Shopify is a powerful eCommerce platform that has made it simple and streamlined for hundreds and thousands of online brands – small and large – to sell their products on their own websites.
While Shopify has features built in that can help retailers increase their sales, you’ll really start to see success when you incorporate these functions into your email marketing strategy and employ some savvy automation tools.
Here are our ten top tips to help you get more sales from your Shopify store.
1. Database Segmentation
Hopefully you’re already using customer data to build engaged email marketing lists, but if you want to really see results you’ll use segmentation to ensure you’re sending people things that are relevant to them. Segmentation is the way that you differentiate between customer groups so you can tailor your marketing messages to suit their habits and behaviours. We explain segmentation more here.
2. Automated Email Welcome Series
A “welcome series” is a collection of emails that people receive as soon as they sign up to hear from your brand. Klaviyo point out that this is a crucial part of the customer lifecycle because first impressions count online as much as they do offline. An example of a welcome series flow is three emails where people receive an initial welcome as soon as their information is saved; the second email might be sent within days encouraging them to also follow your social media and then the last email in the series, before they become part of your usual campaigns, could be showcasing products you know they’ll love. This whole process can be automated so that once customer consent is gained to send them promotional information, they are added to your database into their appropriate segment and their welcome series commences immediately.
3. Thank You Emails
Show people that you are grateful for their business with a personalised thank you email. This is another part of the sales journey that can be fully automated. Greenfish Marketing have found that well crafted thank you emails sent by our clients tend to have among the highest engagement rates. Shopify also agree the right thank you can make all the difference and outline ways you can incorporate showing your customers you’re grateful for their business digitally and with their order.
4. Weekly Stock Updates
We’ve seen this work really well for eCommerce customers and with Shopify and the right set up in your email marketing platform, it’s virtually a “set and forget” marketing activity that yields high returns. It’s not just your new arrivals that you can communicate. Using Shopify’s Stock Alerts well means that you can also incorporate information about your best sellers, slow moving stock and more.
5. Suggesting Related Products
Making the right recommendations for other products your customers may be interested in can increase both the overall cart spend and repeat purchases. Shopify has tools that can do this automatically for you based on user behaviour and sales data, and you are also able to take advantage of this in your email marketing too.
6. Abandoned Browse Emails
This can be a really effective way to engage customers who have spent time browsing products on your website but didn’t ever put them in their cart or complete check-out. They can work really well with incentives and/or related products and can be timed to be sent automatically when your customers are likely to be making purchasing decisions.
7. Abandoned Cart Emails
This is another effective way to get sales. Greenfish Marketing clients who use Abandoned Cart emails – either as a stand alone email or as part of an automated series – see an increase in revenue. There are even some industry statistics that suggest an abandoned cart email can bring in almost 70% more revenue than any other email you send.
8. Birthday Gift Promotions
Who doesn’t love a birthday present from their favourite brand? Capturing and using customer birthday data means you’re able to send emails that can perform up to five times better than other types of emails sent. And with automation, you can send your customers well wishes (and a little present in the form of a coupon code or other incentive) without any further manual work needed.
9. Winback Series
Obviously the goal of these is to re-engage customers with your brand if they’ve dropped their spending habits or email engagement but if they really aren’t interested in hearing from you, after a strategic winback email campaign you can unsubscribe them to keep your database clean and accurate.
10. Monthly Newsletter
Sometimes the best way to sell is not to sell at all, and a monthly newsletter dedicated to sharing your news and updates (with light focus on your products and services) can help to build relationships and connection with your brand and that in turn often leads to new sales. We tell you more about why you need a newsletter here
In a recent survey of struggling eCommerce businesses, 37% admitted their online marketing could have been better and a further 35% say that online visibility is a factor in both success and failure. With some strategic automation and email marketing focus, you can not only increase your revenue right now, but also help future proof your business by creating ongoing relationships with your customers.
Greenfish Marketing are email marketing and automation experts and we’ve helped dozens of businesses streamline their process and make more sales. We tailor solutions to suit your goals and work with everyone from startups to established brands. Book a complimentary strategy call with our team today.
