Email automation is a powerful tool for customer retention for online retail stores. The problem is that many companies are unsure which automated email campaigns they should prioritize and test.
Benefits of Automated Email
In addition to helping you save the time it takes to send all those messages manually (can you imagine?), there are some other key benefits to automating most of your messages to customers:
1. Personalizing the Shopper Experience
According to a study published on Marketing Charts in 2021, 28% of global marketers surveyed said that effectively using personalization was one of their most challenging goals to achieve. However, one of the easiest ways to tackle this is by addressing customers personally in emails, in addition to customizing their shopping experience.
2. Improving Customer Retention Rates
In addition to personalizing the shopping experience, automated email helps improve customer retention rates by sending automated emails for abandoned carts, showcasing products related to recent purchases or recently viewed products, and announcements of new products.
3. Helping Grow the Email Marketing Strategy
Remember the idea of sending all customer messages manually? That’s a bad idea. One of the most important benefits of automated email is its scalability. According to the Salesforce State of Marketing report, 81% of marketing organizations use automation technology (including email) to help them increase engagement.
9 Automated Email Campaigns to Send
There are seven automated email campaigns that most online retailers can benefit from:
1. Abandoned Cart Email Series
According to research from the Baymard Institute, about 81.4% of online shopping carts are abandoned. That’s a lot of money left on the table by shoppers who were interested in your product. Fortunately, there’s good news: while Business Insider estimates that online retailers will lose about $4 trillion due to cart abandonment, it also estimates that smart retailers can recover about 63% of that lost revenue. For this reason, it’s essential to have a strategy for handling abandoned carts, supported by automated abandoned cart emails.
2. Welcome Email Series
A welcome email is the first message someone receives when they join your email list. You might have a welcome message for customers, but in this case, we’re talking about a welcome message for new subscribers who haven’t converted yet. According to 2016 data from Omnisend, welcome emails have an average open rate of 45%, compared to 18% for promotional emails. Shoppers pay attention to and engage with these messages, making them a great opportunity for businesses.
3. Customer Nurture Email Series
The customer nurture email campaign is ideal for online stores. Customer nurturing is the process that guides shoppers through every stage of the sales cycle, ultimately driving them to purchase. Most companies focus on customers who are ready to buy now, while there are about half of shoppers who won’t buy regardless of what we do. This means that most stores are voluntarily leaving 47% of potential customers unaddressed properly. This is where the email nurture series comes in.
4. New Customer Email Series
The email you send to first-time customers is crucial. If you miss this opportunity, you could leave a significant amount of money on the table. You have a chance to start a customer relationship that leads to long-term loyalty and brand advocacy.
5.
Series of Messages for Repeat Customers
Repeat customers account for nearly a quarter of revenue, despite only making up 11% of the customer base, according to a report by Stitch Labs on customer loyalty. You will have an easier time creating a targeted automated email campaign to strengthen relationships with existing customers rather than trying to attract new ones.
6. E-commerce Email Receipts
Email receipts are a virtual goldmine for sales and revenue: this means they are the perfect place to make an offer and encourage customers to take further actions.
7. Re-engagement Email Series
Over time, your subscribers may start to ignore your messages. An automated email campaign for re-engagement or “customer recovery” can help reignite interest. One study by Return Path found that almost half of users who receive these messages will open them and engage with subsequent messages.
8. Stock Updates
You can also send updates to customers regarding stock. When a desired product in your store comes back in stock, you want your customers to know about it!
9. Survey or Feedback Messages
Survey or customer satisfaction messages are also another type of email that can be ideal for automation. While these messages may not directly impact overall revenue like abandoned cart messages do, they are important nonetheless.
Here are some popular tools for automated email marketing:
- Klaviyo
- Shopify Email
- Mailchimp
Now that we’ve covered seven automated email campaigns you can try, along with some best practices, set up your email sequences and use the automated email marketing feature in Shopify to start building your campaigns.
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