This year, Mother’s Day is May 14 and if you don’t already have a plan in place to reach out to your customers by email, it’s not too late to get started.

As a retailer, Mother’s Day isn’t a holiday you want to miss out on. Take a look at these stats from the National Retail Federation:

• Total Mother’s Day spend is expected to reach $23.6 billion
• 20.7% more consumers plan to celebrate Mother’s Day in 2017
• Greeting cards, flowers, and meals are the top three purchases for Mother’s Day

With stats like that, you’ll want to kick your email marketing into high gear.

We recommend that you start marketing at least two weeks before Mother’s Day to make the most of it. Need a little inspiration? Here are four emails you should send to celebrate Mother’s Day:

1. Gift suggestion email

Who doesn’t need a little gift inspiration now and then? Help your customers by offering gift ideas. Whether you highlight your main product or create a gift guide, you should showcase gifts that mom’s would like. Think about organizing your gift guide by interest, style or price points.

If you need help creating a gift guide, check out this post that walks you through the process.

Gift guides are also great to share on image-centric social sites like Pinterest and Instagram. With sales on the line, it might be a great time to try out using Promoted Pins and see if they translate into revenue for you.

2. Invitation email

Use email to invite your customers to an event, class, sale or contest.

Contests can increase customer engagement and increase visits to your brick-and-mortar store or website. A florist could have customers post photos of their mothers on the store’s Facebook page for a chance to win free flowers. A bookstore or kitchen store could hold a Mother’s Day recipe contest for a free cookbook.

Local retailers could also invite customers out to a mom-themed sale or event. Clothing shops can run a Mother’s Day sale, a local spa can host a mother-daughter event.

If you plan ahead, you can organize a class that focuses on Mother’s Day. Hobby stores, for example, can invite customers to a craft class to make a gift for their special someone.

Be sure to include all of the necessary details in the invitation email that you send.

3. Last minute sale email

People tend to wait until the last minute to buy gifts, so give them a nudge with a last minute email. Sweeten the deal with a promotion.

Use clear messaging in your subject line to indicate that time is running out on a certain deal, a limited item or free shipping. Whatever the enticement, put your offer right in the subject line to make sure recipients open the email and take action.

Take a look at the example below. This retailer creates a sense of urgency and offers an incentive to get subscribers to act.

4. Celebrate the holiday email

When Mother’s Day rolls around, send an email that celebrates the holiday. There’s no sales push, just an acknowledgment of appreciation. You could send this email to everyone on your list, or just those who made a purchase. If you send an email to those who made a Mother’s Day purchase, be sure to thank them as well.

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Editor’s note: This blog post was originally published in April 2015 and has been revamped and updated for accuracy and relevance.

© 2017 – 2018, Contributing Author. All rights reserved.