Thursday, 18 April

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WHAT’S HOT ON SOCIAL MEDIA

We know Meta has been rolling out so many different changes this year and been dipping their feet at different things resulting in so countless amount of glitches too, and if you’ve been a victim of it, stick in there—you’re not alone!

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ADVERTISING
#3 - eCommerce Ad Metrics

The Biggest mistake media buyers do while testing is killing ads too early.

“But, how do we decide if its too early or late to kill an ad?”

Good Question!

Before killing an ad, you need to know which metrics you need to consider to conclude an ad.

1. Starting with Hook Rate - It's the metric used to evaluate if your ad is grabbing a viewer's attention and making their "Thumb Stop" from scrolling down.

This is a custom metric that you have to create in your Meta Ads dashboard.

Formula = (3-second video views/impressions) * 100

A thumb rule - The Higher, The Better

2. Hold Rate - It is to determine the percentage of viewers your ad could "Hold" from 3 secs to 15 secs.

Again, a custom formula,

Formula = (Thruplays/3 sec video views) * 100

A thumb rule - The Higher, The Better

3. CTR - Click Through Rate A predefined metric that I already spoke about in my previous post.

The percentage of people who have clicked on your ad divided by the viewers

Formula = (Number of Clicks/Impressions) * 100

A thumb rule - The Higher, The Better

4. CPM - Cost per Mile This is basically the average cost for 1000 impressions.

Formula = (Amount Spent/Impressions) * 1000

A thumb rule - The Lower, The Better

5. CPC - Cost per Click As the name defines, it's your ad's average cost per click.

Formula = Amount Spent/Link Clicks

A thumb rule - The Lower, The Better

6. CPLV - Cost per Landing Page View This is a silent metric that nobody talks about.

While LPVR determines the intent created by your ad and the performance of your landing page, cost per LPV will help you gauge the effect of changes on your ad.

A thumb rule - The Lower, The Better

7. Conversion Rate This additional metric will tell you if your ad has generated any sales.

This is not just based on your ad but a 'N' number of variables on your website, like the product, pricing, offer, social proof, delivery time, authenticity, ease of checkout, payment options, and everything in and around these.

A thumb rule - The Higher, The Better

Do ensure if your media buyer is gauging these metrics before concluding an ad!

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IBRAHIM’S NUGGETS

Post-Purchase Email Flow & its nuances..

Hi, everyone!

Yesterday, we dived into all things Meta’s learning phase. If you run paid media and haven’t read that yet, highly recommend it! You can read it here.

One thing I did forget to mention yesterday was, even if you aren’t running any paid media currently, if you don’t have Meta’s pixel integrated with your store, please do connect it right now, so when you’re ready to run your paid media campaigns, Meta already has some data about your existing customers and site visitors, which can be really impactful.

Alright, so today we’ll talk about post-purchase email flow—a personal favourite of mine. Why do I love this flow? Because at this point, you’re talking to customers that have trusted you enough to remove the dollars from their hard earned money and pay you to get your product, so the barrier to communication now is a lot more receptive, and gets a bit easier.

Okay, let’s get into it..

Must have email flows:

1. Welcome Email Flow | Buyers Vs Non-buyers

2. Browse Abandonment Flow | Buyers Vs Non-buyers

3. Abandoned Cart Flow | Buyers Vs Non-buyers

4. Checkout Abandonment Flow | Buyers Vs Non-buyers

5. Post-Purchase Flow

Please note: I would be mentioning Klaviyo and Shopify by default, but it should pretty much apply to other email service providers (ESPs) and other eCommerce hosting platforms.

Post-Purchase Flow

Who would enter this flow?

As soon as someone would make a purchase, they would ideally enter this flow.

• Trigger: The flow is triggered by a specific event, usually the successful completion of a purchase. This is detected through the integration of Klaviyo with your e-commerce platform, which sends data to Klaviyo about the transaction

• Segmentation: Depending on how the flow is set up, different segments of customers might receive different emails based on factors like the amount spent, the type of product purchased, their buying history, first time customer vs repeating customer vs subscription customer, etc.

• Timing: Timing for these emails can be immediately after purchase, a few hours later, or few days later works too depending on the cadence of how many emails you’d want your customers to receive per day, because you’ve gotta keep in mind that the customers would receive transactional emails as well, as soon as a purchase is completed

I like to use the fulfilled order metric as a trigger for a couple of reasons

• A customer might request to cancel their order right after placing an order for any reason

• Sometimes the 3PL warehouse might delay their fulfilment, and I prefer reaching out to customers once the orders are fulfilled and being shipped out, and until then, they receive transactional emails anyway

• I have 7 separate post-purchase email flows set up exclusively receive order updates, and this has cut our customer support tickets by over 65%

• Why? Because in most cases, brands are being reactive—meaning, you look into an issue when a customer reaches out to you. With these flows in place, you’re being proactive—meaning, you take care of things before a customer reaches out to you, or at least you keep them updated on what’s going on, and most of it is entirely automated

• Not to mention, most of your tickets even today must be customers asking, “Where’s my order??”, and you try to eliminate such tickets with these flows by over 90%

• For subscription customers, I like setting up a separate flow because the way you communicate with the subscription customers should be from the customers that purchase from you via one-time purchases, hence why you’ll notice I’ve excluded Active Subscribers from this flow

I know what your next question is. Ibrahim, what tool are you using for this?

It’s Wonderment! One of the best softwares I’ve used because it can save so much of hassle with the support tickets, and at the same time, enhance customers’ experience as well by keeping them updated throughout the journey after purchase. They also integrate with 3PL softwares, giving you a branded tracking page + integrate with softwares like Gorgias as well by enabling customers to track their order within the Gorgias chat bot.

Also, please note, I would never personally recommend a tool that I’ve never used.

Wonderment Email Flows

This isn’t a must have, but can make a significant difference:

• Email flow 1 is triggered when an order is fulfilled

• Email flow 2 is triggered out when carrier picks up the package

• Email flow 3 is triggered when the shipment is out for delivery

• Email flow 4 is triggered when a shipment is delivered

• Email flow 5 is triggered IF a shipment is stalled, letting the customers know that there’s nothing to worry about, and that we’re actively looking into this situation

• Email flow 6 is triggered when there’s an attempted delivery, but the delivery failed due to any reason

• Email flow 7 is triggered when a product is returned to the sender, after which you’ll be notified, so if you have to process any refunds, etc., you can do that

Please note: these are emails flows, which means, some of these email flows might have multiple emails and some can contain SMSes too. And when a shipment is stalled, not only do the customers receive an email, we receive an email as well, so we could actively look into this situation. Wonderment has exceptional support that’ll help you guys out if you’d like to set it up, and this is not sponsored. Also, in every email, there’s also a link that takes the customers to the tracking page.

Apart from the Wonderment Flow, how do you set up the post-purchase flow?

• You can start off by using a pre-built template by Klaviyo (or any other ESPs), and customize it according to your needs

• Here’s a guide by Klaviyo on how you could set this up

What are the emails you should send out in this flow?

Wonderment Email Flows

This isn’t a must have, but can make a significant difference:

• Email flow 1 is triggered when an order is fulfilled

• Email flow 2 is triggered out when carrier picks up the package

• Email flow 3 is triggered when the shipment is out for delivery

• Email flow 4 is triggered when a shipment is delivered

• Email flow 5 is triggered IF a shipment is stalled, letting the customers know that there’s nothing to worry about, and that we’re actively looking into this situation

• Email flow 6 is triggered when there’s an attempted delivery, but the delivery failed due to any reason

• Email flow 7 is triggered when a product is returned to the sender, after which you’ll be notified, so if you have to process any refunds, etc., you can do that

Please note: these are emails flows, which means, some of these email flows might have multiple emails and some can contain SMSes too. And when a shipment is stalled, not only do the customers receive an email, we receive an email as well, so we could actively look into this situation. Wonderment has exceptional support that’ll help you guys out if you’d like to set it up, and this is not sponsored. Also, in every email, there’s also a link that takes the customers to the tracking page.

Apart from the Wonderment Flow, how do you set up the post-purchase flow?

• You can start off by using a pre-built template by Klaviyo (or any other ESPs), and customize it according to your needs

• Here’s a guide by Klaviyo on how you could set this up

What are the emails you should send out in this flow?

Shopify One-Time and Repeat Purchasers:

1 - Post-Purchase Thank You Email

• Number of Emails: 1

• Content: Thank customers for their purchase, provide order summary, and estimated delivery information. Brownie points if it’s coming from the Founder via TEXT based email!

• Cadence: After the order has been fulfilled, or you could trigger it a few minutes after the purchase as well. You can test the cadence and find out what performs best for you

2 - Educational Email

• Number of Emails: 1-2

• Content: This is a period when your customers would pretty much open any emails you send out to them, and the reason is simple—they do not want to miss any important updates related to the order they’re about to receive

• Cadence: It can vary, but please send out educational emails before the product is being received by the end consumer. There’s not much value in educating them about the products after they’ve already used the product

3 - Product Review Request Email

• Number of Emails: 1 per purchase

• Content: Request a product review, possibly offer a discount or incentive for submitting a review, and if you use something like Loyalty Lion, you can offer extra points for uploading pictures/videos

• Cadence: At least 1 week after the product has been delivered, giving them enough time to use your product, so please set the right triggers, so a customer receives this request only after he/she has received the product

4 - Loyalty and Rewards Email

• Number of Emails: Varies

• Content: Offer loyalty program details, reward points updates, etc.

• Cadence: 10-15 days after the product has been delivered

5 - Post-Purchase Survey

• Number of Emails: 1

• Content: You can ask them where did they hear about you, why they bought it, other burning questions, new product recommendations, etc. It’s the best way to launch new products!

• Cadence: 15-20 days after the product has been delivered

6 - Cross-Sell and Up-Sell Email

• Number of Emails: Varies (based on purchase history and inventory)

• Content: Suggest related products or upgrades based on the items they purchased. This is also an incredible opportunity to sell your subscription

• Cadence: 3-4 weeks after the product has been delivered, and during relevant sales/promotions

7 - Re-engagement Email

• Number of Emails: Varies

• Content: Engage customers who haven’t purchased in a while with special offers, product updates, or company news

• Cadence: If no purchase within 3-6 months, and if it’s a CPG product, 2-3 months

Subscription Customers

1 - Welcome Email

• Number of Emails: 1

• Content: Thank customers for subscribing, provide details about their subscription, and explain how to manage their subscription

• Cadence: Immediately after subscription is confirmed

2 - Educational Email

• Number of Emails: 1-2

• Content: This is a period when your customers would pretty much open any emails you send out to them, and the reason is simple—they do not want to miss any important updates related to the order they’re about to receive

• Cadence: It can vary, but please send out educational emails before the product is being received by the end consumer. There’s not much value in educating them about the products after they’ve already used the product

3 - Pre-Delivery Notification

• Number of Emails: 1 per delivery

• Content: Inform customers about the upcoming delivery, including expected date and contents

• Cadence: 3 days before each scheduled delivery

4 - Post-Delivery Follow-Up

• Number of Emails: 1 per delivery

• Content: Ask for feedback on the received product (post-purchase survey), provide customer support links, encourage product reviews, loyalty and rewards email, etc.

• Cadence: 1-2 weeks after each delivery

5 - Subscription Renewal Reminder

• Number of Emails: 1 per renewal cycle

• Content: Remind customers about upcoming subscription renewal, including date and charge amount

• Cadence: 3 days before renewal date

6 - Subscription Update Notification (optional)

• Number of Emails: Varies (only when applicable)

• Content: Notify customers about any changes to their subscription plan, pricing, or the products

• Cadence: As soon as changes are confirmed

7 - Cancellation Follow-Up Email (this can be a game-changer to reduce churn)

• Number of Emails: 1

• Content: Acknowledge the cancellation, ask for feedback on why they canceled, and provide offers or incentives to reconsider their decision

• Cadence: Immediately following subscription cancellation

I know this can be a lot of work in the beginning, but once it’s set up, it can run on auto-pilot apart from small A/B tests and optimization, which isn’t absolutely necessary if you’re a solo Founder, but can help improve the performance metrics.

Today’s email could’ve easily been a deep dive, but I didn’t want to cut through some important stuff, so it got a bit lengthier that I had initially anticipated. Hope that was helpful.

Thank you for reading.

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Have any questions that you need help with?

Ask here - and look out for Fridays Issue where Ibrahim will answer them.