How to use video in email marketing: 7 best examples

Your customers are used to watching videos. They do it all the time; it’s simply part and parcel of being online. Video email marketing caters to that familiarity, letting you educate, nurture, and create new revenue opportunities alongside text.

The reality of email marketing today is that most companies can build professional emails thanks to the pre-built template libraries provided by tools. But not all can create high-quality, contextual videos, and that’s an opportunity to stand out.

This article is a guide to using video in email, including the why, how, and best practices to follow for optimal engagement and conversions.

Why videos work in email marketing

Videos in emails satisfy the portion of your customers who would rather watch than read and let you provide detailed, visual information without making them scroll and swipe.

Improving your opener’s experience is the lead benefit, and that can translate to more click-throughs and conversions from better storytelling, social proof, and retention. We can also say the same for video links, which take people outside of emails into a browser tab or app.

The impact of video on engagement and CTR

Wistia’s 2025 State of Video Report shows that videos that run for fewer than 60 seconds have a 50% engagement rate, meaning people watch half the video. Adding videos of that length to your emails could keep your openers actively engaged for longer.

The effect on click-through rate (CTR) is threefold. Your videos can contain links to your site, encourage customers to click buttons in your email, or your email can link to your video rather than use an embed and attract its own clicks.

The trust factor and impact on conversions

Adding videos to your emails provides natural connection points for storytelling, education, nurturing, and cross-sells/upsells.

Customers who watch videos in your emails spend more time with them open, which, over time, increases rapport and builds value into future engagement. Your customers are more likely to convert because they are better informed.

Types of video you can use in email campaigns

The types of videos you add to your email automations and campaigns will depend on who you are sending to, and at what stage they are at in their customer journey.

Three popular email campaign video types include:

Product demos

Demos can move your customers closer to purchase and improve their post-purchase experience with instructions and how-tos.

Another benefit to demo videos is that they answer the potential questions your customers have without making them click away from your email, which increases engagement time and helps to reduce support questions.

Customer testimonials

Adding video reviews, testimonials, customer stories, and compilations of the same to emails increases credibility in your products and brand. 

Your social proof videos can cover significantly more customer perspectives than text and star ratings alone provide. Either embed or link to pure social proof videos, or add testimonials to the educational videos you create.

Promotional and announcement videos

Some of your emails will announce products and sales, but it isn’t always realistic to cover everything your customer needs to know in text due to length concerns. 

A video can keep your customer in your email for longer and provide enough information to encourage clicks. And perhaps most crucially, the quality of those clicks will be higher because a portion will come from your video, which qualifies them.

Each of these video types can form part of a drip campaign, or email series, in which you move customers closer to purchase and retention.

7 video in email examples to inspire your efforts

These video email marketing examples have decent video placement, surrounding content, and designs. Use their best elements to improve your own:

1. Storytelling video email example

Subject line: Artist Series | Naiomi Glasses Documentary

Blanket retailer Sackcloth & Ashes uses videos in emails to share documentaries and customer stories. The example above has a “WATCH NOW” CTA button with a play icon, making it obvious where recipients should click to open the video.

There’s a premium feel to this email because the top image fades to black, which also makes the CTA button and description appear as overlays. That setup makes clicking feel natural, with the content below providing a content preview to pre-qualify clicks.

2. Founder letter with embedded video

Subject line: Running is a Gift

Sometimes, the most appropriate place for your email is after a longer text section, as is the case with the Tracksmith founder and CEO’s letter to customers, above.

The email here contains the CEO’s thoughts on running and his own story. It reads like a personal note to connect with customers. The video embed at the bottom builds on all of the points he raises with a customer success story.

3. Product discovery video email example

Subject line: Watch our team test the truck in the Nevada desert.

Slate Auto is the developer of a customizable electric pickup truck. It sends out product discovery campaigns to its subscribers to generate interest in pre-orders.

The promotional email above includes a discovery video with real-world testing in the Nevada desert, with two ways to click through. The first is an image thumbnail, the second is a red CTA button that stands out against the email’s dark gray background.

4. Welcome email with intro video

Subject line: 👀 Get more visibility over your team’s creative.

Brand hub platform Niice sends welcome emails with videos to help new customers learn more about the tool and how to use it effectively.

The video’s thumbnail with a smiling professional and play icon overlay encourages clicks, and there’s a short description below it with upfront value. The content then provides written tips, in case customers don’t want to watch the video.

5. Product focus video email example

Subject line: How to make the perfect cup

Coffee retailer Jot sends post-purchase emails to help customers grind, brew, and make the most of their coffee experience.

The email example above has a video tutorial for making a cup of coffee the right way, with both a thumbnail and a CTA button to encourage clicks. The heading, “So easy a rabbit could do it,” breaks the ice and sets expectations for a short video.

6. Educational video series email

Subject line: Chef notes from the pros 👩‍🍳👨‍🍳

Made In Cookware doesn’t embed just one video into its marketing campaigns; it covers multiple videos to help all customers make the most of its products.

The top image is static but follows the same size and format (a kitchen shot) as the video thumbnails below it. All the thumbnails have play overlays, and their descriptions contain links to the products covered in the videos.

7. Seasonal campaign video email example

Subject line: #SAVETHESTOUT

Shaving and grooming retailer Harry’s uses videos in its seasonal emails. The example above, for St. Patrick’s Day, uses humor to connect with customers and contains a video about a man who gets Irish stout stuck in his mustache.

There’s a green background in this email to match the occasion, something you can replicate with different colors for Thanksgiving, Halloween, and others.

How to embed a video in an email (step-by-step)

There are three ways to embed a video in your emails. All the methods below are reliable because they use thumbnails and links for videos, which then play elsewhere in tabs or your customer’s YouTube app or similar.

If you want to embed videos directly into your emails, Omnisend integrates with an app called Playable for videos up to 60 seconds long.

Using video thumbnails with play buttons

Omnisend lets you embed video thumbnails via a link with a play button overlay in any email template. Its pre-built block makes this easy. Here’s how:

1. Head to Campaigns in the sidebar
2. Click + Create campaign
3. Click Email
4. Enter your subject line:

5. Click Choose email template

6. Pick an email template

7. Now, with your email editor open, select Add Elements

8. Drag the Video element into your email:

9. Enter your video URL from any source, including YouTube or self-hosted:

That’s it! Your email template now has an embedded video thumbnail. Customers can click the thumbnail to open your video in a new tab.

Linking to landing pages or video platforms

You can link to videos on platforms such as YouTube and landing pages rather than embedding them in emails. It’s also good practice to provide a link to your video in emails alongside an embed for those whose email client won’t render the video properly.

To link to your videos with text:

1. Open your email editor
2. Write your content
3. Highlight the words you want to hyperlink
4. Select the Insert Link option in the text editor, as shown in Omnisend below:

Your customer can then click the link. The example above also uses a video embed in Omnisend as described in the previous section.

Using GIFs as video previews

Omnisend’s video element creates a static thumbnail. If you want an animated thumbnail, you can add one using the Image element. Here’s how:

1. Open your email template
2. Click Add Element
3. Drag the Image element into your email:

4. Select the Image element to open its settings

5. Click Select file to upload your GIF

6. In the Link to field, add your URL to link your GIF to your video:

That’s all you need to do to send a video by email. Remember to add a click/play overlay when creating your GIF to make it obvious that clicking through plays the video.

Best practices for video email marketing

Not every email campaign needs a video, firstly. Any inclusions should bring value to your customer experience, be it education or product discovery. And when you do use video in email marketing, these best practices are crucial:

Keep your videos short

Between 30 and 60 seconds is best for keeping your customers’ attention and covering whatever you need without droning on. Your videos should provide upfront value and stay on topic without any repetition.

Optimize for mobile viewing

Your image thumbnails need to be as small in file size as possible without reducing their visual quality. A good compression tool, such as Compress JPEG, works wonders.

Also, ensure the aspect ratios for your images match the video blocks in your email editor, such as 16:9, and host your videos on video-friendly platforms like Vimeo.

Use clear CTAs with video content

Your thumbnails should have click/play overlays to make it obvious that your customers can click the image to watch the video. As for your CTA buttons, make those a contrasting color and size them to at least 44 x 44 px for clickability.

Test and optimize performance

Send a few test emails to yourself before launching your campaign. Open the email in Outlook, Gmail, and other popular email clients. Does the video thumbnail render properly? Is the email doing enough to encourage clicks?

An A/B test is helpful for comparing how different video locations, thumbnails, surrounding content, and subject lines impact open rates and clicks.

Ready to improve your email campaigns with video?

Video email marketing introduces stories, social proof, products, and educational content to your customers in a format they enjoy consuming. 

Click-throughs increase naturally as customers click to watch, and you can create landing pages to host your videos with cross-sells and other revenue opportunities.

Omnisend provides four proven ways to include videos in your emails:

• Video thumbnails with play buttons
• Linking to landing pages and video platforms
• Adding GIFs to emails and linking them to videos
• Integrating the third-party Playable app for video embeds

All these features are available in all plans. The Free Forever plan is a good place to start to check out the email editor and video features.

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