Six Email Marketing Tips for eCommerce Sites
- Updated on: 2021-03-20
- Read original article here
If you own an eCommerce website, marketing is non-negotiable. While it’s always crucial to acquire new customers, you should consider retaining existing customers just as important. Why? Acquiring new customers is five times more expensive than retaining existing customers.
It’s also much easier to sell to someone who was already a customer than to convert a new customer. Think about it: a previous or existing customer already has a relationship with your brand. Therefore, there’s less barrier for entry.
That’s not to say customer acquisition should be an afterthought. A dual strategy focused on customer acquisition, and retention will ensure your eCommerce site thrives and maintains a healthy inbound funnel.
This is why email marketing is such an important marketing strategy. It provides brands with a direct line to each prospect, with ample opportunity to improve existing customer retention and create new customers.
Email marketing is no spring chicken, but with a fast-paced and ever-changing industry like eCommerce, it can be hard to keep up with the best email marketing methods. That’s why we’ve compiled six practical tips that can help you send the right eCommerce emails to your customers.
The more people you have subscribed to your emails, the more opportunity you have to increase sales and repeat business.
Promises of an exciting deal will push your leads to subscribe. Try offering a discount, like 20 percent off the first order, for hitting the “subscribe” button. You can set this promo up as a popup for visitors that are new to your site, or you can schedule it to popup before someone exits your site. Either way, once they sign up, send them an email with their discount as a way of saying thanks.
When customers know that you will occasionally deliver discount codes for their shopping enjoyment, unsubscribing from your marketing list won’t even cross their minds.
First impressions are long-lasting, and this holds for email marketing too. Customers often remember the first set of emails they received when they joined your email list, which is why you need to get your welcome emails right.
A welcome email serves the purpose of welcoming subscribers to your channel. It’s an opportunity for you to prove to them that they made the right decision in signing up for your campaigns.
The golden rule for your welcome email is to be friendly and polite. Offer a little hello, set the tone for your relationship, and top it with what you have to offer. It’s that simple.
As an eCommerce website owner, you have access to crucial information on your customers. By monitoring and keeping track of the products they’ve ordered, you can then create a list for each of your repeat customers based on their preferences.
Identifying your leads’ preferences gives you greater insight into how to anticipate their future needs. And when you’re able to anticipate products they may want, you can increase your sales and their satisfaction. It’s a win-win.
Sending the same messaging to your leads, hoping that it will be enough to convert and increase sales, is not practical. Everyone is different and responds differently to various kinds of messaging. By segmenting your eCommerce leads based on previous buying patterns and preferences, you’ll not only be in a position to send them more emails they want to receive, but you can offer them a tailored experience that shows them you really understand them.
We sort of touched on this in the previous point, but let’s drive it home.
Your emails will work wonders if the customers who are receiving them feel like their individual situation is catered to. To get to this point, you have to evaluate their buying history, taking note of the products they consistently purchase as well as any other items they may search or click on on your website.
We have all been on the receiving end of an irrelevant email. It takes only one to make us lose trust in the sender and contemplate hitting the unsubscribe button. However, by tapping into customer information and activity, you can improve your outreach, so it’s more targeted and specific to the individual receiving it. This will lead to more advocacy from your customers, repeat business, and increased email performance down the line.
The average shopping cart abandonment rate is almost 75 percent. While that’s a large number of people ducking out on purchases, it’s also a huge opportunity for eCommerce sites to capitalize on.
The reasoning varies. Sometimes customers abandon their carts because they forget about the order, aren’t happy with the price tag, or found something they like better on another site.
However, a simple cart abandonment email might serve as a helpful reminder or inspire them to take a second look at their cart to complete their order.
Putting something together that’s fun and catchy never hurts. See how GoDaddy does this in the image below.
Specify the purpose of the email and note the item left in the cart. Next, consider giving customers a discount for the product to motivate them to return to their cart. We don’t recommend doing this every time, as customers may abandon their carts more frequently in hopes of a discount. But, it’s a good move for every first cart abandonment.
Promo and sales holidays, like Black Friday, Cyber Monday, Small Business Saturday, flash sales, and clearance sales are designed to deliver top-notch discounts for shoppers on your eCommerce website.
Take advantage of these holidays by creating a newsletter informing customers of the deals running on your website. Or, create a teaser campaign that eases them into any upcoming promo so you can build anticipation and increase engagement once the promo is live.
Don’t let your email marketing efforts go stale. In the fast-paced world of eCommerce, it’s crucial to stay ahead of the curve and try various email marketing tactics to continue engaging leads and increasing sales. Each of these six email tips can help, just stay consistent and continue to track results so you can make improvements over time.
