Nothing annoys a customer quite as much as being made a fool of. Yet this is exactly what happens when one of your promotions backfires by getting out of step with their actions. That sick-to-the-core-feeling that every marketer gets the moment they know of the gaffe will only grow until the problem gets fixed.
Sending promotions to customers that have already bought betrays your brand. And the customer will let you, and the world, know just how they feel. It’s just happened to me, so with the benefit of an insider’s knowledge I’ll share how it happens, how it feels to be on the receiving end , and how to prevent it. (…)
When we first launched our remarketing service in 2009, Randy Stross wrote a piece about email remarketing in The New York Times suggesting that while remarketing might be a great idea for ecommerce websites, it’s not a great idea for consumers. He likened emails following up on abandoned shopping carts to a salesman chasing you down the street if you didn’t buy from his store.
There are major differences, of course. We’ve long argued that remarketing emails, when done well, not only drive conversions but also build brand trust.
They can deliver great service and provide customers with the confidence to return to buy—either online, by phone or in store. If Randy was right and customers universally resented the intrusion, then these emails wouldn’t work.
In aiming to answer the question more substantively, I turned to data, and specifically email marketing benchmarks.
The key metrics to look at to determine whether customers like or loathe remarketing emails are:
(1) the recovery rate
(2) the open rate
(3) the clickthrough rate
(4) the unsubscribe rate
Frankly, the evidence is overwhelming: Remarketing, when done well, is appreciated by customers. Here’s the evidence:
(1) The recovery rate
The recovery rate is the percentage of visitors that abandon shopping carts, and remarketed visitors that then return and purchase following remarketing. At SeeWhy, we measure recovery rates across all our customers, and currently the average is 20 percent.
So, one in five shopping cart abandoners come back and buy, having being remarketed. In some cases, the recovery rate is as high as 50 percent. Moreover, when remarketed customers buy, they spend on average 55 percent more than customers who didn’t abandon their shopping carts.
(2) The open rate
The average email open rate for remarketing emails is currently 46 percent, more than double the benchmark open rate of 22 percent for all email campaigns. (…)
On average, 62% web forms are abandoned before completion – this means that organizations are losing out on a lot of potential leads, applications and quotations, which results in lost leads and ultimately lost revenues. So in this, the first of two blogs on designing web forms, we’ve pulled together a simple checklist for you to use. The next blog will look at such aspects as field order and single page vs. multi page forms, but initially, I think it’s worth recapping the basics. In order to maximize web form submissions, marketers must design their web form with the recipient in mind. This may seem obvious, but it is amazing how ‘form blind’ marketing departments can get when they are trying to capture all the information they require. Typically, the marketer passes a list of fields to be captured to the web developer and scant attention is paid to what will make the form convert. (…)
On July 27, SeeWhy conducted an online poll among 221 eMarketers. The results reveal some potential shifts in focus over the next 12 months: shopping cart recovery, reducing landing page clutter, link building, and transactional email all emerge as top priorities.
The poll also looked in detail at four key areas of conversion to determine their priorities. The four areas examined were as follows:
• SEO
• Landing page optimization
• Email marketing
• Web conversion/shopping cart recovery techniques
Each respondent was allowed to pick only one response in each category, forcing them to choose their top priority.
SEO Priorities
Marketers plan to focus on link building as their top priority in the next 12 months, with 42 percent stating that it is their top SEO focus. Changes to website pages to ensure they are more SEO friendly were the highest priority for 22 percent, while 21 percent plan to focus on social media integration. Site-based optimization (such as sitemaps and navigation) was the main focus for only 15 percent. There are two notable conclusions that you draw about these findings:
1) Marketers have taken on board the changes made over recent months by Google to prioritize quality and diversity of links in search results over the content itself.
2) Social media integration is unexpectedly high. While social media is hot for marketers, in SEO terms this is really cutting edge stuff, and it signals that marketers have recognized the importance of social media in driving traffic. In particular, Facebook’s social plugins, including the easy to implement ‘Like’ button, are beginning to be viewed as a simple ‘social SEO toolkit.’
Website and Landing Page Optimization
Marketers are taking the ‘less is more’ philosophy to heart when it comes to landing page optimization. Just over half (51 percent) stated that reducing clutter was their top priority, recognizing that landing pages have been added to gradually over time at the expense of simplicity and simple, strong calls to action. (…)
‘Have we conditioned most customers to the point that they expect discounts and won’t buy without one?’
This is a great question, and it’s worth considering in more depth. Recent research shows that coupon redemption is at an all time high, and at the same time, Ben Bernanke warns that the economic recovery is fragile and taxes will inevitably have to rise. It’s no wonder that customers are nervous and cautious. (…)
Rockler is generating spectacular results, measured in recovered revenues, from their shopping cart abandonment remarketing program.
A few months ago, Rockler Woodworking and Hardware rolled out a new email campaign to recover abandoned shopping carts and drive website conversion.
Rockler Woodworking and Hardware is the nation’s premier supplier of specialty hardware, tools, lumber, and exceptional quality woodworking products. Founded in 1954 and on the web since 1996, Rockler has become one of the top destination sites on the web and an Internet Retailer 500 site. Products are sold through catalogs, the company’s direct-to-consumer website at www.rockler.com and 30 stores.
We recently caught up with Jason Bernloehr, e-commerce manager at Rockler, to find out about their new shopping cart abandonment campaign.
Website Conversion: Why did Rockler choose to focus on shopping cart abandonment?
JB: We already knew from testing that following up on abandoned shopping carts is very effective. In fact, it had been a home run every time we tested it. (…)
In Parts 1 and 2 of this series, I wrote about how the Top 10 Converting Websites achieve spectacular website conversion rates by driving repeat sales and through superior merchandising.
The final major conclusion of the SeeWhy /Nielsen research (published in an eBook titled ‘Lessons Learned from the Top 10 Converting Websites’) is that the top ten converting websites ALL use remarketing.
This is remarkable since our research shows that only 26 percent of ecommerce sites use remarketing.
Remarketing is one of the most effective techniques to boost website conversion rates and is arguably the most profitable marketing technique. Website visitors are ‘remarketed’ based on their browsing behavior — using email, direct mail, or in the case of anonymous visitors, advertising. Of these techniques, email is by far the most cost effective, and the top ten converting websites make use of the email address captured on your first site visit whenever possible. (…)
Nothing annoys a customer quite as much as being made a fool of. Yet this is exactly what happens when one of your promotions backfires by getting out of step with their actions. That sick-to-the-core-feeling that every marketer gets the moment they know of the gaffe will only grow until the problem gets fixed.
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