It is essential to bring new customers to your e-commerce store, but it is more important to keep them coming back. Customer retention is better than customer acquisition. You can improve the loyalty of your regular customers, which, contrary to popular belief, is a bit more difficult for new customers.
Customer retention strategies help your e-commerce store to get traction. They also improve the purchase frequency of your current customers. This post will help you improve your relationship with customers.
Design a value proposition
Retention could be something as simple as tweaking your proposition. A value proposition is basically your chance to tell your visitors how your product or service is going to make their life better. You need to sound appealing while introducing your products. To make it simpler, remember that your value proposition should empower, inspire, and connect.
For instance, Paper Source, an arts and crafts niche web store, inspires their audience by asking them to create their own planner bundle.
Another simpler example of a great value proposition is Fair Trade Winds with a promise to empower. Your value proposition will help you with both improving your customer’s loyalty and your brand’s aesthetics.
Use eye-catching images, optimize your call-to-action buttons, and keep the content minimal to get more eyes on your design. As per the Z-pattern rule in web design, your visitors are expected to scan your proposition page in a Z-shape, so place your offer widgets accordingly.
Track your customer’s behavior
Tracking and analyzing your sales is as important as getting them. Analyze customer purchases, i.e. how frequently they buy from your store and which type of products they prefer. If you have a customer who buys every two months (on average), you can send them promotional emails every 2-3 weeks. Personalize your emails by offering only the relevant products.
Additionally, you can use these metrics to identify products in your shop which do not perform well and promote them more frequently.
Create a loyalty program
This is a great way to reciprocate your sales with minimal effort. Loyalty programs are smart marketing strategies designed to encourage customers. It is usually done by offering a reward to customers who purchase frequently. This reward could be a gift voucher, discount coupon, points reward, or even a free item. Create a loyalty program that offers something valuable to your loyal customers. A great example of this is Starbucks’s points-based loyalty program.
Customers get different food and drink items based on the stars they collect. For 25 stars you can grab an espresso shot. You can also earn other freebies like t-shirts, mugs, and similar stuff. If you are just starting up your store, collect feedback on your loyalty program.
Provide robust customer support
Customer support can help you stand out in your niche. Set up a dedicated support team for your frequent customers. Ensure that every customer is satisfied with your support system. For quick pre-sales questions, you can setup chatbots. For FAQs, create forums, help centers, and guides. For product returns or similar issues, you can provide help with a live chat. If real-time help is not possible, you can offer help emails and calls. Multiple ways to contact your team would help fix your customer’s problem faster. Good customer support will definitely help create happy, loyal customers.
It is really important to provide good customer support especially when buyers are not happy with your product. Satisfied customers are more likely to return to your shop and make additional purchases.
Use a subscription-based business model
The subscription-based strategy is one of the most underrated customer retention tactics. This strategy is especially useful for new e-commerce stores. Products like chocolates, gifts, groceries, or flowers are something that online consumers are more likely to buy on a regular basis. For these types of stores, you can use a subscription model for sharing regular discount offers.
Subscriptions will help you retain your customers with minimal effort. You can use Mailchimp to create a subscription box. You can even put something valuable for new sign-ups, i.e. an e-book, a discount, or weekly offer delivery. Coffee Bean Direct, for example, offers a 5% discount to all new subscribers.
Successful subscription-based models share a particular product type. Most of these business marketplaces know that their customers are interested in buying their products over and over again, and would love a monthly-offer email. Subscribed customers are more likely to return and will help you build a base of recurring payments.
Sum it up
Design a valuable proposition that is both appealing, and helps describe the idea behind your product. Use personalized emails. Something as simple as the customer’s name in the email will improve the CTR of your emails. Loyalty programs are a popular way to retain customers using frequent-purchase rewards. Subscription-based business models are becoming popular as subscription services really help inspire repeat customers.
Another important thing for retaining customers is your user experience. Make sure that your website loads quickly and your product catalog is appealing. You can speed up your WooCommerce store using CDN, cache plugins, and other tools. Personalize your marketing campaigns by analyzing your purchases. Content marketing and social media is always available to use. You can use them to get targeted, loyal customers.
Pulkit Bhardwaj
Pulkit is a WordPress writer and web design, enthusiast. He loves helping people with website growth and content management. When he is not writing for tech sites or design blog, he can be found discovering new WordPress tools.
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