Klaviyo Email Flows That Stay True to Voice and Function for Expedition Press

Printshop owner Myrna Keliher creates letterpress stationery and broadsides that beautifully showcase the works of contemporary poets. With a growing list of email subscribers, she came to Aeolidia to migrate Expedition Press’s email marketing from Shopify Email to Klaviyo and create her first automated email flows.

Right away, we focused on balancing Myrna’s unique storytelling with marketing-focused content that would convert customers and encourage repeat purchases. Key to Expedition Press’s marketing strategy was the collaborative nature of the brand’s poetry ephemera.

“She has this really cool business model where she does beautiful letterpress designs, but she also has relationships with the authors,” said Helen, our Ecommerce Strategist and Klaviyo expert. “So when she does a broadside with a quote, it’s with the cooperation of the author and publisher.”

As our team worked on designing and building Expedition Press’s new Welcome Flows in Klaviyo, we knew it would be essential to include the names of the authors in the email product feed.

“People may not always know a poem’s title, but they’re definitely going to know Lucille Clifton,” Helen said.

The only problem was, Klaviyo’s built-in, drag-and-drop product block is limited, only allowing for a product’s name and price to display in an email newsletter.

“Expedition Press’s products center around poets and their works,” said Lolly, our email marketer. “Being able to showcase the author’s names was a really important part of having the experience of Myrna’s website match her emails.”

The solution? Helen and Lolly created a custom dynamic product feed that featured the product name, the name of the poet or author featured in the product, and the product price in Expedition Press’s emails. The universal blocks of code that Lolly built are easily updated, so Myrna can add new products herself as needed.

Prior to working with Aeolida, Myrna had struggled to showcase author names, often coming up with awkward workarounds that took a lot of her time, were prone to errors, and were not reliable or effective. Now, the custom feed we created is one of her most-used features.

“I’ve seen sales attributed specifically to it, which is really encouraging,” Myrna said. “It allows my deeper inventory to get some air time regularly, since I typically only have time to feature what’s new and upcoming. Sales aside, it also makes a space for folks to get a random smattering of poetry with no extra time on my part, which is right on brand and so great.”

A Brand is a Voice (is Poetry) 

Through careful choices in typography and design, our designer Christine made sure the new Expedition Press templates felt like a natural extension of not only the website, but Myrna’s actual letterpress prints.

Then of course, there was the writing itself. We understood that the voice of Expedition Press also happened to be Myrna’s voice. Her previous flows were personal and narrative-driven; this was key to how she connected with her customers. But we also needed to improve her engagement and sales. Could a brand built on poetry and sharing the intangibles of language employ marketing-driven copy to convert customers?

Copywriter Natalia combed through Myrna’s previous newsletters, blog posts, and social media feeds to get a sense of her authentic literary voice. She was careful to preserve it while also making the writing more concise, human, and effective.

“It was tricky because at the heart of it, what Myrna does is honor the work of poets by sharing it with her customers,” Natalia said. “It’s this very pure art form. So to create an email flow that’s like, ‘hey, you forgot something in your cart,’ …that would negate what her work is all about.”

Instead, we focused on writing copy that is honest and expresses a shared love of poetry. Humor and self-awareness played a part, too, like in these abandonment emails that gently inspire customers to take another look at the words that left an impression.

Myrna was delighted with the results. “I feel supported in a deep way, and I’m grateful. My previous work was not lost… it was being honored, analyzed, and reincarnated to a better life,” she said. “My newsletter still feels my own, it just feels more professional, with a lot of boxes ticked off and taken care of that I wanted for years but either didn’t know how or didn’t have time to implement.”

Myrna’s new Klaviyo flows may be automated, but the custom functions, the design, and messaging were carefully crafted by our team to marry art and commerce, and stay true to the poetry behind Expedition Press’s voice.

“If you’re thinking about working with Aeolidia in any capacity, go for it. They are genuinely fabulous human beings and really damn good at what they do.” — Myrna Keliher, Expedition Press

If you’d like us to capture your business’s voice while honoring your values and developing a unique strategy for your Klaviyo email flows that leads to more sales, please get in touch.