1. Use personalization technologies to send personalized e-mails.
Among the most effective ways to retain consumers is to send out personalized e-mails to them offering relevant products, special offers, etc. that suit each consumer’s specific behavior.
2. Only send personalized e-mails to customers who have agreed to receive marketing material.
In many countries, you aren’t permitted to send tailored e-mails to consumers unless they’ve explicitly accepted this kind of communication. This limitation comes with one benefit, however, as you’re able to connect with consumers that have a purchase history as well as an account.
If you are aware of the consumer’s purchase history, you’ll be able to compare her with other identical consumers. That is the framework for correct personalization:
As per this knowledge, you’ll be able to map the consumer’s life cycle, which helps you to foresee what the consumer may most likely purchase in the future, and at what time. In the personalization market, this is called “Prediction.” Today’s personalization engines are incredibly proficient at predicting the consumers’ shopping behavior because they depend on “machine learning” and “artificial intelligence.”
As a result, these engines are more effective in e-mail marketing than even experienced online marketers.
3. Predict the customer’s shopping patterns by comparing each customer with other similar customer archetypes.
Let‘s find out how these engines generally function and how you’ll be able to utilize them to accomplish personalized e-mails through a consumer named “Lisa.”
The personalization engines compare Lisa’s behavior to similar consumers by analyzing when they purchase a product, search for products, add products into a Wish List, visit the online store without buying any products, etc.
According to this data, the technology will be able to predict which products Lisa is going to most likely purchase and when that will trigger a personalized e-mail:
AMAZON MAKES USE OF BEST-PRACTICE PERSONALIZATION
As Amazon is among the top in the world at delivering personalized e-mails, I will utilize them as an example to demonstrate the different types of e-mails you’ll be able to send to your consumers.
4. Insert a mini-navigation in your e-mails, such as “Women, Men, Girls, Boys” so the customer can easily enter your website
If Amazon added a very generic header in its place, for example: “Products for you,” then the e-mail opening rate will be considerably lower.
Also, Amazon has added micro-navigation for “Women,” “Men,” “Girls,” and “Boys” that the consumer will be able to press if she’s uninterested in either of the product matches. You can use this basic strategy in all types of e-mails.
5. If the customer taps a link to a product or a brand category in a personalized e-mail such as “Shirts” or “Levi’s”, send the customer to a product category where she can easily filter the products
In this illustration, Lisa is browsing Amazon for denim products without purchasing any. Using this information, Amazon delivers this personalized e-mail to Lisa with the denim products she’s most likely to purchase.
To trigger her interest, the e-mail title given is: “Top Jeans, Denim Shirts + more,” which improves the e-mail opening rates.
6. Make it your focus to send personalized e-mails to customers based on product relevance and not based on good deals
All the above examples concentrate on offering the consumer with relevant products at the appropriate point of time of the consumer lifecycle. Note: Not one of the e-mails tend to be deal-oriented.
This idea is extremely appealing from a business perspective, as you obviously can make additional money on selling products that aren’t on sale.
7. If the relevance e-mails do not sell, however, then test if you can sell other bargain products to the customer.
If Amazon isn’t able to sell non-discounted products using relevance only in spite of this, then they attempt to sell discounted products. In this instance, the consumer entered Amazon’s online store on May 29th and didn’t purchase a single thing.
14 days after, she gets this e-mail with a wide variety of Levi’s products at a 30% discount.
8. You can test if a customer is a “deal hunter” by sending targeted offers, such as Amazon’s One Deal a Day e-mail.
Amazon additionally attempts to figure out, if you are a “deal hunter” by pushing deal-based e-mails like this “Find New Deals Every Day” series wherein the consumer gets a new deal in his inbox each day for 12 days in a row.
9. Send an e-mail to the customer with abandoned shopping carts (if you have the permission to do so). Write the name of the most prominent product in the e-mail subject line to achieve the highest possible opening rate.
Amazon additionally sends this kind of abandoned shopping cart e-mails, that is a relatively simple, yet handy tool. This e-mail also demonstrates the efficiency of Amazon’s personalization engine.
A consumer is most likely thinking about the “How to Win Friends and Influence People” book. Because of this, Amazon places the title of the book within the e-mail subject line as well as displays it at the top of the e-mail at the same time to enhance the opening and conversion rate.
10. Display the product the customers will most likely buy at the top of the e-mail followed by other related products.
Why this e-mail is particularly appealing is the fact that Amazon has accumulated a series of products for each consumer in line with the consumer’s shopping as well as browsing behavior.
In case the consumer clicks the “See even more similar items” link in the bottom of the e-mail, the consumer then gets into a personalized area of Amazon.com, in which the recommended products will be listed together on a single page:
11. Send the customer to a personalized part of your online shop from personalized e-mails.
The consumer also gets into this personalized section of Amazon.com if she taps the “Learn more” button close to each product within the personalized e-mail.
This approach is brilliant, as the consumer then always enters into a personalized landing page, rather than entering separate areas of the Generic Amazon.com online store. This way, Amazon makes sure of the highest level of relevance and convenience, that generates the best possible foundation for selling. It is quite impressive and compelling.
12. Implement personalization techniques throughout your online shop, such as in the Book department with “Recommended for You”, “Inspired by Your Shopping Trends”, “More Top Picks for You”, etc.
Amazon makes use of this same personalization technology whenever an existing consumer returns to the online store, e.g., by entering the Books department:
Notice the way Amazon personalizes the Books department by using “Recommended for You,” “Inspired by Your Shopping Trends,” “More Top Picks for You,” etc.
As Amazon makes use of this strategy throughout most of their online store, it’s very personalized for every consumer.
Leave a Comment