How an interior design company +51% email revenue in the biggest sale of the year
Haus of Interiors
Industry: Home Improvement Platform: Shopify
About the Brand
Haus of Interiors is a UK-based store that specializes in European-style interior furnishings.
Their high-end minimalist design pieces and excellent customer service make them a premier destination for home, office, and commercial decor.
Haus of Interiors is proud to be known as a brand synonymous with luxury and minimalism.
The Challenge
We were already working with the client prior to the BFCM season and seeing improvements in their numbers.
While the client wanted to maximize profits during BFCM, they didn't have a preferred strategy to take advantage of it.
In this regard, the client reached out to eCom Maniacs with the following challenges that needed solutions:
- They had no idea how to market for BFCM (Sends Cadence, List Cleansing, Sender Domain Warmup, Deliverability Check, etc.); and
- They were not able to update and customize their Automations and Campaigns for BFCM.
Before BFCM
Upon engaging our services with eCom Maniacs in Q2 of 2021, we saw a positive and upward trend in store and Klaviyo revenues.
These major wins include:
After eCom Maniacs
Total Revenue for the month of November increased by 69% (MoM) by generating $147K in revenue. This also shows a 318% Total Revenue increase from the previous year.
OUR BFCM PLAYBOOK
• Target a narrower segment to maximize email deliverability and inbox placement.
• Start sending highly-engaging Campaigns as early as October to ensure a high Open Rate and Click Rate come BFCM.
• Decrease the original discount offers from 10% (Email Signup) and 15% (SMS Signup) to 5% and 8% to make BFCM offers more appealing.
• Extend Campaigns targeting larger audiences, specifically the less engaged lists.
• Use the strongest CTAs and offers, best-performing subject lines, and preview lines, and schedule these to go out at the optimal send time.
Pre-BFCM Segmentation
In preparation for BFCM, we sent high-engagement content to a narrower segment (at least 30 days engaged). This helped maximize Open/Click Rates and email placement during BFCM.
Advanced Acquisition Strategy
We used the weeks before the holidays to increase excitement and acquire potential shoppers using scarcity, urgency, and a valuable offer. (See Image 1)
● Subscribe to Early Access - Targeted VIP customers or net new profiles and asked them to opt-in to receive BFCM discounts before the rest of the regular subscribers.
● Subscribe to SMS - “Join our SMS list and never miss a deal!” or “Join our SMS list for an exclusive BFCM offer!”
● Subscribe to Exclusive Content - For those looking to educate subscribers before the holidays, “Get our healthy holiday cookbook” “Get our guide on how to save for the holidays.”
Offers
Instead of relying on a typical 50% off discount for Black Friday Campaigns, we provided a range of high-value offers that the client could choose from, in accordance with which option would suit their business best:
• Bundle Deals - This offer is best for businesses with multiple SKUs. A bundle is usually comprised of best sellers or a combination of flagship and new products sold as a single package at a collective rate.
• Long-Term Discounts - Instead of discounting products or services for one-off purchases, customers can be encouraged to sign up for a yearly or monthly subscription at a significantly lower price. This forms the basis for various VIP programs.
• BOGO (Buy One, Get One) - A classic, where the customer gets 2 products for the price of 1.
• Holiday Perks - These perks are often cyclical and seasonal in nature. The offers usually go live in time for major holiday events. Some examples include free shipping, free gift wrapping, and guaranteed delivery date.
• Loyalty Perks - Loyalty offers, such as cash-back and rewards points, provide customers with incentives and benefits and may help foster long-lasting B2C relationships. In fact, 78% of buyers are more likely to buy from a company that offers a loyalty program.
• Creative Offers - Offers that are typically customized to the business' production and inventory pipeline schedule. Some examples include "Kick-off the Season Sale," "Early Bird Sale," "VIP Access Sale," and so on.
Here are other types of offer structures you can use for BFCM:
➔ Flat % off
➔ Flat $ off
➔ Tiered % or $ off
➔ Gift With Purchase
➔ Free Shipping
➔ Buy 1 Get 1
➔ Price Change Offer
A Multi-Channel Strategy
eCom Maniacs recommends a multichannel approach as it is the most effective way to engage with prospects and maintain top of mind with consumers through a variety of platforms.
What we recommended:
- Warm-up cold traffic in October and early November before the Cost Per Impression (CPM) spikes as BFCM approaches
- Launch primer Campaigns 21 days before Black Friday
- Decide on, and roll out, discount Campaigns
- Host offers on a dedicated landing page
The Dedicated Landing Page
A BFCM-dedicated landing page was essential to converting traffic for this project for the following reasons:
- A clear and concise message allowed us to funnel the audience to a page solely focused on a single message/call to action.
- A straightforward UX design helped visitors stay focused on the goal rather than distracted by numerous links leading them away from the page.
- A focused landing page allowed for quick loading time. The average person takes only 3 seconds to decide whether they will remain on a web page and explore its content.
- The targeted focus on the unique selling points helped highlight the offer's key benefits.
- A countdown timer encouraged a sense of urgency and created FOMO (fear of missing out). This tool grabs users' attention and functions as a highly-effective scroll stopper.
- Black Friday weekend is one of the busiest shopping periods. So, capture customers' attention with bold banners showing off your giveaways, offers, and exclusive deals.
The Email Flows
Otherwise known as the bread and butter of the eCom Maniacs BFCM strategy. Our email Flows are designed to deliver persuasive messaging that helps increase audience engagement.
Here's our simple but effective formula:
- A header that highlights seasonal deals
- A template that you can swap out in high volume/high engagement Flows (Welcome, Abandoned Cart, Browse Abandonment, etc.)
- Decreased time delays for Abandonment Flows (from 2 hours → 30 minutes)
- Updated subject lines to call out deals, add urgency, and highlight scarcity
- Countdown timers
- If someone viewed many pages, appeal to their indecision — if you offer gift cards, consider this option for a Browse Abandonment email: “How about a last-minute gift card?”
The eCom Maniacs 6-Step BFCM Sequence
Based on our market research and data insights, we predict that BFCM shopping will kick off earlier and last longer each coming year.
With almost half of all consumers purchasing early, we predict that more and more deals will appear earlier and extend well beyond December 24th.
A quick Google search for “Black Friday 2021” serves up plenty of content offering “early” deals to shoppers, many of whom are eager to get their hands on items that were in short supply in 2021 due to the market disruptions of 2020.
In this regard, we strategized and created a 6-Step BFCM Email Sequence:
The Hype Builder
We launched our BFCM strategy with “Warm-Up Campaigns," including Testimonials, a Founder's Story, and Win-Back Campaigns.
Win-Back Campaign emails perfectly complement our BFCM strategy as they aim to persuade customers to interact with a brand once again. The Win-Back email can also help improve Open and Click-Through Rates, and provide clients with unique incentives to come back.
We followed the Win-Back series with additional BCFM teasers to build hype. The teasers were released until November 22nd, when the BFCM sale officially began.
Priority List
Each of the BFCM teasers included an Exclusive Offer CTA lead magnet.
This strategy evokes FOMO, as the Exclusive Offer allowed customers to capitalize on special deals before the main Black Friday sale.
Main Launch
The main launch was released on the sale day itself.
We segmented the client's list according to their interest, price sensitivity, customer value, and level of engagement. The client's most engaged segments were prioritized since they were set to deliver the best results.
This particular email highlights the sale offer and duration. For this sequence, we highly recommend showcasing best-selling products.
BFCM Popups
We also decided to launch both BFCM email (Image 1) and SMS (Image 2) Popups to create urgency and provide customers with an extra incentive to move forward with a purchase.
The Popup offered an additional 5% on top of the BFCM offer for email signup, attracting 654 new subscribers to opt-in. (See Image 3)
Our Popup's Submit Rate was 4.7%, well above the industry average Submission Rate of 2%. (See Image 3)
To protect the client's revenue health, we ensured we weren’t offering unsustainable discount rates, given the main BFCM discount offers.
So, we recommended adjusting email and SMS Popup discounts from 10% (Email Signups) and 15% (SMS signups) to 5% and 8%.
Social Reminder
This email's purpose is to remind customers that the sale is ending.
At this stage, we continued to utilize urgency by including a countdown timer. This would provide an extra push that would encourage the customer to take action and participate in the sale if they hadn't yet.
Sales Closing
Think of this sequence as a "last call." This final email highlights the sense of urgency on the last day of the sale.
Here, we re-emphasize the discounts, indicate product scarcity, and include positive customer reviews.
Cyber Monday Extension
Having observed the positive results of our BFCM strategy, Haus of Interiors decided to extend the sale until December 5th to maximize gains.
Wondering how we scheduled each of the BFCM Campaigns? Here's a look at the Email Schedule Calender we created for our client:
THE END RESULTS
The BFCM 2021 run for Haus of Interiors yielded excellent results, especially concerning cash revenue.
eCom Maniacs' highly-effective BFCM Strategy launched 19 Campaigns, which generated $147K in total revenue.
$56.7K came from Klaviyo revenue, a 51% increase from the previous month.
A year-on-year comparison from Nov 2020 to Nov 2021 also shows a whopping 318% jump in Total Cash Revenue generated.
All this, within just 1 month.
Email Performance
Email performance also maintained healthy levels. Overall, Open and Click Rates for all email Campaigns were high (above 35% for Open Rate and 2% for Click Rate).
Unfortunately, deliverability, specifically Unsubscribe Rate, took a hit during BFCM.
However, this can be explained by the decision to send Campaigns and Flows to a much larger audience than usual in order to increase reach. Making this decision meant targeting some unengaged segments as well.
Naturally, as your recipient pool expands, you also run the risk of increasing disengagement.
But because we were confident in the success of our BFCM Strategy, we took this calculated risk.
Ultimately, however, the risk paid off. Haus of Interiors made 69% more than the previous month — taking their monthly cash revenue from $87K to $147K.
Finally, the multi-channel approach that we recommended saw a $13.2K increase in SMS Flow and Campaign revenue, plus the addition of 100 new SMS subscribers. What a way to wrap up the BFCM season!
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