For eCommerce stores, the BFCM and holiday season sale is an opportunity to end the year on an amazing note by making extraordinary sales during the sale period.
But every store is going to make the most of this period and offer competitive deals. This brings forward two challenges:
- Getting people to buy from your sale
- Making them come back to buy more during BFCM
Because you’re already offering huge discounts, you can’t offer more discounts to them.
So what more can you do during this period?
Well, this is where you can put your Shopify store credits to work.
What is store credit?
Store credit is an amount or an equivalent to points that online stores offer to their customers towards various things. These store credit points can be utilized to buy more from the store.
Store credits are a way to enhance customer experience, and encourage customers to buy more. Store credits also help boost customer loyalty. Learn more about store credits here.
When do online stores give store credits?
- When customers return an item
- When customers make purchases
- When customers cross a certain cart value threshold
- In return of a product review
- In return of referrals to new customers
- When customers give a shout-out to your brand on social media
Here’s how to use Shopify store credits to encourage more BFCM and holiday season sales
Offer additional store credits on high-value products
You might think this sounds illogical – offering more credit points in return for the purchase of high-value items; but it’s not.
For example, let’s take the case of Lancome – a high-end cosmetics company. Since starting their loyalty rewards program, the company saw a 60% increase in actions such as purchases and social media engagement. Their monthly sign-ups increased by 40%.
It works! Here’s a simple explanation — high-value items increase your order value and revenue. And so, you’d offer more store credits in return. This store credit will be used by the customer to make more purchases. Which means it’s additional revenue for your store.
Now it makes sense, doesn’t it?
By offering more store credits, you can encourage shoppers to buy high-ticket items from you. But you need to get this strategy right. Here are some cues to help you:
- Bring in a sense of exclusivity
- Don’t associate tactics such as discounts with your high-value items
- You can create a personalized luxury store credits program on your Shopify store
- You can create a tier-based store credits system where customers can reach different levels as they keep making more purchases from your store
Example – Sephora’s Beauty Insider – a tiered, points-based program.
Want to create a loyalty program as strong as this one? Get the Flits store credits today.
Offer store credits based on the number of items purchased
Another way to encourage shoppers to buy more during the BFCM season is by offering store credits based on the number of items they purchase. For example, customers that purchase 10 items get more store credits compared to when they purchase just a couple of products at one go.
Here’s an example of how cosmetics brand Tarte runs its store credits points program
If you think that BFCM store credits have no role to play in customers’ purchase decisions, you’re underestimating the power of store credits. 92% of customers say credit points are important to their purchasing decisions.
Offer store credits that can be redeemed only after BFCM
Shoppers know they’d get great discounts during BFCM. And there’s only so much discount you can offer to them to motivate them to buy from your store. You can’t offer a discount on top of a discount during the sale period. That’ll be a loss for you.
But what you can do is offer store credits. Customers can redeem the store credits after the BFCM or the holiday season sale. In this way you can:
- Bring those customers back to your store (84% of customers redeem credit points)
- Boost customer engagement
- Secure revenue for the period after the BFCM sale
- Build relationships and loyalty with customers (rewards accelerate long-term loyalty – Harvard Business Review)
Offer store credits for referrals
You can encourage your existing customers to help you grow your customer base with the help of store credits. How? By offering store credits in return for referrals.
83% of customers are more likely to refer your brand to their friends after a positive experience. Receiving store credits is a positive experience for your customers and they’re more likely to refer a friend to you.
Moreover, customers who are referred to your brand are five times more likely to use the referral program. This means they’ll bring more customers to your store.
There are many ways to generate referrals in return of store credits:
- When customers share about their purchases on social media
- When customers refer a friend organically
- Through your dedicated referrals program
- When customers share a product or brand review
- When customers share their credits points with friends
Offer store credits on repeat purchase
Another way to use store credits to generate more sales is by offering points on repeat purchases. Here’s what you do – when a customer makes a purchase during the BFCM and holiday sale period, tell them they can earn more store credit if they buy more during that specific period.
For example, ‘Earn more credit points on all purchases made during the BFCM sale.’
Studies reveal that customers are ‘extremely’ and ‘very’ likely to start their future purchases from a site that offered them incentives like store credits. 75% of customers would make more purchases after receiving incentives from a brand.
Offer manual store credits to VIP and loyal customers
Next, how about you personalize store credits for your most special customers? While usually the store credits are given out automatically when a shopper makes a purchase on your site, manual store credits can be offered separately.
Here’s how it works:
- Create a segment of your most loyal and VIP customers
- These should be customers who have been buying from you over a period of time
- Work out a personalized amount of store credits for them. (One way to determine the amount is to base it on their past purchases)
- Send these store credits before the BFCM sale begins. This will encourage them to buy more during the sale
When customers who support your brand are made to feel special, it boosts their experience and loyalty. They are most likely to buy more from you during the BFCM sale, and beyond.
Offer Shopify store credits on cart value
You can think creatively and create opportunities to offer store credits. One way is to offer store credits when a shopper reaches a specified cart value during the BFCM sale. For example, store credits when the cart value reaches $100 or more.
Similarly, you can keep increasing the store credits for different thresholds. For example, 1 point for every dollar over $100 and 2 points for every dollar over $200.
The premise is simple – the more a customer buys during the BFCM sale, the more store credits they can earn. And the more store credits a customer earns, the more likely they are to come back to your site for future purchases.
Offer store credits for specific products
It’s obvious – some products on your site would be more popular and sell faster compared to the others. Most eCommerce stores monetize their high-demand products and ignore products of low demand.
Use the BFCM sale period to push the less popular products. Offer more store credits on those products. When shoppers see a higher discount rate on specific products, they might feel more encouraged to buy them.
For example, if you sell garments, you could offer higher store credits for seasonal items such as umbrellas, woolens, etc. which might not be immediate requirements of customers but they’d be motivated to buy them because they’re at a discounted price.
Enable multiple options to redeem store credits
While store credits are points given to customers for various reasons such as towards purchases, for referrals, reviews, etc. You can allow customers to redeem store credits in different ways.
For example, when you earn credit points from banks for using your credit card, they allow you to redeem points in different ways – to buy air tickets, towards restaurant bills, as cash, etc. You can do something similar with your BFCM store credits.
Enable store credits to be redeemed as:
- Gift card – convert store credits to gift cards that customers can give to their friends. This way, their friends become your new customers
- Discounts – turn store credits to discounts that they can avail on future purchases after the BFCM sale
Sum up
Store credits are a crucial opportunity for Shopify stores trying to boost BFCM sales. At a time when deals and discounts are just a few clicks away, if done right, you can utilize your store credits strategically to offer an upgraded customer experience. And you can do so with the help of the Flits app store credits add-on feature.
Boost sales and increase repeat purchases during BFCM and bring back customers after the sale period with the help of Flits Shopify store credits.
