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Kate’s Clothing used weekly promotional emails, linked product banners, post-send review and engagement-based segmentation to pursue more sales and customer engagement. In a case study published on January 6, 2021, Benchmark Email reported strong campaign figures for the retailer, but the vendor did not provide the audience size or measurement methods needed to verify the comparison or show that any one tactic caused the results.
Why Kate’s Clothing used email marketing
Benchmark Email describes Kate’s Clothing as an online alternative clothing retailer selling gothic, steampunk, vintage and maternity styles. Owner Kate Whitegroatt said its newsletter goals were to increase sales, promote products and share general and exclusive news and updates.
Email gave the retailer a way to link subscribers directly to products, including people who had signed up on its website but might not follow the business on social media. Whitegroatt explained: “Email Marketing is a great way to do this. It allows us to include links and visual banners to direct our customers and subscribers straight to the product they wish to see.”
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She also said the retailer’s weekly campaigns contributed substantially to sales and that orders often rose on send days. Those are the owner’s observations as reported by Benchmark; the case study does not include order records or an analysis that could establish a causal effect.
What Kate’s Clothing did with its campaigns
Used promotions and product links
The retailer sent weekly emails with changing content, including exclusive discount codes, brand promotions and sale announcements. Whitegroatt said discount newsletters performed exceptionally well. Benchmark’s example shows a discount-led subject line and a visual banner linking to the related page on the retailer’s site.
Reviewed opens and link activity after sending
A few days after a campaign went out, the team reviewed opens and clicks to see which links drew activity and consider changes for the next email. The case study describes campaign review, not controlled testing: it does not report test groups, a test design or the results of a specific experiment.
Segmented subscribers by engagement
Whitegroatt said Kate’s Clothing had recently begun separating subscribers according to how actively they engaged with campaigns. Most emails went to the more engaged group, while the retailer occasionally sent to the full list to try to re-engage less active subscribers.
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She said this approach increased activity and helped reduce spam reports and unsubscribes. Those outcomes are company-reported observations; the article does not isolate segmentation from other changes or establish that it caused them.
Varied the creative
The retailer changed weekly content and, when revisiting a theme, refreshed the layout, banners or wording. This gave it a way to reuse a promotional idea without sending an identical-looking message each time.
What results did Benchmark Email report?
Benchmark Email reported these figures for Kate’s Clothing’s latest campaign to its full subscriber list in the 2021 case study, alongside averages it attributed to its retail users:
| Metric | Kate’s Clothing full-list campaign | Benchmark retail-user average |
|---|---|---|
| Open rate | 27.91% | 17.62% |
| Click-through rate | 36.23% | 1.87% |
| Bounce rate | 0.19% | 6.31% |
| Unsubscribe rate | 0.134% | 0.109% |
As presented by Benchmark, Kate’s Clothing was above its stated retail average on open rate, click-through rate and bounce rate; the reported unsubscribe rate was also higher than the retail average. The click-through figure of 36.23% is reproduced as printed in the case study; the source does not define the metric or explain the large difference from its stated average.
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These figures are not enough to establish a rigorous comparison. Benchmark’s article does not give the campaign audience size, metric definitions, retail comparison-cohort size or dates, calculation methods, or independent verification. It also does not explain whether the campaign and retail averages were calculated on the same basis. Treat them as vendor-reported figures, not audited results or proof that the described tactics produced them.
Independent reader supportYour contribution helps us test, update, and keep practical guides available for everyone.What the case study can—and cannot—show
The case study offers a practical account of how one online retailer used email: connect offers to product pages, review activity after a send, vary the creative and target frequent engagers more often. It also records the owner’s view that campaigns supported sales and that engagement-based segmentation helped with activity and list health.
It cannot show how much sales changed, whether another retailer would see the same results, or which practice mattered most. Benchmark reported Kate’s Clothing’s list at just over 7,000 subscribers at the time of the 2021 article; that historical figure should not be read as the retailer’s current list size. The source is Benchmark Email’s vendor-published account, not independent comparative research: How Kate’s Clothing Uses Benchmark Email to Increase Engagement and Sales.
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