6 Ways Retailers Can Improve Customer Engagement

Email marketing is one of the most valuable tools retailers have today. It can help drive customer acquisition, keep people around, and of course, buy from your shop. 

But, none of that happens if you don’t have a strategy. Customers often don’t engage on their own. They’ve got a crowded inbox and a lot of stuff going on in real life. So, you need to step up encouraging engagement on your end. 

When you do that, you’re going to reap the benefits. Email has the potential to deliver a huge return on investment. If you want to get new customers, keep the old ones, and build loyalty, email is how to do it. 

The first step is building engagement. How do you do it? We’re glad you asked. 

Increase loyalty

If you have a loyalty program, email is one of the best ways to promote it. Unfortunately, far too many brands send out a welcome email to their loyalty members, and then, it’s crickets. Building loyalty means keeping people informed and engaged. 

Now, add in personalized content, and you’ve got a winning formula. Use your loyalty emails to both inform your loyalty members about their points and encourage them to click with personalized calls to action. 

Tap into data

You can glean a lot of information from your customer’s buying and decision-making behavior based on how they shop, both in-store and online. Use your eCommerce and sales tools to offer more personalized content in the emails you send. 

Use your data to go beyond the transaction too. Send your customers up-to-date information on the items they’ve left in their carts and tracking updates on their packages. There are many ways to use customer data to help provide a better experience for them and get them more engaged with your brand.

Offer more personalization

Today, most customers want personalized content. They aren’t interested in opening a generic email that gets sent to everyone on your list. The brands that are going all-in on email personalization right now are seeing big results. 

One easy place to get started with increasing personalization is to highlight recommended products in the emails you send. Then, use the data you have from your customers to tie in the products they’ve already shown an interest in or bought. Don’t forget to include ratings and reviews for these products, too; they help motivate your customers to buy.

Get visual

In studies, emails that have images and videos tend to perform better than those that don’t. So while you’re focusing on adding more images to your emails, think about how you can personalize those images to your customers. 

Use animations and gifs to grab your reader’s eye from the start. Add in personalization, and you can take it to the next level. Your customers can open their email and see informative and eye-catching content that speaks to their interests and drives action. That combination is hard to beat. 

Be a resource

It’s natural to want to use your emails to sell. But so is every other brand. What you can do to stand out is to take a step back from being sales-focused all the time and add in emails that are also informative and help your customer. While it might not generate revenue right away, it can build long-term goodwill, which can translate into conversions. 

Do this by offering helpful advice, information, and tips to your customers. It can be as simple as creating a holiday gift guide built around specific customer segments or listing blog posts that tie in with recommended products or services. You can also show your customer reviews and highlight common FAQs about products, so they have what they need before they buy.

Go dynamic

If you really want your emails to stand out from the crowd, go dynamic. Sending customers interactive emails they can engage with right from their inbox can help boost all your metrics, drive engagement, and increase conversions. 

When you use dynamic emails, you’re sending readers personalized content that’s also relevant. Plus, when you ask for engagement, you’re able to grab even more data on your customer’s interests. That information can help you send better, more personalized emails and product recommendations in the future. 

There is no shortage of ways retailers can boost customer engagement. Email is the perfect tool to help you dig in and get started.