Customers are most engaged with a company the moment they make their first purchase from that company or sign up for a newsletter. No matter how extensive your product range or how good customer support you provide, both customers and subscribers will eventually lose interest in your company. At the same time, it’s not at all a fact that something is wrong with your marketing strategy… It’s just a natural process of losing interest. Sending a win-back email campaign should be an essential part of any effective marketing strategy.
What is a win-back email campaign?
A win-back email campaign is a message or series of emails that are sent to uninterested (inactive, dropped) customers in the hope that you will convince them to return to your online store and make a purchase, or re-engage them with your mailings. To increase your chances of success in this battle for customer attention, it’s important to offer them some sort of special discount or bonus to re-engage them in your company.
Getting a customer back with just one email is likely to fail. Regardless of how profitable an offer you have prepared for such clients. The client can simply take advantage of this offer to make one purchase on super-favorable terms, after which he will lose interest in you again. Instead, in order to fully and successfully engage the client again, it is recommended to send him a series of messages. The first message should contain information about the discount or bonus described above. In your next message, you should remind the customer of all the great benefits your company has to offer.
How often do you need to send a win-back email campaign?
It is better to reactivate the client base constantly. To do this, once every six months, select the segment of subscribers who don’t read or don’t buy. If possible, automate this process or set yourself recurring reminders so you don’t forget to do it regularly.
Subscribers who haven’t read a single letter in the last 6 months and ignored reactivation mailings should be removed from the database. Such contacts don’t bring profit, but only take money from the company, as it pays the mailing service for them, and also reduces the email reputation of the domain by ignoring emails.
Win-back email campaign examples that will get customers back
■ If the user has purchased a product with a short life cycle, such as food. At the end of this cycle, remind him that it’s time for a new purchase.
■ Abandoned cart. When a visitor viewed a product, they added it to their shopping cart but never bought it. Send an email with product information and an offer to complete the order.
■ Abandoned order. By order, we mean the main target action: the purchase of a product, registration, payment for a service, fill out an application, and so on. If the user started this action and didn’t finish it, return it with a trigger email and give them a reason to complete the order.
■ Viewed products (pages). If the user has viewed the same product (or a page with a description of the service) several times, then he is interested. Send this user an email with a discount on this product (service) before they go to competitors.
■ Return of inactive users. Set up sending a win-back email campaign for customers who used to buy from you, but are now inactive, or don’t come to you. Offer them a discount, special conditions, or expert help.
Possible variants for the Subject Line
■ We haven’t seen you for a long time! Get % off any item on your next purchase
■ Where are you? We missed you! Come back, we have a great offer for you!
■ Here are [some] reasons to keep buying from us
■ Absolutely everyone at [company] missed you! Here are [some] reasons to stay our subscriber
■ Let us know if you still wish to receive information from us
■ Breaking up is difficult, but it’s not too late to fix everything!
How to maintain a constant interest of the client in the company using win-back email campaign
■ Pay attention to the study of the client after the purchase. He shouldn’t feel that he was left alone with the goods. He wants to see that they take care of him, and help him. To do this, you can create a chain of training letters with instructions on how to use the product. For example, if you have an English language learning service, tell about its capabilities, and if you sell electric grills, send the client interesting options for dishes that can be cooked in them.
■ Collect feedback. After the customer has made a purchase, send him a letter requesting a review or offer to take a survey on the quality of the product or service. You can motivate a client to answer questions or leave feedback by offering him a bonus for this. For example, a discount on the next purchase or points for feedback.
■ Periodically change the design of emails, and add characters. For example, send messages on behalf of one person, and grocery emails on behalf of another. Separate email streams so people know right away what email to expect from whom.
A Win-Back Email Campaign – Frequently Asked Questions
Is it necessary to include a discount offer in a win-back email campaign?
The very essence of sending a customer win-back email is some kind of special offer or bonus that will re-interest your once-loyal customers or subscribers in your products, services, or content. The best way to do this is to simply give the customer a significant or unique discount.
But don’t stop there. It’s equally important to remind the customer of all the essential reasons to buy from your store. At the same time, in such messages, information about the discount provided should be indicated in order to enhance the effect of the message. Lastly, the “last chance” email, containing the opt-out and renewal links, can also include a discount to encourage customers to return to your store using this last opportunity.
How many customers’ win-back emails should be sent?
You should send one email offering a discount to encourage the customer to return to your store. Even if the client takes advantage of your offer and makes a purchase, it’s still recommended to send him another message describing all the benefits of working with you. This is necessary so that the client doesn’t lose interest in you again, or simply doesn’t cash out his unexpected profit without any intention of continuing cooperation with you. And, the last.
What to do if the emails sent earlier had no effect and the recipient never returned to your store and didn’t answer your messages?
In this case, you should send him one more, last email, asking if the client wants his address has been removed from your list. This way you can keep your customer base up to date and focus on more promising customers.
What to do if the client doesn’t respond to the last message of the win-back emails campaign?
You can send another email in about a week. Just to make sure the previous email wasn’t accidentally lost in the client’s mail. Any additional messages you send after removing an address from your client list should inform the benefits of your products. But if you don’t get any responses to these emails, then it’s probably best to forget about the client and move on.
Before sending emails, set the frequency with which it’s better to send letters (no more than two per week) and think about their design (ideally, the body of the letter should be with a photo, links, and interactive buttons). Constantly test how effective messages are (how often they are opened, how many visits to the site as a percentage). It’s optimal if your mailing service has integration with a CRM system that shows which emails ended up in the Spam folder, and which ones showed the highest conversion.