As the coronavirus starts to affect sales, many merchants are adapting and adjusting their expectations and goals. Instead of sales, many merchants are focusing on engaging new audiences and growing their subscriber base. However, while acquiring a new audience is crucial, you must not forget your existing customers.
Returning customers usually spend 20% more than first-time customers, and are more likely to refer your product or business to a friend. Repeat customers also have a 60-70% conversion rate. By engaging with your existing customer base and building a strong relationship with them, you can nurture them to make a repeat purchase during this time or after restrictions are lifted.
In this blog, we want to specifically give you strategies to engage existing customers and build a relationship with them.
10 Strategies to Engage Existing Customers
1. Set up a loyalty program that offers store credits
One of the best ways to engage existing customers and nurture your relationship with them is through a loyalty program. On average, loyal customers are worth up to 10x as much as their first purchase. By setting up a loyalty program, you can make the shopper invest their time into your store to build their loyalty credits. They will later be able to spend these credits on a purchase.
Flits store credits allow you to set up different rewards for different activities by your customer. You can reward your shoppers when they order from your store, leave a review, or on their birthday.
Along with the store credits, you can provide a holistic loyalty experience for your customers with a customer account page. This page shows your customers their store credit balance, wishlist, recently viewed products, etc.
The page is personalized to each of your customers, making them eager to come back to your store and interact with their credits and check out their wishlisted items.
2. Build social proof by requesting reviews
By asking your customers for reviews, you can nudge them to engage with your store again. Reviews are a low-commitment request and can be a great way to start your engagement campaign. When sending a review request, ensure that your shoppers are aware that they will earn rewards for leaving a review.
Moreover, by using this time to build your reviews, you can boost your credibility and build social proof for your store.
If you don’t have an app to help you send review requests and display them on your store, you can set up Photo Reviews & Testimonials app to start building your credibility and engage existing customers better.
3. Create quizzes/ contests that capture shopper intent
Gamify your products and create quizzes out of them for your customers. Quizzes like “Answer these questions and we’ll pick the product you match with” is sure to make your customers spend more time on your store. At the end of the quiz, you can even let the shopper add the item, to their wishlist for a later purchase.
You can enable wishlisting through Flits and customize how shoppers interact with it. This wishlist can be viewed on the customer account page. The best part is that customers can easily add the item to their cart directly through their wishlists.
4. Collect user-generated content
User-generated content is sure to make your shoppers connect with your brand better. Encourage your customers to share how they use your product during this time. You can create social media campaigns to start a chain of posts shared by your customers about your product.
You can even make it a contest by setting up a reward for the best post or by promising to donate for each post shared. This can encourage your customers to share and create a buzz around the campaign. For instance, if you sell tea products, you can ask your customers to share their morning tea ritual videos or if you sell skincare products, you can ask them to share a picture of what self-care looks like during quarantine.
5. Create blogs with helpful content
Provide value to your customers by creating and sharing helpful content with them. These can be tips, videos, quizzes, etc. With such content, you give your customers a reason to visit your brand, engage with you, and view you as an expert within the field. When creating such content, ask yourself what your customers would love to read or interact with. This can help you come up with content that is sure to be a hit!
Once you’ve published it, don’t forget to share it with your customer base through emails and social media so they don’t miss it.
Harney & Sons is a tea brand that has created an interactive page all about tea. From the different types of tea to how to brew it, their customers will surely be busy on this page for an hour or two.
Read about how you can set up content marketing for your Shopify store.
6. Create virtual experiences
Virtual experiences are fun for everyone! Many brands are providing virtual freebies to their audience. In return, customers are eager to receive the brand’s emails and visit their website to avail these fun offers.
You can set up virtual freebies for your customers. You can create quizzes, Instagram filters, templatized pages, etc. For instance, if you are a cosmetic store, you can provide a template for a skincare routine that your customers can fill up and save for easy reference.
If you are within the fashion, cosmetics, or accessories industry, you can allow customers to spend their time ‘trying’ your products. Virtual try-ons allow the customer to try the product within their device screens before placing the order. Apps like ProFit how you provide this experience to your shoppers.
7. Send humanizing emails
Send emails to your customers, updating them in an honest and authentic manner. You can send emails from the CEO that talk about the impacts of the pandemic on your own business. You can also update how you will be selling and restructuring your work moving forward.
You can also send emails about how your staff is being taken care of, giving a glimpse of your workday. Share any charity efforts you’ve taken up and encourage your customers to contribute if they can.
Such emails must be in the first person, without adding any fluff. You can show your customers who you really are and make them feel more connected to your brand.
8. Set up retargeting ads
For customers who have been browsing your products, you can set up retargeting ads. Retargeting ads show personalized ads to shoppers about products they were recently looking at or added to their carts. People who see retargeted ads are up to 70% more likely to convert.
Apps like RetargetApp help you easily recapture shoppers who are already interested in your products, nudging them to successfully make a purchase. Such ads are also cheaper to set up, meaning that you don’t need a large budget to recapture these customers and get them to purchase from you.
9. Set up a community online for your shoppers
Brands with a community have proven to increase purchases and reduce product research costs. A University of Michigan study found that customers spend 19% more after joining a company’s online community.
Use social media platforms like Facebook and Reddit to build a community. For instance, if you sell beauty products, your community can talk about problem-solving skin issues or showing off skin product haul. Communities can help you easily engage existing customers in a more authentic manner.
More importantly, these communities will later easily attract people looking for solutions like yours.
10. Offer bulk discounts
While engaging your customers with different activities, you can also provide easier ways to shop on your Shopify store. Provide bulk discounts that make it easier for your customers to place a large order. Shoppers are in the habit of bulk shopping and by setting up a discount, you can incentivize them and make it easier for them to buy in large quantities.
Set up apps like Volume Discount to easily set up a custom volume discount on your Shopify store. This discount can be customized based on the number of items that your customer shops or even based on the value of their order.
Engage existing customers to convert them into loyal shoppers
We hope these strategies help you better cater to your existing customers, provide value to them, and build a stronger relationship with them that can later be leveraged to bring in more purchases on your store.
Once set up, ensure that you monitor these strategies and understand the problem areas and suggestions from your customers. Use this feedback to improve your tactics and deliver positive experiences to better engage existing customers.
