Ecommerce email marketing — optimize your campaign in 8 simple steps

Okay, here is a fact- 80% of the 254 retail professionals that participated in a survey said that ecommerce email marketing is the most profitable channel of all the digital marketing channels. Followed by organic search channels and social media.

So, I guess we all have a picture of how important email marketing is in the e-commerce industry. Also the reason why everyone is hell bent on creating high converting email marketing strategies.

But to achieve that rate of success which forces you to think that investment in email marketing is bliss, you need to have a complete understanding of when, how, and what to email to convert as well as retain your customers.

And how would you do that?

Well, it’s simple, all you have to do is consider your customer’s journey with you as their lifecycle. This lifecycle is divided into three main stages- New Customers, Existing, and Dwindled.

There are a lot of things to consider before you make your mailing list but today, we are going to talk about at what point do you need to send marketing e-mails to the customers.

In all, the types of emails you may need to create for different stages of the customer’s lifecycle!

Ecommerce Email Marketing #1: The First Email After Customer Sign-Up- Welcome EMail

The first e-mail to a freshly signed customer is your chance to make a grand impression for your brand.

Although the sign-up is itself a sign of interest in the brand, this welcome mail will display your correspondence capacity to the customers.

The tone should be perfectly warm with a tinge of personal touch and as simple as possible. Make sure you don’t gag the customers with overly personalized welcome notes! While email marketing needs personalized marketing, you’re still not there on that stage.

All you have to remember for this campaign is that there will be many more instances where you will have the chance of more conversions, so make the welcome email minimalistic and at the same time visually attractive.

Avoid conveying more than necessary with additional information. As I said, you will have plenty of opportunities for that!

3 Quick Tips

1. Showing gratitude is the simplest welcome email theme, you can use that
2. Including a ‘virtual mobile screen’ with Google maps showing your physical store location could be a good idea.
3. You can include a ‘Sign-Up’ discount coupon

Ecommerce Email Marketing #2: Express Your Happiness On The Start Of The Journey- Congratulatory First Order EMail

Receiving the first order from a customer is a huge thing, it is a confirmation of the probability that you just bagged a lifetime customer.

But we all know how tough the competition is; if only the customers would be so loyal to stick to their e-commerce partner! Well, Amazon has made it, maybe you can too!

Sans the hard work, it is not possible but how will you know without trying? So let your first-time buyers know how excited you are to be at their service. Congratulate them on their first order and tell them you’ll be glad to be at their service anytime soon. That’s more like creating crazy e-commerce customer service for them.

3 Quick Tips

1. You can share the story of your brand and how each customer has contributed
2. On the basis of the type of your customer’s first order, say, for instance, it’s a pair of shoes, you can suggest pairs of socks
3. A link to a blog written related to the product purchased could be a great idea. Include catchy CTAs to generate more traffic on blog posts.

Ecommerce Email Marketing #3: Order Details Are A Must- Confirmation EMail

This is one of the most common mistakes committed by small to medium scaled businesses. Well, they do send confirmation email but without the details that it must have.

Customers are looking for e-commerce platforms who not only offer good products but have commendable logistics. Anything below the smart range is simply frowned upon.

So your confirmation mails should not miss the order details such as order ID, Tracking ID, and estimated delivery time. Talk about creating effective eCommerce marketing strategies?

3 Quick Tips

1. You can assure the customers about your return and exchange policies and add a link to that web page. That’s one of the key features your eCommerce business should have.
2. An entire order summary would be a perfect addition to the confirmation mail
3. The subject line should include the order number

Ecommerce Email Marketing #4: Cart Abandonment Is A Painful Reality- Remembrall EMail

There is a plethora of shoppers and even more reasons why they abandon their cart. The amount went way beyond the budget and now felt too lazy to choose what to buy, no intention to shop, high-delivery rate, found a better deal, genuine hurry, caught up in some work and intend to order later, etc. are just some of the common reasons.

Whatever the reason be, you have to assume that your customers wanted to buy that passionately and just couldn’t at that moment.

So what’ll you do? Yes, remind them they chose some lovely items and forgot to order. It’s one of our favorite ways to minimize cart abandonment. All you have to do is be thoughtful, not pushy!

3 Quick Tips

1. Set a convincing yet a warm tone to the e-mail
2. Display the products added in the cart to lure out the shopper in your customer
3. And most importantly, add a compelling copy of CTA for higher email CTR

Ecommerce Email Marketing #5: It’s Important To Know What Impression Have You Created- Feedback Email

Here you have to be extremely cautious as these emails have the tendency of annoying the consumers.

But the naked truth is that you need feedback. Reviews have the capacity to drive your sales both the ways.

So, how will you do it? Well, imagine how you would like to be asked for a feedback? Yes, we don’t want the form to be very long. So concision is what works for feedback emails.

3 Quick Tips

1. ‘Help us improve our services’, taglines like these will do the trick. It’s one of the best ways to build efficient eCommerce customer service.
2. Make your questions as crisp as possible
3. Never make writing a compulsion for customers. Give them a choice between answering a questionnaire or writing their own review

Ecommerce Email Marketing #6: For All The Lapsed Customers- Re-engagement Email

There will always come a time in each of your customer’s lifecycle when they will go into hibernation and you will not hear from them for quite a long time.

Yes, exactly, it’s time for ‘Long time, no see!’ kind of emails! There could be many reasons for this lapse and it is your responsibility to check on your customers.

Why you ask?? Because it is much cheaper to retain a customer than to engage a new one. So you’ll fail terribly if you let your older customers go thinking that you will always build a clientele.

Make your re-engagement emails all about your need to get them back. Offer your soul if you have to!

Remember, you are a seller!

3 Quick Tips

1. Discount coupons are a must in re-engagement emails
2. Choose catchy subject lines and always include words like ‘gift’ in them
3. You can add the details of either the coming up deals or make the customer regret by adding what kind of deals they missed when they weren’t around and here is their chance!

Ecommerce Email Marketing #7: Selling Is An Art- Informational Emails Are A Neat Method

Buy this, buy this!- This is not art and this is absolutely not how you sell! To make this entire thing subtle, there are information emails.

Now, this is a fact that no customer is going to buy from your every day, right? But you still have to maintain that rapport with them.

These emails are to be sent between their purchases and the next purchase. You can share your brand’s story blog, or convey them how you rewarded the top reviewers, etc.

All it needs is relevance!

3 Quick Tips

1. Suppose 15 customers bought a particular dress from your store and one of the celebrities used a similar dress. You can create a blog post on how the celebrities are styling the dress and include the link in the mail with a catchy subject line
2. Never go out of relevance
3. Keep your blog updated, that’s what helps you revive your information emails. That’s one of the coolest SEO checklists to tickmark.

Ecommerce email marketing #8: It All Comes Down To Increased Profits- Cross-sells and Upsells Emails

If you win the game of customer satisfaction, you also have to win the money game. After all, you are running a business and earning profits is the goal.

Cross-sell and upsell emails will let you achieve that goal as you will strategize the pitching of products that go with an already-purchased product (cross-sell/ instance: pitching headphones if the purchase was a phone) or the products that have a significantly higher value than the last purchase (Upsell).

Cross-sell will increase the number of orders and ultimately your profits. Upsell emails are a hard seller but a strong one as the margin of profit is bigger for these products.

3 Quick Tips

1. Try to combine the both, as in pitch a product that complements the purchase and also has a larger margin
2. Don’t over or under do. Give more than one options but restrict to a 5 or 6
3. Hash your customers on the basis of their spending capacity. The one who has never spent above $50 on your e-commerce store is highly unlikely to purchase a $70 product via this emailer

Above all of these, never make the mistake of spamming your customers or compromise their data. The ones who are lost because of these reasons will definitely never come back but will also not allow their friends, your potential customers to buy from your e-commerce store!

Why you need digital marketing agency to take care of your email gimmicks?

I have mentioned the 8 tips. But understanding them, and executing them are two different tasks. Email marketing has much deeper nuances that you may not be aware of. This is why you need digital marketing services who not only understand email marketing, but takes care of SEO and conversion.

Look! The goal of email marketing is to get them rolling through emails. Be a part of your newsletter family. And many more. All this needs expertise and digital marketing strategists who follow.

You might also be interested in

1. Social media marketing for your business
2. Affiliate marketing for beginners

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