Listening to Ben Stavelely of dotmailer discuss eCommerce success stories Thursday night at the NYC Microsoft Theater, I remembered a talk by author Ron Ploof talking about the value of content. Product value is enhanced by good stories, and Ghurka is very good at telling theirs.

The session, organized by the MeetUp group SEO and Social Media Marketing Academy by NY eCommerce Forum, focused on how dotmailer had helped Ghurka leverage its data and email platforms into an effective content strategy across all phases of the buying cycle. By creating an automated onboarding process for their digital sales and marketing efforts, they saw real impact on both ROI and brand equity by getting the right story to the customer at the right time, thanks to smart and consistent data collection.

My three takeaways:

• Learn to love the pop-over. It may seem like it’s an annoyance to visitors, but Ghurka captures 80 percent of its data from that initial newsletter registration. Staveley also pointed out that getting the basics about a customer from the very beginning is the best chance to keep your database healthy. Are they annoying? Sure. Is a site visitor going to hate you for the experience and retaliate by not buying anything? Probably not…
• Have a plan. It’s great that you asked about their birthday, but what are you going to do with that information? Do you have something to say to the person who just wandered onto your site by accident as opposed to the one who has been looking for a particular product for weeks and can’t quite make the decision? Or the one who buys from you regularly and can’t say enough good things about you? Ghurka’s welcome communication program segments its database into subscribers and purchasers, with a series of messages based on what they’ve learned about that visitor. Maybe the content strategy is telling the quality story to justify price and establish brand equity, or maybe it’s creating customized experiences and messaging based on past interest and identifying cross-promotional opportunities. Map out what you want to say, who you want to say it to, and how you’re going to identify those audiences.
• Ask for feedback like a real person would ask. Ghurka sends out follow-up messages to random buyers four days after purchase, asking them how their experience went and taking the opportunity to flesh out their customer data with two or three additional demographic questions. Their open rate on those emails is 80 percent, with a 25-percent response rate — who wouldn’t take that?? What was interesting to me was that the email was very basic — not formatted or colorful or “on brand.” It was just a personal email with an embedded form, and maybe that plain format made it easier to believe that an actual human had sent the note. Sometimes as marketers, we get wrapped up in design and brand colors and captivating graphics, but getting someone to respond to an email is about making a personal connection. Sometimes flash works, and sometimes it’s just about conveying genuine concern for providing a better customer experience.

Thanks to the SEO & Social Media Marketing Academy for putting the event together; looking forward to more of them!