We’ve talked this month about why subscribers become inactive and go cold and what you can do to re-engage these subscribers. I’ve given 8 example emails to charm and win-back inactive subscribers and 3 advanced win-back strategies. (Click below if you need to catch up.)
This week I also wanted to go over a few dos and don’ts of re-engaging email subscribers.
We’ve talked a lot this month about why subscribers become inactive and go cold and what you can do to re-engage these subscribers. I’ve given example emails to charm and win-back inactive subscribers. We talked about advanced win-back strategies. This week I also wanted to go over a few dos and don’ts that didn’t fit into the other videos.
Do incentivize with an offer. For those who sell products in an online store, when making an offer in your re-engagement email, use numbers instead of percentages. The folks at MarketingLand looked at offers that promised a dollar-off versus a percentage-off a next purchase. A dollar-off discount consistently performed two times better than a percentage discount. When I read this, I went through and changed all my coupons.
If you don’t sell products but rather services, offer something else of value that you don’t normally provide to the general public, maybe a how-to guide, a checklist, a white paper, a video, or an invite to your upcoming webinar – something relevant that provides value. The purpose here is to re-engage those on your list.
Don’t: Treat everyone the same. A big pet peeve of mine is when I sign up with someone either as a client or a customer and I continue to get emails targeting me like I’m a prospect. Here’s an email I still get pretty much every day. I’ve been a customer of Choice Warranty for over a year and I still get these daily emails.
When customers haven’t engaged with your brand in a while, you might be tempted to treat them like a new customer and send a generic promotion. However, the key difference here is that when you’re trying to use email marketing to win over an old customer, you’re reaching out to someone who already has a history with your brand, even if it was for a short time.
Because you already possess existing behavioral customer data on your previous shoppers, you have a unique opportunity to personalize your messaging and deliver campaigns and emails that are directly targeted to what they’re interested in. If they previously bought from a specific product line, share a message about a new product available from that line. This is a far more effective way to engage them—and ultimately win them back.
for example, and this is just a made-up email that I imagine personally getting from Marie Forleo saying, “Hi there Lisa, how are things going in your business since you bought Copy Cure six months ago?” Here is something highly targeted because she knows my name, she knows when I bought the program, and she’s asking me how are things going, prompting me to reply.
Do automate! I don’t want you to do a one-off event, I want you to begin to automate these things. Create a “Win-Back campaign” and then when you identify your inactives, tag them and add to this campaign sequence. And here’s a link to a really good training video for an example: https://virtualassistanttrainer.com/advanced-win-back-campaign-strategies
Don’t give up too soon: I’ve seen my colleagues remove subscribers after 30 days of inactivity and others never. They are still hanging on to those old inactive people who will never re-engage with you. Statistics say that 75% of inactive subscribers could re-engage within 90 days, so don’t prune lists too early. This also says don’t wait too long to re-engage. Sending an email or starting your re-engagement campaign around day 75 is a really good strategy.
There you have your dos and don’ts for re-engaging subscribers.
Catch up on previous Re-Engaging Your Subscribers episodes:
Did you enjoy this episode and want to put it into action? Grab this planner!
Subscriber Re-Engagement Planner
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It happens to the best of us: we have great plans and intentions for growing our businesses and we vow to email our subscribers regularly; but then life and/or business events get in the way and those awesome plans are forgotten or given a lower priority. Whatever you do, don’t condemn yourself or consider this an epic failure. The beauty of being human is we’re allowed to make mistakes and there’s always a way to start over again.
This planner walks you step by step to re-engaging with your subscribers.
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