As brands prepare for Valentine’s Day marketing campaigns – a $25.8B US holiday in 2024 – new research reveals that emphasising human connection over the holiday itself boosts engagement by 22%. A ten-year study of over 61,000 email subject lines carried out by marketing platform Jacquard (www.jacquard.com) has found that referring to “your Valentine” (the gift recipient) significantly outperforms “Valentine’s Day” (the event), whilst generic romantic language (love, heart) actively hurts performance.
Jacquard, which has analysed over 200 billion retail emails for major brands including Sephora, Dick’s Sporting Goods, and Best Buy, has now turned its proven engagement science toward dating for Valentine’s Day. The company’s new AI tool uses a decade of marketing engagement data to translate the same linguistic analysis that drives conversion for billion-dollar retailers to help users craft higher-performing dating profiles ahead of Valentine’s Day.
The research also reveals that practical messaging around shipping outperforms aggressive sales tactics, with “shipping” driving 28.3% higher engagement whilst phrases like “shop” and “save” reduce clicks by over 20%. This reflects Valentine’s shoppers’ focus on timely gifts (often in the form of last-minute purchases – same day delivery orders quadruple on February 14th compared to the previous day), as they increasingly tune out artificial urgency, seeking more authentic and thoughtful communication instead.
Jacquard’s Valentine’s Day Marketing Report 2026 analysed 61,000 promotional email subject lines sent between 15th January and 14th February over the past decade. The research challenges several popular Valentine’s marketing practices: generic romantic terms like “love” reduce engagement, whilst more specific emotional language like “adore” drives significant uplifts.
Jacquard combines AI technology with a team of computational linguists who calibrate campaign language to ensure it resonates authentically with customers, balancing algorithmic precision with human nuance.
With Valentine’s Day representing a key revenue moment for retailers (Valentine’s spending was projected to reach $27.5B in 2025), Jacquard’s findings reveal which tactics will help brands cut through the noise, and which industry conventions are destined to fail this year.
The human connection advantage
Language that focuses on the person receiving the gift, as opposed to the holiday itself, significantly outperforms traditional Valentine’s messaging, according to Jacquard’s analysis.
The data showed:
“Valentine” (referring to the person) delivers a 10.8% uplift
“Valentine’s” (referring to the holiday) shows an 11.1% drop in performance
Subject lines framed around “your Valentine” or “be a Valentine” consistently outperform those mentioning “Valentine’s Day Sale” or “Valentine’s Gifts”
Toby Coulthard, CPO at Jacquard, comments: “Consumers are overwhelmed by transactional Valentine’s Day messaging on a day that’s meant to be all about genuine affection. The data shows that when brands shift focus from the calendar event to the human relationship, engagement improves dramatically. It’s the difference between ‘Valentine’s Day Sale’ and ‘For Your Valentine’ – one feels like a retail obligation, the other feels personal. One makes you think of a day in the calendar, and the other calls to mind a specific loved one. Even the smallest choices can make a real impact during such an important time of year for retailers.”
The love language paradox
Brands tend to overuse generic romantic terms, and the data suggests subscribers are fatigued by this approach, Jacquard’s research found.
The data showed:
“Love” actively reduces performance by 6.6%
“Heart” drives engagement down 15.6%
“Sweet” shows a 14.3% decline
“Adore” delivers a massive 16.9% uplift
“Romantic” drives a 11.7% increase
Coulthard comments: “Every brand defaults to ‘love’ and ‘heart’ around Valentine’s Day, which creates a sea of sameness in the inbox – all too familiar to consumers inundated with the cliche-ridden, generic language of standard LLMs. More specific, elevated emotional language – words like ‘adore’ or ‘romantic’ – feel more intentional and less generic. The data shows that specificity, and a focus on making the language used stand out, wins over generic sentiment every time.”
The Galentine’s effect
Valentine’s Day is no longer exclusively for romantic couples – 25% of consumers planned to celebrate Galentine’s Day in 2025. As such, increasingly inclusive language drives significantly higher engagement, according to Jacquard’s analysis.
The data showed:
“Friend” is a top performer with a 10.9% uplift
“Partner” shows a 4.1% decline
Positioning gifts for friends or “Galentines” consistently outperforms couple-focused messaging
Coulthard comments: “The rise of Galentine’s Day has fundamentally changed Valentine’s marketing. Brands that exclusively target romantic couples are missing a significant opportunity. ‘Friend’ language not only captures the Galentine’s audience but also performs better overall because it feels more inclusive and less presumptuous. Not everyone celebrating Valentine’s Day is in a romantic relationship, and the data reflects that reality.”
Thoughtful gestures over generic gifting
How brands frame the act of gifting has a dramatic impact on engagement, Jacquard’s data shows.
The data showed:
“Treat” drives a 11.6% uplift
“Surprise” delivers a 10.7% increase
“Spoil” causes a 22.7% drop in performance
Generic plural “Gifts” shows a 27.6% decline – the second-worst performing term in the dataset
Coulthard comments: “‘Gifts’ in plural feels like a chore – a list of obligations rather than a thoughtful gesture – with the proximity to Christmas meaning the word gift has all but lost its meaning. Meanwhile, ‘spoil’ has become overused to the point of meaninglessness, and can even carry negative connotations – it doesn’t fit with the feeling of the season. ‘Treat’ and ‘surprise’ feel intentional and positive. They position the purchase as a special moment rather than a retail transaction. This distinction becomes particularly important during Valentine’s, when emotional resonance is the entire point of the purchase.”
Practical messaging outperforms sales pressure
Clear, practical information drives significantly higher engagement than aggressive sales tactics during Valentine’s season, according to Jacquard’s analysis.
The data showed:
“Shipping” delivers a 28.3% uplift – the highest-performing word in the entire dataset
“Offer” shows a 6.9% increase
“Free” drives a 6.7% uplift
“Shop” causes a 21.3% decline
“Save” reduces engagement by 10.3%
“Limited” drives performance down 18.8%
Coulthard comments: “Consumers don’t want to be commanded to ‘shop’ or told to ‘save’ during Valentine’s – they want practical information that helps them execute their purchase decision. ‘Shipping’ is the single strongest performer because it answers the critical question: will this arrive in time? Similarly, artificial scarcity tactics like ‘limited’ backfire during Valentine’s because consumers can see through manufactured urgency. Genuine helpfulness outperforms sales pressure.”
From retail to romance
Alongside the research release, Jacquard is launching a Valentine’s Day AI tool to help people find a date in time for Valentine’s Day. The tool uses Jacquard’s natural language AI to analyse dating app profiles, bios, and prompts, optimising them to increase right swipes by applying the same linguistic analysis that drives conversion for billion-dollar retailers.
The dating tool applies the same principles revealed in the email research: specificity over generic language, human connection over transactional messaging, and data-driven optimisation of self-presentation.
