The busy shopping period is officially here and as everyone gears up for the holiday sales, it's important that brands utilise November for their Christmas campaign planning, particularly when it comes to Customer Relationship Management or CRM. In this blog post, Samantha De Caprio, Director of CRM, outlines the key things that brands need to do this Christmas and into 2019.
1. Why is November a key month for your channel when it comes to Christmas planning?
Ensuring that existing customers are as engaged as possible in the winter months is just as crucial to a profitable festive period as big TV campaigns, retail promotions and Christmas special offers. November heralds the beginning of Christmas for many consumers and they are getting ready to spend. According to Salesforce, 39% of all transactions in 2017 were on mobile, so ensure that your campaign is mobile-friendly and optimised.
Key things to do:
- Keep on optimising. Are your promotions performing as expected?
- Review, adapt and make real-time adjustments in order to maximise sales.
- Understand creative, click and content performance as well as what products and calls to action (CTA) are working best and optimise accordingly.
It’s time to give your last-minute shoppers some peace of mind. Broadcast your free shipping cut-offs and let them know that extended shipping is there if they need it.
As we get closer to Christmas and shipping cut-offs, create a sense of urgency and drive conversion by clearly stating the remaining days you’ll ship for free or when shipping is still available. Promote last-minute gift ideas or stocking fillers for lower priced items using key tactics and CTAs identified across other campaigns.
2. How will 2018 be different to last year in terms of CRM trends?
Segmentation will continue to be key. Understanding your different customer segments using RFM (recency, frequency, monetary) variables, to identify loyal and repeat customers from one-time customers and gift buyers, enables you to tailor messaging and content appropriately.
Clients should use this opportunity to review email engagement rates and use Christmas as a springboard to re-engage with lapsed or less engaged customers, as well as identify opportunities to convert signups and prospects to customers, particularly relevant in a post-GDPR world.
Now is also the time to integrate your promotion, gift and offers across all your channels, both digital and offline. Think about which customers you want to activate across owned and paid channels, and customers you want to communicate exclusively via owned channels, and exclude them from your acquisition activity.
Building more dynamic and personalised journeys using dynamic content. Examples:
- welcome emails for new sign-ups
- incorporate category or product purchased or browsed
A.I. and predictive behaviours that convert and improve sales will be on the rise this year with improved technology solutions from most of the core ESP/CRM providers.
3. This is the first Christmas since GDPR legislation took effect. Will this change how Christmas campaigns are run and if so, how do you see campaigns being different?
Whether you do or don’t directly promote Christmas, this is a great period to refresh and grow your database ahead of peak periods.
Remember that you need to keep personalisation and relevancy front of mind so that even tactical and promotional emails can be tailored using dynamic content, rather than one-size-fits-all. You want to avoid customers unsubscribing as it is much more difficult to re-activate and re-engage without the cost of acquiring that customer all over again. Keeping customers signed up and engaged is key not only for this pre and post-Christmas period, but so you can deliver a strong customer experience and protect potential future revenue.
4. Why is it important for brands to still reach customers after Christmas Day and into the NY?
No doubt your customers will have plenty of gift cards and holiday money to spend after the 25th, so be sure to keep on nurturing your best performing tactics.
January is a peak period. It's therefore important to reward new and existing customers alike and ensure that communications continue to be personalised and relevant to keep unsubscribe levels really low and engagement high. Don’t bombard with frequent and bulk sales messaging.
