How to Reduce Customer Churn By Using Email Marketing

Email is an evergreen marketing tool.

Our email address is a digital equivalent to our home address. So, we give it only to those we trust.

That is why businesses dearly cherish their lists of subscribers. It isn’t only a database of random email addresses. It is a list of people who trust your brand so much that they want to hear from you on a regular basis.

When companies monitor their marketing metrics, it becomes clear that email marketing is a very powerful promotion strategy. In this post, we are delving deeper into email marketing, trying to figure out how you can use it to stop losing customers.

Email Marketing In a Nutshell

Every experienced marketer knows that email is a promotion channel approved by tradition. Besides, the main reason email marketing campaigns are dear to marketers is that they are extremely cost-effective.

According to some opinions, each dollar spent on email marketing earns $42 in return. That is a very, very good ROI.

That being said, let’s define the strategy. Email marketing is a form of digital marketing, in which promotional content is being sent to potential customers and prospects via emails. The main purpose of such emails is to guide the prospect through all of the phases of the customer journey.

There are multiple ways to build a rich list of subscribers. You can use the power of social media, gated content, or a loyalty program. And you can use features such as pop-ups and forms to gain those addresses. For example, many e-commerce sites use Shopify pop-ups to get more subscribers.

It is a very old marketing technique, which is there as long as the Internet itself. However, throughout the years, email marketing lost nothing of its old charm.

On the contrary, it only improved and became more effective. The contemporary technology and automation tools are able to further boost its performance. According to some estimations, more than 51% of companies use automation. The majority of businesses agree that email marketing automation tools save time and significantly improve targeting and lead generation.

Except for automatization, another keyword for contemporary marketing is personalization. As email marketing developed, people grew tired of generic content. Therefore, today, each parameter of email content counts. Text, images, infographics, videos, etc., everything needs to match the customer’s interests and values.

Reasons for Customer Churn

Simply put, customer churn is losing your subscribers. It refers to those situations in which people decide to stop receiving emails from you.

Usually, the normal unsubscribe rates are somewhere between 6 and 8%. However, if you notice you lose subscribers at a quicker rate, it means your email marketing strategy needs to change ASAP.

Unsubscription is a serious issue and costs a lot. According to some studies, businesses lose $1.6 trillion each year due to customer churn. Besides, getting a new customer costs five times more than keeping one.

In order to prevent and stop it, one needs to understand the reasons for customer churn.

One of the primary reasons people decide to remove themselves from your subscription list is some form of negative experience with your company or brand. It can be anything, from a buggy product to unknowledgeable customer support.

Another situation that could make your prospects leave is that your competitors have a better offer.

Finally, lack of continuous proactive support is a mistake many businesses and marketers make. Instead of reacting only when someone decides to leave, you should take care of your customers every step of the way.

There’s another aspect of churn that’s important to consider when it comes to email, and that’s your email reputation. If an above-average amount of your email bounces or is undeliverable, your company’s email reputation suffers, and your future emails could be directed to the spam folders rather than inboxes. That’s why you don’t want to be mailed to old addresses that no longer work or people who have unsubscribed. So, keeping your email list fresh and up-to-date is always a good idea.  

How to Use Email to Reduce Attrition?

Speaking about taking care of your customers every step of the way, emails are one of the most efficient ways of showing how much you care. Therefore, we compiled a list of some email marketing tips for you, to help you reduce unsubscribe rates to a minimum.

Reward Loyalty From Time to Time

Loyal customers are special and should be treated as such. Therefore, think of sending an email with a small gift or discount coupon after a certain number of purchases.

Or, how about announcing a referral program? You could award customers for spreading the word about your products.

A lot of businesses provide gifts and incentives on birthdays or special holidays. Who doesn’t like to get a gift? Happy customers mean happy business.

Proper Segmentation Enables Proper Targeting

Knowing your customer is the most important step in any marketing strategy, including email marketing.

The term email segmentation refers to a process in which you recognize the subtle differences between your subscribers. For sure, they all share one thing – interest in your brand. However, learning more about them will enable you to communicate in a better way.

When grouping your subscribers, there is a set of criteria that will help you understand them better:

• location
• gender
• age
• interests
• budget
• previous buying behavior

How do you know all this from a bunch of email addresses? You will need to use tools such as Google Analytics, or rely on your internal data. What you are particularly interested to know here is whose engagement dropped and why.

Foresee and Prevent Dropping Interaction

Be proactive in keeping awareness. You can always use emails to wake up dormant prospects. However, you need to pay special attention to your emails’ content.

To begin with, you need to make sure to write good email subject lines. Most promotional emails are disregarded by people. So, sometimes, a good email subject line is what stands between your emails and the trash folder. Subject lines should be:

• short
• personalized
• unambiguous
• just a little mysterious

On the other hand, they should not be:

• pushy
• imprecise
• grammatically incorrect

Furthermore, try to sound helpful.

Also, sending content from social media, created by other happy customers, is a good strategy as well. It could generate a bit of FOMO, and inspire people to come back in the game.

It goes without saying that personalization and customized recommendations work like a charm here as well.

The Content of Your Emails Should Be Useful

Think of it this way: if you want to get value from your customers, you need to offer something in return. For example, you can create useful and engaging email content and give it for free.

Value comes in many forms. Money is one of them. However, as we live in an information age, useful tips and rare tricks are highly valued as well. Thus, you can surprise your dormant customers with a free course or webinar they might be interested in.

Or, you can share interesting case studies or educational content they can’t find elsewhere.

Also, you can use emails as a means of educating people about the amazing features your product and services have. You can show how to use your product more efficiently. Finally, you can remind them of all the different problems they could solve with it.

Ask for Feedback

Asking for feedback on time is one of the best ways to prevent customer churn. For example, you can kindly ask recent buyers to

• rate your services
• tell you how much they enjoy your product
• give ideas on how you could improve
• recommend you to a friend

We all live busy lives, so make sure that feedback forms are easy and quick. You can always send an email with a short fill-out form, thanking the prospect for their time in advance.

Also, remember that chat apps are another great way to come closer to customers and collect feedback.

According to some email marketing guides, feedback is of such importance that it should be analyzed along with the KPIs. It is the best way of learning about and from your customers.

Never Lose a Subscriber Again

To reduce churn and prevent unsubscriptions, you need to know your customers inside out. Only then will you be able to provide them with useful content. So, keep your customer data up-to-date and use new information to keep your email clean and segmented. Finally, asking for feedback and awarding loyal customers are great ways to make your customers feel recognized, valued, and interested in staying with you for a long time.