Guest blog written by Patrick Junker Ravn, Head of E-mail Marketing at ASENTO
The 3 most important e-mail automations you need to have set up as a webshop
Email marketing is a broad term and covers lead generation, campaign emails, segmentation and much more. All, are elements that are important when you want success and not least growth through your email efforts
Another important element of the good email strategy is email automation. In short - automatic communication directly to your target audience's mailbox.
In this post, we present 3 automations, all of which are automations that a webshop must have set up in order not to miss out on easy earnings that are also scalable in the long run!
#1 Welcome automation - Your opportunity to present your brand in the best possible way and generate revenue at the same time!
We all know it - we sign up to an email list and receive a welcome email trying to persuade us to buy.
But a welcome automation is much more than that. With the right messaging and planning, a welcome automation can create a strong relationship with your new permission - while also creating revenue on your shop.
Your first email should come right after the user signs up for your newsletter. The user will expect to receive an email and for that email to be in their inbox within a short period of time.
The email should contain a crisp presentation of your brand, which of course includes the colours, fonts and visuals that you want your brand to be associated with.
In addition, it is important that you try to personalise your email to the user - as much as possible. This can be done with a first name, which is data you should collect when signing up.
The email should also contain the prize on which the user signed up in the first place. If the user signed up because of a discount code, then the email should of course contain their code. If the user signed up to become part of their universe, then you should provide an introduction to your universe and what it offers.
So is a welcome automation just that?
It can be, but we don't recommend it. After all, you have brought in a user who is at a stage where your brand is new, interesting and highly topical to them. This is reflected in the average open rate, which in a welcome automation is higher than all other automations
For this very reason, you should continue to influence the user in the direction you want them to go. In the vast majority of cases, the goal behind this type of automation is a conversion, which is then what you should be working towards. Therefore, you continue your automation and after a few days we recommend that you send the user another email.
What, the email should contain, should match with the strategy you choose.
Below we have set out two strategies for a welcome automation.
Common to both is that they work towards a conversion, but the "pressure" is different
Important: Exclude purchases through the flow and remember to make the individual emails evergreen so they can run over a longer period.
The two strategies can of course be made longer if you wish - it's just important that you always remember to exclude the users who buy through your automation and at the same time that your emails are evergreen and can therefore run over a longer period.
#2 Abandoned Cart - The lowest hanging fruit to be harvested!
Abandoned Cart or Lost Cart automation is not revolutionary, but it is automation that needs to be set up as it can reap the lowest hanging fruit. And what is more low hanging than a basket lost on your webshop WHILE being subscribed to your email list? No, we don't know that either.
An abandoned cart automation is triggered by a lost cart on your website. Unlike the welcome, you want to wait a bit before sending out your first email in this automation, otherwise you risk sending the email while the user is still on your site - they've just abandoned the cart.
But after a few hours you should have your first email out to the user. The email should contain a crisp subject line and preview text that gets the user to open the email
In the email, we see the best results by personalising it and also talking into the basket that the user has dropped on your website - usually a picture of the product and price is best. The messages in the email should be simple:
"Hi Karsten, we see that you left your basket on our website. Maybe something got in the way? We'll save your basket for you if you want to return to it" (Only applies to people called Karsten!)
This email is just to inform your user that they have forgotten their basket and that you are saving it for them for a while longer.
Mail number two should come 6-8 hours after the last mail. The mail should be salesy, and here you can already start using urgency or scarcity (or both!) to convince the user that now is the time to keep their cart on your shop. Example
"Hi Karsten, a few hours ago we sent you an email regarding your abandoned cart on our site. We just want to remind you that due to increasing demand for this particular item, our system will have to delete your cart in 24 hours. You can retrieve your cart in the next 24 hours via the button below."
In the above case, you remind the user once again that they have forgotten their basket, and this time you implement both scarcity (increasing demand) as well as urgency (24 hours left).
If the user doesn't buy on the above email, and if you're willing to give the user a little extra, then you can also go with a third email. The email here should hit on what is most likely the barrier to the user buying: the price
If you give the customer an advantage on price either via a discount code, free shipping or similar in the last mail, you also ensure that you compromise your bottom line first in the last mail. This is hopefully not an email that the majority will get, as you have got them to buy in one of the first two emails, and thus you have excluded them from the rest of your automation
In several ESPs you also have the option to segment on the value of the basket that they have lost. This way, you can also choose if it is only at certain basket sizes that you want to discount.
Example of third mail 18 hours after basket is dropped(6 hours before expiry):
"Hi Karsten! Last time you visited our webshop, you forgot one of our best-selling products in your basket. We have reserved the basket for the last 18 hours, but unfortunately our system deletes the basket after 24 hours and makes it available for purchase on our webshop again
We know that 999 kroner can be a lot for a chair - but we also know how much you're going to love it. Because we're so confident, we also want to give you a little extra - something we don't normally do. But we'd like to give you 15% off your basket..."
#3 Browse Abandonment - High volume of emails which can drive revenue and create additional data points on the user.
A browse abandonment automation is based on a visit to a product - but the user has neither bought a product nor put a product in the basket.
Users here are probably in a consideration or research phase, which is something you need to take advantage of. Usually, this type of automation is not the one that generates the most revenue - but it is an automation that, with its high volume, can generate more data points about the user that you can leverage in your email setup
As a starting point, we recommend that you start with a single email in this type of automation and then build on - depending on the reception from your users
A good option here is to show complementary products or products that are similar to the product they saw on your webshop. You can also easily speak into the single product that they looked at:
"Hi Karsten! You seem to have good taste - we love these jeans too! Based on this product, we know a bit more about you, and we've taken the liberty of putting together 3 pairs of jeans that are super cool and just your style. Check them out below."
In the example above, you acknowledge the user's taste, but you also give the user 3 new options. So you're covering two angles
Another angle is to completely omit over the user that you know their behavior on your webshop. In many ESPs you can also link this trigger with the number of products the user has looked at. If you see here that the user has looked at many products in one session, they might be inspired to make their next purchase, which you can therefore speak into
If, on the other hand, the number of products is low, then the above example of Karsten's jeans will probably work better, as Karsten seems to be on the hunt for a new pair of jeans
As mentioned earlier, this type of automation is not the one that generates the most revenue - but on the other hand, it has a volume that can provide good data points about your customer, which you can use in your segmentation - but also in the rest of your automations!
The 3 automations above are must-haves for any webshop, and they should of course be adapted to your company's brand and communication. The next thing you need to work on is collecting new permissions and getting more data points about each one, as well as continuously building your automation setup bigger to scale this channel and raise your revenue
If you have any questions about email marketing, I'm ready to answer them by email pjr@asento.dk
