Learn how to increase repeat customers via the Shopify customer account page
Just because customers bought from your brand once or twice, doesn’t always mean they’ll keep coming back to your site or make more purchases.
Unless…
You consistently work toward bringing them back to your site.
That’s because as the number of eCommerce brands is increasing, so is competition. And everyone’s trying to target the same customers—including your customers.
So, if you don’t engage first-time or existing customers, you may lose them in a blink.
This is why it’s important to run post-purchase marketing and promotional strategies.
In this blog, we take you through effective post-purchase strategies to run via your Shopify customer account page.
But first, let’s get into the bottom of how repeat purchases are related to the eCommerce customer account.
How are Shopify customer account page and repeat purchases related?
The Shopify customer account page holds all the important information about customers, their order history, activities on your website, store credits, offers, etc.
Some of the common components of this page are: order history, customer information, wishlist, recently viewed products, store credits, eCommerce reward program, among others.
For Shopify merchants, these features and the entire account page are a data bank. This data can provide insights into customer behavior and preference, which can be applied to create marketing campaigns.
And this is how this page is closely related to generating repeat customers.
In short, to build marketing campaigns to bring back customers and increase sales.
Let’s get into some details of why repeat customers are so profitable.
How do repeat customers increase profit?
Consider these numbers, to begin with: Repeat loyal customers spend 33% more, and 65% of a company’s revenue is generated via them. But what are the exact reasons why repeat customers are profitable? Let’s find out.
1. Customers rarely buy on their first visits
First-time site visitors rarely convert. Shoppers tend to revisit online stores to explore and compare products before they finally make purchases. This is why, the more times customers come to your site, the more the probability they will buy.
2. Existing customers trust your Shopify brand
Customers who have bought from you, like your brand and products, and trust your brand. Hence, they’re easier to sell to. And so, repeat customers tend to purchase more as they keep revisiting.
3. Repeat customers spend more
As repeat customers buy more, spend more, they have a higher average order value. Additionally, they also tend to shop more during special events such as sales, festivals, and holiday seasons.
4. Existing customers generate social proof
Finally, another important factor is that repeat customers become your brand ambassadors, share your recommendation to other people, and help generate social proof. All these factors make them profitable for your brand in the long run.
But do you know who your repeat customers are? Let’s learn how to identify them.
How to identify repeat customers via Shopify customer account
You can identify repeat customers by reviewing customer data from your customer account. For example, measuring customer loyalty metrics such as customer lifetime value, repeat purchase sales, and customer retention rate, can assist you in determining repeat customers. There are a number of different methods to identify repeat customers. Let’s look at some:
1. Store credit or loyalty program
Store credits and loyalty points are things your customers can use easily to make purchases. Consider offering store credits when customers checkout and make purchases. In addition, urge them to join the loyalty program. Assessing the store credit and loyalty program activities can give you a peek into your repeat customers.
2. Analyze data from the customer account
Identify repeat customers by analyzing eCommerce customer account data. For example, count the number of customers who have purchased more than once against the total number of customers and multiply the figure by 100 to calculate the percentage. You have your repeat customer rate.
3. Use customer account profiles to identify repeat customers
You can analyze your customer profiles to get an overview of their purchase histories and interests to identify repeat customers.
And once you’ve identified repeat customers, comes the tough part: to bring those customers back to your site for more purchases.
8 strategies to increase repeat customers and repeat purchases via your Shopify customer account page
Consumers want brands to help them shop. Today’s consumers have become used to ease—having everything at their fingertips, help from customer support, personalized and customized communication and offers tailored to their needs, etc. Apply these eight effective post-purchase strategies to boost repeat customers.
1. Use order history to upsell, cross-sell and recommend products
Upselling, cross-selling, and product recommendations are effective post-purchase strategies to generate repeat customers. All the three strategies involve helping customers discover new products that are related to their past orders.
How to create upsell and cross-sell campaigns from order history?
- Collect order history data to understand customer’s likes, interests, product preferences, average product value, etc. Recommend new products based on this information that you think customers might like.
- To upsell, recommend products of higher value than the ones customers have bought or have been exploring. Remember, these products should also be of better quality and add value to customers.
- To cross-sell, identify products that complement customers’ past orders. For example, if customers have bought baby shampoo, cross-sell baby oil and powders to them.
- You can also try product bundling to upsell and cross-sell. For example, display ‘Customers also bought’ on the product pages while customers are browsing.
- Create multi-channel campaigns — email, social media, SMS, WhatsApp, Messenger, etc.
- Send product alerts based on customers’ past purchase behavior. For example, if a customer bought warm socks in winter last year, send them recommendations for the same product in the following year’s winter
Example:
If you’re looking for a customer account app, explore Flits Customer Account Page App for your Shopify store.
2. Use social login to retarget and remarket
A common reason shoppers refrain from registering on eCommerce login pages is because they do not want to fill lengthy forms. Nor do they want to remember new login ids and passwords.
That’s where social login helps make sign-ups easier. In addition, it helps gain access to customers’ social accounts, which can be utilized to retarget and remarket to them.
Social retargeting and remarketing are among the best post-purchase strategies. Studies show retargeting and remarketing bring 30% click-through rate and 40% increase in revenue, respectively.
How to retarget and remarket via social login?
- Ensure the remarketing and retargeting ads are relevant to target customers. For example, don’t retarget all customers in every campaign; segment them to keep communication relevant.
- Run cross-channel campaigns—create campaigns for all your social channels.
- Request customers to share unboxing videos of their recent purchase on social
media.
- Create how-to videos and guides of products bought by customers and share on social media.
3. Use recently viewed products to send reminders
Customers browse multiple products on your site and may forget about products they saw and were interested in. To remind customers and make their purchase decisions easier, brands display ‘recently viewed products’. Data from this section can help you craft effective post-purchase marketing campaigns.
How to create post-purchase strategies from recently viewed products?
- Send reminders of products customers viewed, to drive sales.
- Offer discounts on recently viewed products to entice customers to make purchases.
- Bundle recently viewed products with other products to increase the average order value.
- Promote recently viewed products around festivals, holiday season, etc.
4. Use wishlist to send discount alerts
Another effective strategy to recall customers to your Shopify store is to use data from wishlist. Customers add items in the wishlist because they aren’t ready to buy them yet. This gives you an opportunity to create promotional campaigns to push sales of wishlist products.
How to use wishlist for post purchase marketing?
- Create FOMO (fear of missing out) and urgency campaigns around items in wishlists. For example, send alerts when an item in the wishlist is almost out of stock.
- Show related item suggestions. For example, if a product in the wishlist is sold out, show alternatives via multi-channel campaigns.
- Send back in stock notifications when items in the wishlist are restocked.
Here’s an example:
5. Use wishlist around special events
If you’re using the wishlist feature only to allow customers to add and save their favorite items, you’re underutilizing its capabilities.
There’s a lot you can do to promote sales of items in wishlists. Consider pushing wishlists around special events and days, for example, during sales, birthdays, anniversaries, etc.
Here’s how to use wishlist around special events:
- Allow customers to share wishlists with their friends and family. That way they can share the list and receive gifts of their choice.
- Personalize campaigns by promoting products from wishlists around the festive period to push sales.
- Send price drop alerts for wishlist products when there are sales.
- When items in wishlists are low stock, send fast-selling notifications.
- Offer special discount on wishlist items during birthdays and anniversaries to push sales.
6. Run onboarding campaigns with new sign ups
Once first-time customers sign up for your Shopify customer account page, you must engage them with onboarding campaigns. However, ensure that the campaigns add real value to them and aren’t just run of the mill interactions.
Here are some examples of how you could run onboarding campaigns:
- If customers have bought a gadget, share a how-to guide that tells them all the different ways they can use the gadget.
- First-time customers who have just registered may not know all the different features on your Shopify site. Tell them how they can do more on your website.
- If you have communities and loyalty programs they can join, tell them about it.
- Make first-time customers feel good about the products they just bought.
- Make it easy for them to contact you and tell them about all the channels they can use to stay connected with you.
- If you have a referrals program, tell customers about it.
7. Use reorder to send reminders
Customers like brands that make their lives easier. One way you can enhance their shopping experience is by using the reorder feature. It allows them to place recurring orders faster and easily.
How does the reorder feature help?
- Reorder feature makes placing repeat orders easy
- Reorder data helps retailers predict inventory requirements
- It makes order placement faster as the product quantity, variety, etc. information is already stored
- Retailers can send reminders to customers to reorder products based on reorder history
Example:
8. Ensure you always surpass customer expectations
Engage customers beyond transactions. To build a long-term relationship with your customers, it’s important you create emotional connections. Merely transactional interactions will not get your desired results.
How to use the Shopify customer account page to build emotional connections?
- Differentiate your brand by creating personalized campaigns and communication—customers appreciate personalization
- Collect feedback from them via the Shopify customer account page and address their concerns
- Never miss a chance to offer them a discount or price benefit—this will make them feel special
How to set up repeat customers strategies on your Shopify customer account page?
To create a dedicated strategy for repeat customers, you will have to depend on your Shopify customer account. Because that is the place that will give you information and data to initiate repeat customer strategies.
And that is why, you must choose your Shopify customer account app carefully—one that offers comprehensive features, so you do not have to install multiple apps.
Install Flits Customer Account Page app for your Shopify store.