As an e-commerce store owner, there are a lot of challenges that you need to overcome. But more often than not, it has something to do with generating and increasing sales.
This is where email marketing could come in handy. After all, a common area of friction in e-commerce is capturing and nurturing leads.
That said, we have listed down 14 ways you can use email marketing to maximize your e-commerce sales:
Grow Your Email Mailing List
Growing an email list, whether from scratch or requiring consistent effort, is challenging. Fortunately, there are many tactics that you can do to grow your email marketing list.
You can start with your new customers. Upon check out, ask if they would want to receive updates from you. You can also cross-promote using social media and your online store.
The main thing that you need to do is to incentivize them or provide them with something.
Create a Welcome Email Series
One of the best email strategies you can implement is crafting welcome series emails for new leads and subscribers.
An email series will walk them through a nurturing sequence that will get them to purchase. More often than not, people don’t want to make a purchase immediately.
It would be best if you stayed consistently on top of their minds so that when they’re finally ready to purchase, they’ll buy from you.
Ideally, a welcome email series should include handy tips on using a product or inspiration when shopping for items. You might also have the benefits of using your products or include them in your Stories.
Reward Loyal Customers
Establishing a loyalty program for your customers is one way to cultivate your relationships with them. Remember, your business won’t survive if it doesn’t have loyal customers supporting it in the first place.
Offering your customers points for their future purchases is one way you can accomplish this.
You can also segment customers that spent a particular amount in your store. From there, you can entice them to book through exclusive offers, access to sales, discounts, special offers, and product bundles.
For seasonal sales, offering deals like buy one, get one, 50% off, and other conventional methods work well.
Another idea is to offer holiday-related promos. There are Thanksgiving and Christmas, and you can do the same for your e-commerce store’s anniversary.
You should also attract high-quality customers by leveraging your existing customer network. You should provide discounts to customers who refer you to other people to buy from you.
You can even go as far as giving off discounts to both the sender and the referral recipient.
That way, you’re giving new visitors the incentive to complete their first purchase.
Segment Your Email List for Personalization
Another thing that you can do is segment a list based on your buyers’ purchasing behavior.
Remember that highly personalized email content is far more valuable than conventional content. Fortunately, there are several ways in which you can be relevant and personalized for your customers.
Besides personalizing subject lines and using your subscriber’s first name, you can also use past consumer data, including browsing history, past purchases, abandoned purchases, and more.
Make an effort to get to know what they want, and then provide recommendations based on that.
You can also segment leads to prospects who haven’t made a purchase yet by gender. Or provide them with a tailored email recommendation based on the product that they may like.
Use Visual Storytelling Techniques
Don’t hesitate to add rich content to your emails. Multimedia content coupled with enticing copy can retain your subscribers’ attention.
This tactic can also help you boost website traffic and conversions. In case you are unaware, emails containing video clips can generate 300% higher click-through rates.
These results show that visual interest is essential in making your email marketing campaigns effective. Here are examples of useful images that you might include in your emails:
- High-quality emails of people who wear or use your products.
- A well-put video testimonial of people who are explaining why they like your product in the first place.
- High-quality images of the product itself.
When including emails in your email marketing campaigns, you’re achieving two things:
- You’re demonstrating the value of your product to those who want to buy it.
- You’re breaking up the text of your emails to make them more readable.
Think about it. What do you see the moment you open an email and see massive blocks of texts? Will you read the whole thing? Probably not.
You’ll probably skim the first line and delete it afterward if it doesn’t immediately grab your attention.
Imagine if you open an email, and you’ll be greeted instantly by a high-quality and engaging email. It would make you want to read more.
It might even compel you to click the call-to-action button for more details.
This is the kind of reaction you want to make for your ecommerce store’s email marketing campaign.
Share Customer Reviews and Testimonials
Your customers trust others’ recommendations, even if it’s from those they haven’t met yet personally.
To help you enhance sales conversions, you might want to include reviews and testimonials in your email campaigns.
Then, place these reviews under a featured product. You can also use relevant quotes or words, highlighting the benefits your products gave to your past customers.
Incentivize Email Subscription
If you want to get started with email marketing, then you need to get leads.
There are several ways you can do this, but the best way is to come up with an excellent offer.
What you can do is provide something in exchange for your customers’ information. It can be an e-book, a free product trial, a free webinar, or more.
So, ask yourself what’s the most reasonable thing that you can offer your customers for free. If you want to grow your email list, then consider this as an investment.
Think about providing free shipping, freebies, and hosting giveaways and contests. These offers can lead to your opt-in.
Set Up an Abandoned Cart Email Series
Online cart abandonment is about 78% on average. Meaning, 3 out of 4 people will abandon their online carts before they can complete a purchase.
Fortunately, many shopping cart tools will allow you to send abandoned cart emails.
These tools monitor any abandoned cart and send automated reminders to customers. Over time, these abandoned cart emails help you boost your sales.
Several studies show that the conversion rates, on average, for abandoned cart emails are at 10%. Moreover, abandoned cart emails may be the last push a customer needs to make a purchase.
Ensure a Mobile-friendly Email Design
You’ll do relatively well if you have an email design that’s easy to navigate across different devices. Do you know that 55% of emails are opened on a mobile device?
A best practice is to come up with a branded look that spans across all your emails. Doing so enhances your brand recall and the perceived value of your brand.
In the same way, every touchpoint matters as well. This involves every email you send, not just with newsletters and sales emails. Everything should be well-designed and comfortable enough to read.
This might also include sales emails that your customers get the moment they buy something from your store.
Send Restock and Wishlist Notifications
An out-of-stock product is another excellent opportunity to encourage email subscribers. You can encourage customers to sign up if they want notification of product availability.
If you allow shoppers to come up with wishlists, you can set up email automation. This will enable you to send them updates about your products from time to time.
Chances are, interested shoppers will always want to be kept in the loop of products that they want. It’s a great way to keep them engaged with your email marketing campaigns.
Once you have your customers’ email addresses, don’t forget to ask them to opt into your email newsletter.
Send Birthday Email
A person’s birthday is usually the time wherein they love giving themselves a treat.
If you have information, like your customers’ birthday, you can use that to automate a birthday email with a special offer or gift on your site.
With this type of email, you’re making your customers feel that you highly value them and thus compel them to come back to your store to make a purchase.
Go Traditional
Although your most loyal customers are getting many perks, using traditional marketing tactics will also allow you to bring in more subscribers.
Both holiday and seasonal email marketing campaigns are an excellent way to get your subscriber’s attention. This is true for people who haven’t quite taken the step yet from a traditional window shopper to a paying customer.
Test and Optimize
Doing A/B testing allows you to improve your conversions and gain vital insights from your customers you have never seen before.
A great practice is to test whenever you can in all your email campaigns. This includes CTAs, subject lines, and lead magnets.
You might also want to test various types of copy and layout. Then, check which ones perform best. After regular testing, you’ll notice essential patterns that will help you set up your future campaigns.
Launch Referral Programs
Referrals can be an integral part of many e-commerce site’s growth strategies. A user coming from a trusted referral is more likely to make a purchase than a cold user. Hence, it would be best to incentivize customers who bring in new customers.
Whether it’s getting cashback deals or one-time discounts, people love getting rewards. Sending a simple email explaining the mechanics is already enough for your customers to become aware of your referral program.
It also won’t hurt on your part if you place a small footnote that will remind them of your referral programs for your future emails.
Conclusion
The email marketing tips we have highlighted in this article lets you maximize e-commerce sales. That’s because email is an excellent way to cultivate a meaningful relationship with your customers.
The key here is keeping your customer’s journey in mind. From there, you can figure out where and how you can leverage email marketing.
The more value you provide through your emails, the better your customer relationship will be. That’s because creating loyal customers is the key to boosting your sales.
Featured Image source: https://unsplash.com/photos/J6Qn9sE4aKM
by Ahoy
