Transactional Email 2.0: Think Beyond the Purchase

Loren McDonald, SilverpopCharles Nicholls, SeeWhy

Think beyond just this…

To Pre- to Post-Purchase EmailsPre-Transaction

• Browse abandonment

• Cart abandonment

Purchase Process

• Order Confirmation

• Order status• Shipping notice• Shipment confirmation

• Trip preparation

Post-Purchase

• Satisfaction Survey

• Review request• Review notification

• Recommendation

• Replenishment• Repurchase• Upgrades

Relationship

• Bounceback• Account reminder

• Loyalty programs

• Account status• Purchase anniversary

Right time, right message!

Question is not What is

the optimum frequency?,

but How do we send

more relevant emails,

more often but with

fewer resources?

Diversified Email Program

Multiple Opportunities in the Funnel

Recommendations/Abandon Site Email

Early results:

• 40% open rate

• 57% click to purchase conversion

• Earns £1.42 per email deployed

• Earned £62.70 per email clicked

Remarketing: After the Order

Demand from Order Confirmation Series emails grew 41.5% from 2008 to 2009.

Open rates range 45%-50%

Order Confirmation Series

Cross Sell / Upsell

Best Practice:Recommend accessory itemsor complementary items for each product in cart

Fred, A Special

Thank-You Offer From

Tafford

Tafford Customer Survey - Tell Us

What You Think

Fred, A Special

Thank You Offer from

Tafford

Fred, A Special

Thank-You Offer From

Tafford

Tafford Customer Survey - Tell Us

What You Think

Fred, A Special

Thank-You Offer From

Tafford

Tafford Customer Survey - Tell Us

What You Think

Fred, Rate the Tafford products

you purchased

Post Purchase Lifecycle Indexed Results

6X+

Better

Surv

ey

perfo

rms

over

20%

bette

r…

Purchase Anniversary

15% higher conversion rate than average from broadcast messages

Red Letter Days Feedback Request Email

Recommendations

Review

Recommendations based on

segmentation

Product Review Email14% of those who click place another order

Second highest conversion rate next to Abandon Cart emails.

Products Review Notification

12% of those clicking on this email go directly to make another purchase.

Reminders…almost out of stock

Open, CT and Conversion Rates that are MORE THAN DOUBLE broadcast email rates

Average Order Value is 53% HIGHER

Low Volume/High ROITriggered Emails:

3-5% of email volume45% of profits

Travel Site

4% of email volume40% of email revenues

Ecommerce Site

Keys to ConversionLeverage

Other Technologies

Timing

Great Design

Compelling Content /

Offers

Test, Test, Test

- Web analytics- Reviews- Recommendations

e.g., Review request timing may need to vary

- HTML- Mobile- Image blocking- Navigation

- Timing- Layout- Offers- Copy style- Level of personalisation

- Personalised to Purchase- Non-purchase behaviour- Right tone- Compelling offers- Value add

Shopping Cart RecoveryCharles Nicholls, SeeWhy

About SeeWhy

24

Featured by

• Founded in 2003, headquartered in Andover, MA and Windsor, UK+ ~750 ecommerce customers

• The only real time shopping cart recovery service to follow up in real time via email and social networks.

• Delivered as a service (SaaS)

• Integrated with email service providers, social networks & web analytics

+ Tight integration with Silverpop Transact

• Best practices education• Primary research in ecommerce

Transactional triggered email sells

59.8 %Batch Campaigns

40.2%TriggeredCampaigns95.9 %

Batch Campaigns

4.1%TriggeredCampaigns

Sales GeneratedVolume of Emails sent

25

80% of revenue is from shopping cart recovery emails

Top 5: Why visitors abandon shopping carts

26

Potential solutions:

1. Promotions2. Remarketing to shopping

cart abandoners

#1 Price #2 Not ready to buy

71%Average Shopping Cart

Abandonment Rate

Christmas is coming......

Based on 2009....• From

– 2nd week in September

• Through– 2nd week in

November

• Sales volume

• Abandonment

27Prime time for email remarketing

For a $20m ecommerce company…

$127,000/day

$5,000 /hour

$46.6 million/year

Recover abandoned carts – The best ROI

What’s being left on the table?

Annual ecommerce revenue

(1- Abandonment rate) - Annual ecommerce revenue

20,000,000

1-70% - 20,000,000 = $46.6 million

annually

or $127k

daily

28

Increase conversion rates by…

Percentage Daily $ Amount

Annual $ Amount

10 % $ 12,700

$ 4.66 M

20 % $ 25,400

$ 9.32 M

30 % $ 38,100

$ 13.98 M

Real life performance

29

Ecommerce site

Segment Market Recovery rate

Order value

Incremental 1st year recovered revenues

1 Retail Youth and Teen

9% $50 $6m

2 Retail Middle aged & retirees

21% $110 $4m

3 Retail All ages 6% $75 $750k

4 Gaming Youth 13% $7 $250k

5 Software All ages 37% $30 $166k

Average 19.8%Average SeeWhy Recovery Rate: 19.8%

Average payback period: 11 days

Best practice formula:

Cart recovery campaign checklist

30

ID your visitors

Real time first follow up

Multiple follow ups

Automation

Service tone

• Incentivised sign up’s work well• Recognised the value of getting personally identifiable data

with a simple reward

ID your visitors

31

And here’s your sign up reward

• Free shipping– Simple promo code– Share with friends

• Must be sent real time

• Increases conversions

• Also works with Social Network logins– E.g Facebook Login

Real time first follow up

33

“It’s all about speed here. The faster you contact the

consumer, your chances are dramatically increased.”

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

100

90

80

70

60

50

40

30

20

10

Hours

Lead

Tem

pera

ture

>> After just 1 hour, 90% of ecommerce leads go cold

Real time responses are:

+ Immediate+ Relevant+ In sync with

customer

+ Three stage follow up campaign+ Real time+ ~24 hours later+ ~7 days later with a promotion

Multiple Follow Ups

Cumulative conversion

Conversion per stage

Unsubscribe rate

1 2 3

Lift

Stage Conversion

Open Rate

Revenue / Email

1: Real time 11% 60% $11

2: 24 hours 6% 55% $4

3: 7 days 3% 50% $3

Total 20% Average 55% Average $6

A ecommerce company generating $20m in revenues per annum loses $127k every day due to abandonment

• Generates $0.75m in incremental revenues

• 3 stage campaign with a promotion on #3

• The first few hours after the abandonment are critical– $700/hour initially– Falls to $50/hour

after 5 days

Multiple follow up email performance in action

Hours elapsed after abandonment

Rev

enu

e re

cove

red

per

ho

ur

#2 sent here#3 sent here

#1 sent here

• World’s largest commencement photography business

• Highly seasonal business

• 1.5 million graduate photographs per year

Graduate Photography – Grad Images

• Urgent requirement to go live asap• Simplified campaign developed• Launched in peak season to significant impact

Grad Images: Three stage campaign

Immediate

23 hrs after

120 hrs after

• Email delivery via Silverpop Transact real time transactional API

“Service” tone

>> Service Tone

An overt sales message may be counter productive. Service based communications work much better

+ Expectations+ A service email stating their

transaction did not complete+ Use your transaction

confirmation as a model

+ May not be ready to buy yet+ An overt sales message may be

counter-productive

Email design tips

39

• Service tone– Service over sales

• Personal– Personalized, directly

relevant

• Emotional connection– With the product

abandoned– With the brand– With a person

• Strong Call to action– Return to cart / item button

• Multiple methods of contact– Phone number– Email address– Link to stores locator

• Transactional email– The time between abandonment and recipient receiving the

email should be <1minute– Transactional API’s are essential (such as Silverpop Transact)

• Real time triggering– Individual behaviour on site directly drives an immediate

response– Data cannot be moved in batch, (or even extracted manually!!!)

• Staying in step with visitors– Returning visitors need to be spotted irrespective of how they

come back to the website• Return to my cart button• Direct• Search engine• Banner ad etc

Automation

40

Top 10 Converting Websites

Research report• Lessons learned from the Top 10

Converting Websites– Average visitor-to-sale

conversion of 23% (industry average 2-3%)

– What they do differently

• To get your free copy of the report at www.seewhy.com

41

Resources / Q & A

About Silverpop

• A leading email marketing / marketing automation provider

• Email marketing

• Transactional email

• Share-to-social

• Send Time Optimization

• Landing pages

• Surveys

• SMS• API Integrations w/ Web

analytics, personalization, reviews, recommendation technologies

Resources

• Resource Center– White papers– Webinars– Blogs– Case studies– Newsletters– http://www.silverpop.com/marketing-resources/index.ht

ml

• Many presentations on SlideShare– www.slideshare.net/Silverpop

Thank you!

On Twitter: @Silverpopwww.slideshare.net/silverpop

www.silverpop.com