We recently covered how you can reduce the percentage of abandoned shopping carts, the bane of email marketing. Rates as high as 70% have been reported. This shows that there’s more than enough room for improvement.
Even if, because of all your improvements, the rate has dropped considerably, there will still be those who, infuriatingly, disappear before completion. All is not lost. You can chase these customers, and indeed should.
One option is email targeting. In researching this article I went onto the websites of a few companies where I subscribe to their email marketing list and filled a shopping cart with various items. I found it remarkable that in only <40% of cases I received an email within two days and none within two hours.
I would suggest that an email should be sent almost as soon as the information of the abandoned cart is available, and within two hours at the latest. You will want to jog the person whilst they are still at their computer. Wait too long and they will be doing something else and the memory of your product will fade.
The wording of the email can be critical. You will know your customers from your email marketing lists so will be able to choose the tone will be most appropriate. Remember that they might be a bit irritated by the immediate follow up, so being pleasant, helpful and concerned is a good baseline.
Tell them that their cart will be left on the system for however long and should they click on the page again, everything will be as they left it. Ask them why they abandoned the cart and if there is anything you can do to mitigate their difficulties or concerns.
If they do not respond then consider whether another follow up email would be appropriate. Do you think it advisable if the total value of the cart is rather low? You don’t want to irritate a subscriber for a few pennies so establish a cut off point.
This email should be sent when the their cart will remain available for just another few hours. Remind them of this. If your offer has a time limit, point this out to your customer, reinforcing the cut off date. After all, you don’t want them to miss a never to be repeated bargain.
The third email might well contain an offer. Care needs to be exercised here. If you offer a price which is lower than the email marketing campaign one, presumably lowered just enough to allow you some profit, then the customer might well, if they have any sense, use the same abandonment procedure for your next campaign.
They could well respond to an additional item, for instance a ream of 80gm paper to go with the bargain printer. Another option is to offer a slightly higher grade product at either the same price or one slightly higher. The reverse, a cheaper one, might fit the bill.
Don’t ignore an abandoned cart. The customer has already shown they are partial to your product so go chase them down.
