Definition
Since Gmail introduced tabbed inboxes, most marketing emails land in the Promotions tab rather than the Primary inbox. While this is not inherently bad — 70%+ of Gmail users use tabs — there are techniques to ensure your email remains visible and engaging within the promotions tab rather than being buried or filtered to spam.
Key Factors
- Authentication: Proper SPF, DKIM, and DMARC are table stakes — unauthenticated mail is filtered immediately
- Engagement: Gmail prioritises senders whose mail consistently gets opened and clicked
- Complaint rate: Keep spam complaints under 0.1% to avoid tab-level filtering
- Consistency: Regular sending patterns help Gmail understand your sending profile
- Content relevance: Gmail's AI increasingly evaluates content relevance for tab placement
Promotions Tab Tools
Google offers Promotions Tab Annotations — schema markup that adds deal badges, expiry dates, and images to your emails within the tab. These can significantly improve visibility and click-through rates.
Related Glossary Terms
A/B Testing
A/B testing in email marketing is the practice of sending two variations of an email to a small sample of your list to determine which version performs better before sending the winner to the remaining subscribers.
Abandoned Cart Email
An abandoned cart email is an automated message sent to customers who added items to their online shopping cart but left without completing the purchase. It is one of the highest-converting email types in ecommerce.
AIDA Model for Email
The AIDA model (Attention, Interest, Desire, Action) is a classic copywriting framework used to structure email campaigns that guide subscribers from awareness to conversion.
AMP for Email
AMP for Email is a Google-developed framework that allows email messages to include interactive elements like forms, carousels, accordions, and live content. It turns static emails into dynamic, interactive experiences directly inside the inbox.
Anchoring Effect in Email Marketing
The anchoring effect is a cognitive bias where the first piece of information presented (the anchor) influences subsequent decisions, used in email to frame pricing and value perception.
Announcement Email
An announcement email is a dedicated campaign that communicates a specific update, milestone, or change to subscribers, from product launches and feature releases to company news and events.