Add this to your welcome sequence in 2025

What To Add To Your Welcome Sequence in 2025

I have a question for you. 

Don’t be mad.

But when was the last time you looked at your welcome sequence? 

Of all the places people can get stuck in their email marketing, welcome emails are one of the biggest hurdles. When I taught Email Stars live, we covered welcome emails in the very first module. Twelve weeks into the program students would still be writing their damn welcome emails. 

And once they were done? 

Fuhgettaboutit. Don’t make me look at that shit ever again.

But when you started your newsletter, you probably weren’t super clear what it was going to be about. You didn’t know which topics would be blockbusters and which would be tumbleweed-city. You didn’t know what day and time you’d settle on to send it. You didn’t have the credentials or experience you have today. You didn’t know your sister Julie who lives in South Carolina with her 13 cats was going to be a regular feature. Chances are you didn’t even know what you were going to be selling. 

Welcome sequences are like websites; they need regular updating. 

Inbox algos change just like social media algos do. Trends come and go. Branding evolves. YOU change. 

Before I left on my cruise this month, I wrote a whole new sequence from scratch—for all the reasons noted. (Please don’t sign up with a new email! It’s not live yet, plus you’ll mess with our back end. I’ll find a way to share it with you, promise.) 

I could’ve just edited the old one, but getting paid to write is the whole reason I have this business, so I jumped at the opportunity to sink my teeth into a meaty writing project. You probably don’t need to start over. 

I also had a long list of elements I wanted to add, which you should definitely consider adding to yours too. 

Here’s what got added to our welcome sequence:

A paid offer

I added a $7 offer throughout the sequence, which will go back into my ad spend budget. I want to be net-zero on new subscribers within 30 days. This would be a gamechanger for my whole business. 

Easy-to-answer questions

When a subscriber replies to your emails, it tells the algorithm, “This sender is important to me,” and improves inbox placement (i.e. keeps you out of the promotions tab). A tip: don’t make it complicated. The reply should take your new subscriber less than 30 seconds to compose. One of my questions isn’t even a question, it just says, “Hit reply and say, ‘I want the present.’”

Tons of links

Links didn’t use to be as important as they are today. Now that open rates data is compromised, we rely more heavily on link clinks to know who’s engaged and what emails they’re engaging with. I added links, mostly to my best podcast interviews, but also blog posts, offers, and social media.

Talk about AI

I only touched on it briefly, but it’s an important way to signal the sequence is current, and let subscribers know my stance.

What’s new with our programs

I did this in my old sequence but my offers and their positioning have changed, plus I’ve added a new email about our programs. I want new subscribers buying something sooner, or at least putting  themselves on a waitlist for one of our programs. 

More opportunities for consent

If a subscriber gets on the email list without ticking the consent tickbox, there are multiple opportunities in the sequence to give us consent to keep emailing. If we wanted to switch to a manual double-opt-in process, those consent opportunities are all ready to go. (The classic “click here to confirm your subscription” is an ineffective way to do double opt-in, and a huge missed opportunity and one email is easy to miss and doesn’t usually say anything about why a person would want to subscribe.)

The way I see it, the welcome sequence’s job is to:

1. Recoup ad spend
2. Ensure good inbox placement
3. Set up future deliverability
4. Onboard subscribers to the newsletter so they aren’t shocked and scared away 

Our new sequence will do all those things, plus it’s fun, entertaining and reads like something I wrote in 2025, not 2023 when I was a whole different Tarzan. 

When was the last time you looked at your welcome sequence? 

If you did a huge groan, you’re definitely not alone. I was thinking of doing a free workshop on this topic, as part of our upcoming promotion for 1KSUBS, which opens again in March. 1KSUBS helps you define what your newsletter is about and who it’s for, two things that make it tough to write a welcome sequence if you don’t know. 

What questions do you have about your welcome sequence?

Hit “reply” and share what’s hard.

Let me solve all of your problems. 

~ Tarzan 

Tarzan Kalryzian [she/they]
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