What’s the secret to real returns from your ecommerce project?
It’s not about having huge traffic to your website.
It’s not about having the lowest priced offering in your market.
It’s not about having a sophisticated social media presence.
It’s about retaining customers with targeted, automated communication throughout the business-relationship cycle. As your relationship with the customer changes, so does your contact. With a lifecycle email campaign, you’ll be contacting customers based specifically on their behaviours, nurturing the relationship with well-timed and appropriate communication.
Think about your customers as transitioning through three key categories: Prospects, Engaged Customers and Lapsed Customers.
Now let’s define our terms.
Prospects
This is someone who has never purchased from you. You could be contacting them via your mass email marketing, or they may have registered their interest via your website. Either way, they’ve never actually paid for your service.
They are at the beginning of the lifecycle and your top priority for prospects is find as many of them as you can and get them to the next step: engagement.
Engaged Customers
This is someone who has taken the next step and actually laid money down for your offer. They may also be repeat customers who have been interacting with you long-term.
The key activity you’re looking to provoke with an engaged customer is repeat purchases. That means re-subscriptions, up-sells and brand loyalty.
Lapsed Customers
This is a formerly-engaged customer who has ceased to interact with your company. Your main job here is to tempt him back into the fold.
So let’s get down to specifics.
What does a lifecycle email programme look like? Let’s find out.
Sample lifecycle email programme recipe:
1. First Contact
The customer has made contact. Either they’ve signed up for updates or a newsletter on your site; maybe they’ve interacted with your brand on social media; or perhaps filled out a survey. Now is the time to engage them with an introduction.
2. Welcome to the Matrix
Send a welcome message and begin to educate the potential customer about what you have to offer. The purpose of your contact now it to get the client interested while building trust. Expect to contact the customer multiple times via email. Use these vehicles to speak about your products and company, answer questions that the client may have and overcome hesitation towards your brand. During this phase you are, essentially, ‘warming’ the leads, so make sure your correspondence is focused on what the customer wants and needs. Be relevant.
3. Prioritise
When it comes to ecommerce, traffic is important. The mistake, however, is thinking it’s the most important part of the marketing process. The fact is most of the people who visit your site won’t actually buy anything. Keeping customers is better than getting new ones. This is the beginning of your relationship with the customer, not the end.
Focus on building the relationship with your automated mass email campaigns. Show the customer how to use anything he’s purchased better. Bring new products he may be interested in to his attention. Ask for further engagement.
4. So what next?
What else can the customer offer you? If they’re happy with your product or service, ask them to ‘like’ you on Facebook, tell a friend or buy something else. Would it be possible to increase their purchase frequency? Would a discount for an additional purchase be appropriate? What products do you sell that work in synergy with the purchased item? Offer it.
5. Jog their memories
Use service alerts, receipts, coupons and other special promotions as a chance to upsell your customer. Piggy-backing an offer to buy on the tail of another message is a great way to keep offers in front of your audience, without coming off like a hard-sell annoyance.
6. Get specific
Target specific customers based on their web behaviour. If someone’s clicked a certain page on your website, automate a follow-up email offering them the product they were looking at. Automating a ‘based-on-what-you’re-interested-in-you-might-like-to-buy-this’ email — à la Amazon.com will keep your products front of mind for your audience (one market researcher found that it takes seven contacts before a customer is ready to buy, so don’t be afraid to ‘overdo it’, just a little bit).
7. Abandonment issues
Cart abandonment — adding an item to a one’s online shopping cart but failing to follow that purchase through — is very common in the online environment. Abandonment however, needn’t be permanent. To reduce abandonment rates automate a sequence of follow-up emails to shoppers who haven’t completed their order. The first email should be to remind the shopper of their forgotten purchase. If they still fail to act, follow up with an enticement to act — maybe free shipping, a discount or freebie.
8. It’s not over ‘till it’s over
Not all customer relationships last forever, but some do. Just because a customer has stopped buying doesn’t mean it’s over. Whether they’ve lost interest in your service, gone to a competitor or simply moved on in their life, now’s your chance to win back your old customers with an offer they simply can’t refuse. Remember: They’ve made a purchase in the past and, given the right offer, are likely to purchase again so spend a little time coming up with a great deal to bring them back into the fold. Remind them of just what you’ve got to offer and entice them with a discount or some other promotion.
9. Breaking up is hard to do
But sometimes it really is over. If you have no luck getting your lapsed client spending again, use the situation as an opportunity to get some last licks in. Send a survey asking why they’re leaving and make one last offer of a great deal in return for re-engagement. Remember, even a lapsed customer is worth more than one who’s never bought from you, so put time into honing your offer.