The objective was a program that looked polished, ran reliably, and responded intelligently to how contacts actually behave.

The open rate is around 50%!

A client who knows their craft deserves a marketing setup that matches it. From the first conversation, the goal was clear: build something clean, functional, and built to last. Getting into the details of contact organization, audience segmentation, and campaign design was genuinely exciting work, and seeing it come together for a client this passionate about their product made it even better. The kind of project that reminds you why thoughtful execution matters.

"We had a fantastic experience with Ryan. He helped us set up monthly marketing emails with Mailchimp - this included everything from organizing/tagging contacts to producing beautiful emails with CTA's and links to our website. The open rate is around 50%! He is very thorough and such a pleasure to work with. He has great ideas too. We hope to work with him again in the very near future." - Cristin Duerinckx INCKX Photography

Full Coverage: Rebuilding Email Automation for an Auto Insurance Provider

ryanm@newbrightonmarketing.com (Ryan McGibben) — Mon, 29 Jun 2026 20:21:22 GMT

Client Overview

A Vancouver-based auto insurance provider came to New Brighton Marketing looking to modernize their email marketing program. Their existing setup had grown stale -- outdated templates that no longer reflected their brand, integrations that weren't configured to support automation, and a tagging structure that made reliable entry and exit from workflows impossible. The result was a program that was technically running but not performing.

The Challenge

The client needed more than a cosmetic refresh. Their abandoned cart reminders and review request sequences had stalled, and without a properly structured automation framework, re-engaging those touchpoints wasn't straightforward. The underlying infrastructure had to be rebuilt before any new campaigns could perform reliably.

The Goal

The objective was a program that looked polished, ran reliably, and responded intelligently to how contacts actually behave.

How the Automation Works

The sequence triggers when a contact's Transaction Type is updated to Renewals -- a signal that someone has started but not completed their policy renewal. From there, the automation takes over.

Before sending anything, it checks whether the contact has already converted. If they have, they're tagged and exit immediately. If not, the first email goes out within the hour.

That same logic repeats across four touchpoints, with delays of one hour, two days, three days, and five days between each send. At every stage, the automation checks for a completed transaction before proceeding. Contacts who convert at any point are tagged as converted and removed from the sequence. Those who move through all four emails without completing their renewal receive a final "did not convert" tag, keeping the contact record clean and the data actionable.

The numbers reflect how well the sequencing holds attention over time. Email 1 opened at 57.3%, and engagement remained strong through the sequence -- 46.6% on Email 2 and 43.9% on Email 3. The bulk of automation-driven conversions came early, with 2K contacts tagged as converted after the first email alone, followed by 161 after Email 2 and 36 after Email 3.

The result is a sequence that never over-communicates, exits contacts the moment they convert, and leaves a clear data trail regardless of outcome.

Email Design

Each email in the sequence follows a consistent visual framework that reinforces the B&W Insurance Brokers brand at every touchpoint. The template opens with the company logo and a warm brand identifier -- "Celebrating 40 Years of Service" -- before moving into a full-width hero image with a branded gradient overlay that mirrors the look and feel of their website. The effect is cohesive and immediately recognizable.

Partnership credibility is built into the design itself. ICBC and Autoplan branding appear directly within the hero images, signaling to contacts that they're renewing through an authorized, trusted provider.

Below the hero, the body copy sits against a deep teal background using the brand's primary color palette. Each email opens with a personalized greeting using the contact's first name, creating an immediate one-to-one tone that feels less like a bulk send and more like a direct nudge from someone who knows them. Two CTAs are stacked and styled to match brand colors -- a warm orange for the primary online action and a muted blue for the phone alternative -- giving contacts a clear path forward while maintaining visual hierarchy.

Each email closes with a rotating Google review, adding a layer of social proof that reinforces trust at the moment a contact is deciding whether to complete their renewal. The reviews feature real customer names and titles, lending authenticity without feeling forced.

Across all three emails, the hero imagery rotates to keep the sequence feeling fresh, while the template structure, color treatment, and messaging remain consistent -- creating a sequence that feels like a conversation rather than a series of disconnected sends.

The Road to Renewal is Paved with Good Automation

What started as a broken email program is now a reliable, brand-aligned revenue channel. By rebuilding the infrastructure from the ground up -- fixing integrations, restructuring tagging logic, and redesigning the template -- the automation now does what it was always supposed to do: reach the right contacts at the right time and get out of the way when they convert.

The results speak for themselves. Open rates above 57% on the first touch, consistent engagement across the full sequence, and thousands of contacts moving cleanly through a workflow that tracks every outcome. The client now has a program that reflects their brand, responds to contact behavior, and generates measurable returns with minimal manual intervention.

New Brighton Marketing Case Studies

Perfectly Framed: Building an Email Marketing Program for an Architectural Photographer

Client Overview

Unique Opportunity

Clean, Easy to Use Template

The open rate is around 50%!

Full Coverage: Rebuilding Email Automation for an Auto Insurance Provider

Client Overview

The Challenge

The Goal

How the Automation Works

Email Design

The Road to Renewal is Paved with Good Automation