Understand and segment customers for more conversions
As marketers, we’re always trying to send the right message to the right users. However, we don’t always get it right and messaging may not be resonating as well as we think, leading to missed opportunities.
This is where segmentation becomes important in your email marketing efforts, and where you’ll be able to learn how different groups of users respond to different types of emails; essentially understanding your users and business better. It gives you the ability to tailor and optimize your customer experience so you can increase engagement, click, and conversion rates. We’ll show you a segmentation method our client Rocky Mountain Oils used to help them understand and convert more customers.
Segmentation based on user behavior
Rocky Mountain Oils used segmentation based on a user’s purchase behavior within the Cart abandon stage. They took Cart abandon users and created three different segments for these user types:
- No purchases – User that has abandoned their cart, but have not purchased anything from their site.
- Single purchasers – User that has abandoned their cart, but has purchased only one item from their site.
- Repeat purchasers – User that has abandoned their cart, but has purchased more than one item from their site.
After they identified these three segments within the Cart abandon stage, they created templates to test each segment. The testing revealed that:
- For users with No purchases, plain text emails that looked like it was written by a Rocky Mountain Oils employee with resource links had the highest engagement (CTOR.)
- For Single purchasers, emails with more educational information on the brand and heavy product recommendations had the best engagement rates.
- For Repeat purchases, strict plain text emails without any recs or links performed the best.
- Across all segments, any email with additional product recommendations using our Cart abandon + Similar recommendation scheme always performed better than emails with just the carted item.
Sample campaign data
Rocky Mountain Oils was able to test segments automatically, and used the data they found to drive better performing emails campaigns. Instead of every Cart abandon user receiving the same “one size fits all” email, they were able to test and optimize based on each user type, figuring out what performs best with each segment.
Now that they understand each specific segment of users within Cart Abandon, they will now have the ability to control not only what type of emails they were sending, but also what incentives and offers worked best with each type of segment. This all led to increased engagement, open, click, and conversion rates across the board.
Note: Cortex has three different abandon stages at your disposal: cart, search, and browse abandon. This specific example focuses on the Cart abandon stage, but you can learn more about the other stages here.
Let’s get started
This effective method can easily be added to any campaign within Cortex. What you’ll do is setup up a few templates, segment these users into groups, and let Cortex do its magic.
Step 1: Create testing templates
These templates will be used to test in each segment (No purchases, Single purchasers, Repeat purchasers) Create 4 new templates for testing:
- Cart abandon email, with product recs
- Cart abandon email, no product recs
- Plain text email, with resource links
- Plain text email, no links
(Note: You can also clone templates that you like and modify them instead of creating new templates)
New templates for testing
Step 2: Segment templates
Take each template and clone it 2 more times. That will give you a total of 4 templates per segment, with 12 templates total.
- 4 email templates for No purchases (i.e., Cart abandon email, with product recs; Cart abandon email, no product recs; Plain text email, with resource links; Plain text email, no links)
- 4 email templates for Single purchasers
- 4 email templates for Repeat purchasers
Update the name of each template to reflect the appropriate segment (No purchases, Single purchasers, Repeat purchasers)
Clone your new templates again
Step 3: Segment the emails
Now that you have all 12 email templates setup, go into each email under Email Settings>Advanced>Segment targeting and assign each email to it’s proper segment (No purchases, Single purchasers, Repeat purchasers)
Assign each email to a segment
Step 4: Finalize templates
Update and modify your emails accordingly. Proofread, check your links, subject lines, and that all the segments are added. Now let Cortex handle the rest.
We recommend you evaluate template performance after 4-6 weeks. Pay attention to templates or combination of templates that are outperforming others and adjust accordingly. Otherwise, continue to monitor and adjust as needed.
Now you’re a pro segmenter
Rocky Mountain Oils was able to figure out what type of messaging works for their users in each segment, and tailored and optimized their content accordingly. Using this same method of segmentation will surely help you understand your customers better and increase your conversion rates.
Each user responds differently to messaging, therefore sending “one size fits all” emails do not benefit brands. That’s not what ReSci is about–we want to provide a personalized experience to your customers. One unique thing about Cortex shown in this example with Rocky Mountain Oils is it enables marketers to experiment and figure out what works for their users with its unique ability to run multiple tests at the same time. Not only does Cortex give marketers a safe haven to test creative, but it let’s marketers do it even faster.
Having trouble implementing this? Feel confused or lost? Want more strategies? Contact us the help desk, or reach out to your Client Success Manager and they’ll be happy to help!
Brought to you by Andrew Pohlen, Senior Client Solutions Manager at ReSci
Andrew works with some of the best commerce brands at ReSci. He helps brands become more successful by providing effective marketing strategies. Check out more content from Andrew, like his webinar with Foodstirs that helped marketers with holiday strategies.
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