After a holiday shopping season, you’ll be confronted with a unique set of challenges. It’s not a revenue issue but an engagement and lifetime value one. Here’s how to navigate the critical period successfully and make even more money with a post-black friday marketing strategy.
I’m no psychic, but I can predict something without even looking into your email list.
As you get over the high of seeing huge revenue numbers after a Black Friday sale or any other massive sale…
Your smile’s gonna droop a little when you start digging into your customer segment data.
Here’s what you’ll see over the next few weeks:
A few words of caution:
Let me explain why.
We’ve talked about customer segmentation, priorities and monetization before. It’s essential that you keep track of the distribution of prospect and customer types in your list.
This one is a build up of that. So head over and read that first if you haven’t.
Now, as we move away from the holiday season, we’re going to see changes from our baseline and we must get it back within control with a proper post- black friday marketing strategy.
1. Non-customer segment % decreased
Good job, you monetized a bunch of emails that were sitting cold in your ESP.
What you’ll see:
Why:
2. Dormant customer segment % decreased
Looks like you managed to reactivate customers that haven’t purchased in a long while.
What you’ll see:
Why:
3. One-time customer segment % increased
Oh no, so many people aren’t repurchasing!
What you’ll see:
Why:
This explains why people say “discount shoppers are less valuable”.
I actually disagree with this statement. It doesn’t tell the full story. It’s only “less valuable” without a proper post-sale marketing strategy.
While it’s true that majority of these people aren't going to repurchase.
But there’s still a portion of these holiday shoppers that would, and an even larger number of people who visited your site but didn’t buy.
These BFCM customers would need to be treated differently.
There are several main categories of your holiday customer base:
Core customers: These are customers who are “loyal”. They buy with or without discounts, holiday or not. Although a holiday would be an additional incentive to shop.
Promo driven customers: Existing customers who bought from you during a previous promotion, might or might not have been black friday. But one thing’s for sure, they usually only shop during sales.
Window shoppers: They know about you, visited your site a few times. They just haven’t been able to justify the purchase. All they need is a little push. There’s huge opportunity in this segment.
Gifters: It could be people who learned about you from a friend or family member who’s a fan and is considering getting them a gift. This is a hot segment because desire is there, so intent is high. Increase the “giftability” element and you’ve got them.
Category KIAs (know-it-alls): These are people who are fans of eg. skincare, and are just shopping around for the next thing. They don’t need much education, just the right offer. They might not know you well, but they need good proof you are better than the rest.
Discount scavengers: Deep discounts and low price points work for this group. They’re price sensitive, always looking for the next best deal. There’s no way to really create loyalty with this bunch, but hey, a sale is a sale.
You might also be interested in: What happens when you discount for too long?
“Black Friday is over, so why do I need to care?”
It’s important because the way you get a repurchase will be different. And your usual post purchase email flows can only do so much. Another 10% off? Yea sure it might work, but not with the same impact.
So now I’ve introduced 3 segments within your email list, of which, they belong to 6 different customer types.
What are you supposed to do?
This is where you start – moving one-time buyers into two-time buyers. And this should be your priority over the next 30, 60, 90 days.
Just to recap, we initially started with these 3 observations:
Points 1 and 2 are now out of your control. 1) is a good thing. 2) has already been reactivated, and they fall within the 6 customer types, which overlaps a little with 3).
The one-time customer segment is the easiest segment to move because they’ve already experienced some form of value from your product.
Now they need another good reason to buy again.
With the next Black Friday holiday so far away, you can’t let them go to waste or else you miss out on possible LTV growth during this period.
1. Post-Purchase Surveys
You won’t be able to know which of the 6 types of customers they fall into unless you ask. A simple survey is a great way to find out this information.
A tactic that will give you the highest response rate is to have button images that update a user’s profile property, this way a user doesn’t need to type in their email address again or linked off-site. Alternatively, use an interactive email platform like spellbound.io or mailmodo.
2. New product releases
Not everything has to be a discount, especially for the not-so-price-conscious (although it doesn’t hurt to show this to them still).
It could be an exclusive product release or new colorway. It could be a new gift set.
3. Post-holiday offers
Ok discount time. In the next major sale you run, make sure you’re including your segment of BFCM customers (or even better, to protect your deliverability), include your survey responses of customers who were looking for a good deal.
4. Post-black friday winback
You’ll quickly realize that many black friday shoppers become disengaged pretty fast. So email might not be the most effective channel for winback.
At this point, you should consider new channels like direct mail. Use a service like Postpilot to get Black Friday customers back again.
Trial it out, and if it works, you might even want to add it to your evergreen winback flows! With an integration with Klaviyo, you can pull segments easily and have postcards triggered from within the flow. Easy 12x.
A post-black friday marketing strategy is as important as a pre-BFCM build up.
Many brands miss out by going quiet afterwards, but really, it’s the perfect time to go hard, exactly because your competition is going soft.
Now, go implement!