No matter the size of your email subscriber list, there’s always an opportunity to improve customer engagement. On the surface, it may seem like your email list is doing great — maybe you have thousands of email subscribers. But when you really dig in, how is the list performing?
Once you start to break it down, chances are good your retention rates may be lower than expected. If that’s the case, you’re not alone. Many companies struggle to find the right strategy to retain customers.
That’s why we are going to dive into the topic of nurturing campaigns for subscriber retention rates.
Here’s a quick look at what we’ll discuss in this article:
- Why you should be nurturing your email lists
- Getting started is easier than you think
- Nurture subscribers through the buyer’s journey
- How to reach subscribers during each stage of the journey
Why is it important to nurture your email subscribers?
Now, you may be wondering why it’s important to have a strategy built around nurturing your email subscribers. Obviously the people on your email list are interested in your products or services since they filled out a form on your website — right?
While that might be correct, or at least was at one point in time, you need to work on building a relationship with your subscribers. It’s not only about sending them the sales-pitchy emails to entice them to buy your new product.
It’s about building a connection with them, providing them with content they want to see, and creating a loyal member for your brand. Although this may seem like a daunting task, the payoff is well worth the work.
By focusing solely on attracting new customers, you’re missing a huge opportunity to increase sales. In fact, it is 6 to 7 times more expensive to attract a new customer than it is to retain an existing one.
If that isn’t enough to get you jumping on the retention bandwagon, consider this if you can increase your customer retention rates by just 5% you have the ability to increase profits by 25% to 95%.
Having a customer retention strategy is a good business decision for any company. It’s much more likely that you will see increased sales if put your efforts into nurturing the relationships you already have developed with your customer base. Any new customers beyond that are just a bonus opportunity. Image courtesy of Business2Community.
So, how do you start nurturing your email subscribers for better retention rates?
Chances are good, you already have some of the steps in place. If you have a welcome campaign or at least a welcome email that is automatically sent to new subscribers, you’re headed in the right direction.
Once you’ve got the basics down, such as the welcome email, it’s time to get serious. Start by defining your audience and segmenting your list. It’s important to understand who your audience is before you can truly know how to market to them.
From there, you’ll want to provide subscribers with content that adds value to them. You don’t want to just start throwing products and promotions in their face, you want to warm them up and give them a chance to get to know your brand.
It might seem like a lot at first, but by taking the time to understand your customer base and their wants and needs, you’ll see a return on investment sooner rather than later. In fact, companies that nurture their leads tend to see an increase in lead generated ROI of at least 45% compared to companies that don’t nurture their leads.
If done right, lead nurturing can generate more sales at a lower cost. When considering the cost benefits to retain customers verse attracting new, the benefits outweigh the cons when it comes to nurturing campaigns. Image courtesy of Neil Patel.
But if you base your nurturing campaigns on the buyer’s journey, it will help you move subscribers through the steps and increase sales in the process. The more relevant the content is to the user, the more likely they are to convert from a subscriber to a customer. This is why nurturing them through the buyer’s journey is the perfect solution to providing relevant content.
Implement Nurturing Campaigns to Move Subscribers Through the Buyer’s Journey
One great thing about nurturing campaigns is that they can be used for subscribers across the buyer’s journey. This means you have the opportunity to reach customers where they are at in their own journey.
If they are a new subscriber, sending them down a path that leads them through the awareness, consideration, and ultimately to the decision stage will help not only increase sales but build a relationship with your brand.
Creating nurturing campaigns based on where customers fall in the buyer’s journey will help provide them with more relevant content, making them more likely to continue to engage in the content you provide them.
You’ve been told many times before that list segmentation is the key to customer retention and email list engagement — well, in this case, we are segmenting based on the buyer’s journey as well.
Segmenting your list will improve email correspondence sent to your subscriber base. Knowing what your customers want to receive based on their interests, previous shopping behavior, and where they are in the buyer’s journey will all help you provide more relevant and engaging content. Image courtesy of Smart Insights.
Awareness Stage Nurturing
During the awareness stage of the buyer’s journey, your subscribers are still very new to your company. At this point, they are most likely not ready to make a purchase from you but are realizing they have a problem that needs to be solved.
Generally, during this stage of the journey, the subscriber is just realizing the problem at hand and starting to do some research around the topic. They may have found your site through a Google search and filled a form out to learn more about how you can help them with this new problem.
At this stage, you want to provide your subscribers with very general and education content. Providing them with sales and product promotions may be too pushy for this stage and should be kept to a minimum.
Instead, provide them with basic, educational resources to help them understand their problem and how it can be solved. This could be through blog posts, free white papers, webinars, or another outlet that is low pressure.
Blog content is a great option for the awareness stage subscriber. This is a very simple and non-committal way to research a topic to learn more about solving a problem. Blogs are often a place that many consumers start their journey towards a purchase. Image courtesy of The Manifest.
Consideration Stage Nurturing
So, your subscriber has worked their way from the awareness stage to the consideration stage — but what does that actually mean?
This means that the user has clearly identified the problem they are experiencing and are now actively looking for a solution to that problem. They still may not be ready to make a purchase at this point, but they are working their way to that stage.
Building trust with your subscribers is a huge part of the nurturing process. Providing useful information without trying to sell products and helping people through the various options when it comes to purchasing will go a long way with your customers. Image courtesy of One Dome.
That being said, it is still not the time to push your products and services into their inbox. Now is the time to continue to help the subscriber make their decision on what to do about their problem.
Provide them with educational information and show that your company is a thought leader on the topic. This will help build a relationship while positioning your company as a reputable source for information around the topic they are searching for.
During this stage, you could be sharing more educational content such as how-to articles and videos, comparison guides, and more detailed articles around the topic.
Decision Stage Nurturing
The decision stage is when you can convert your subscriber to a purchasing customer. They have done their research and know what they need to do to solve their problem. They are ready to make a purchase.
At this point, you need to seal the deal. This is the time to provide the product-specific information that is relevant for the subscriber. Bring out your best sales pitch with these emails and get the user to your site to complete their purchase.
Make sure they know why your product or service is the best solution for the problem at hand. Provide them with resources that show why his product will help them, provide how-to resources that are product specific, installation guides, and anything else that might entice them to make that final step and purchase your product.
Knowing your subscribers and understanding the content they want to receive will help improve the number of customers who make it to the decision stage. At this point, they either will or will not make a purchase from you. By providing them with the right custom content throughout the process, your chances are much higher. Image courtesy of Neil Patel.
Once you’ve scored the sale, it doesn’t end there.
Post-Sale Nurturing
Lead nurturing doesn’t end when a subscriber becomes a customer. In fact, it really only just begins. At this point, you should be working to bring that new customer back to purchase more products and services.
Remember, it’s much cheaper to nurture a current customer than attract new customers. Once the initial sale is completed, continue to send relevant communication to your customer. You now know what types of products they are interested in and can provide product recommendations and share complementary products with them.
The end goal is to move that new customer into a loyal customer stage. There, they will not only continue to purchase from you, but they can act as an advocate for your company. 83% of people trust recommendations from their friends and family, which means the more loyal customers you have, the more they will recommend your company.
Retaining the customers you already have will pay off in the long run. Just a small percentage increase in customer retention will provide you with a huge opportunity for an increase in profit. Image courtesy of Hallmark Business Connections.
Let Email Nurturing Campaigns Help You Improve Customer Retention
When it comes to the world of email retention rates, nothing beats the results of email nurturing campaigns. Keeping constant contact with your customer base and walking them through the buyer’s journey will help build stronger relationships and increase your sales numbers.
Nurturing your customers is easier than you think. Get started with something simple like a welcome campaign and slowly begin to build out your programs to be more segmented. From there, you’re nurturing campaigns can grow to move subscribers through the buyer’s journey and create a long-lasting, loyal customer base. So, what are you waiting for?
