{"id":6623,"date":"2016-03-09T11:28:31","date_gmt":"2016-03-09T11:28:31","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/ecommercemasterplan.com\/?p=6623"},"modified":"2016-03-09T11:28:31","modified_gmt":"2016-03-09T11:28:31","slug":"think-email-address-first-sales-second","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ecommercemasterplan.com\/think-email-address-first-sales-second\/","title":{"rendered":"Think email address first, sales second"},"content":{"rendered":"
In retail we spend a lot of time, money, and effort attracting people to our websites (and our stores, and our cold mailings) to try and get them to buy. Getting the first purchase shouldn\u2019t be the aim of the majority of our \u2018cold\u2019 marketing \u2013 our aim should be to get their email address.<\/p>\n
Why? Well, it\u2019s easier to get an email address than it is to get a purchase. Once you have their email you can start a conversation with them to get them ready to buy. The reason it\u2019s easier to get an email address than a purchase is because there\u2019s less risk in it for the consumer, and the less risk there is the more likely people are to do it.<\/p>\n
Of course once we have their email address they still see just as much risk in making a purchase so we have to reduce the risk they perceive. Reducing this risk is all about building TRUST with the consumer. The best way to build up the trust between you and the consumer (and get them to make that first purchase) is to create a welcome sequence.<\/p>\n
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I recently interviewed Nathan Rothstein, the co-founder of Project Repat (an American eCommerce business who turn people\u2019s old tshirts into blankets) in his words \u201cit\u2019s all about collecting the emails\u201d \u2013 that\u2019s the strategy they\u2019ve used to turn over $4m in 2015. He was kind enough to share his stats, and they get 8% of their site visitors to sign up to their emails, and 25% of them will go onto buy. That\u2019s an extra 2 percentage points of conversions from their website traffic.<\/p>\n
Here\u2019s Nathan\u2019s exit pop up:<\/p>\n
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I recently released a podcast outlining 20 ways to increase your email sign ups<\/a>, but here I only have space to bring you tip 11. Which is \u2013 have a pop up!<\/p>\n It still amazes me how many businesses don\u2019t have a pop up asking for an email address on their website. (I\u2019m using the term \u2018pop up\u2019 in the most generic sense, yours might an interstitial, a lightbox, an overlay \u2013 it doesn\u2019t matter what you call it, what matters is that it\u2019s working.) When I turned on the pop up on eCommerceMasterPlan.com it increased our signup rate from a regular 0.X% to a steady 2%+ (and it was an ugly annoying popup!) with a little tweaking and testing we\u2019ve now got it to 4%+ and we\u2019re still working on getting it higher.<\/p>\n You definitely have to test your popup email sign up so here\u2019s the key things you should be testing:<\/p>\n\n
\nIt can be the first thing someone sees on your website (an \u2018entry pop up\u2019) or the last thing they see when they go to leave (an \u2018exit pop up\u2019).
\nAlternatively you might trigger it after they\u2019ve looked at a certain number of pages, or when they scroll a certain distance down the page.<\/li>\n
\nA pop up can appear in the centre of the screen or as a strip along the bottom or top of the visitors screen.
\nMost people put them right in the middle of the screen, but for some the bottom\/top of the page can work better.<\/li>\n
\nI always recommend you start without a promotional offer. Just offer up the great information the visitor\u2019s going to get by subscribing. This will give you a benchmark to test any promotions against, which then means you can work out if the costs of the promotions are worth it.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n