This is an excerpt from Ryder E-commerce’s latest ebook “Unleashing the power of creative channel expansion for D2C brands” by Yotpo, who powers advanced solutions for email and SMS marketing. Check out the full ebook here.
The e-commerce landscape has long been driven by the relentless pursuit of customer acquisition and rapid growth. However, the industry is now experiencing a shift towards sustainable growth, which necessitates a renewed focus on customer retention.
According to a recent survey conducted by Yotpo, 52% of brands said that they are more focused on retention than they were a year ago, but 40% have yet to make any changes to enhance or broaden their retention strategies. Additionally, 70% of brands reported that their retention rates either remained stagnant – or worsened – over the past year.
While the importance of retention is widely recognized, many brands struggle with where to begin. To develop a powerful e-commerce retention strategy, a brand needs to leverage all available marketing channels to build a cohesive customer journey. By integrating and aligning these channels, brands can achieve even greater impact, fostering sustained engagement, repeat purchases, and long-term customer relationships.
To build a multi-channel retention strategy, you need to know your customers, create a fully connected journey, and offer them value at every touchpoint. Here’s what that looks like in practice:
Once a customer receives their order, keep the momentum going by sending an email and SMS to solicit reviews and ratings. Invite them to join your loyalty program and send them an automated welcome flow letting them know how to earn points, including following you on social media.
Step 2: Create a value exchange between you and your customer
After a customer leaves a review, reward them with loyalty points for their feedback and then send an email or text letting them know how many points they’ve earned.
Step 3: Deliver personalized communications for ongoing engagement
Use SMS and email to remind the customer of their loyalty points balance and recommend products they are likely to buy based on their purchases and behavior.
Step 4: Shorten the path to the next purchase
If you offer subscriptions, let the customer know that they can redeem loyalty points on a subscription, and incentivize sign-up by offering additional points. Use technology like Click-to-Redeem to offer them a curated cart experience right from a text.
Step 5: Deepen the connection between the customer and your brand
Now that your first customer is a repeat one, keep engaging them and providing value. Remind them when their next subscription order is coming up so they can make changes or skip, incentivize referrals to help offset your acquisition costs, and send SMS and email when they reach a new loyalty tier, explaining the new benefits they’ve unlocked.
To build these multi-channel experiences that keep customers coming back, your technology solutions need to work together, with shared data points and a single view of the customer. With the right data and segmentation capabilities, you can ensure that you’re always engaging the customer with the right message, on the right channel — building deeper relationships and turning every first-time shopper into a loyal brand advocate.
Want to learn more? Check out the rest of our ebook on how brands can effectively expand their selling channels and find more opportunities to creatively engage customers:
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