3 Strategies for Recapturing Lost Customers

Mara Lam on Nov 10, 2021 12:52:00 PM

It’s inevitable: Your business is going to lose customers. But every time a customer leaves your shop for good, you’re losing out on hundreds of dollars in sales.

When a customer leaves your business, they contribute to your churn rate. It’s normal for every business to churn customers, but ideally, you want your rate to be as close to 0% as possible. If you have a high customer churn rate, it means customers find you, buy a product one time, and then never return (or worse, they start shopping with your competitors).

Customer loyalty doesn’t stop after a shopper’s first purchase. You’ve already spent the time and money to win this person’s business; why not keep more of your shoppers around?

As a Shopify store owner, you’re in a constant battle to bring your shoppers back. Here’s how you can bring back customers and significantly slash your churn rate—without a lot of marketing resources.

Why recapturing lost customers is a must

If you have a constant influx of new shoppers, that’s great! But at some point, that stream of new business is going to dry up. That’s why it’s so important to invest in recapturing lost customers right now, so you have a diverse source of revenue.

Recapturing lost customers is important for Shopify businesses because:

• You lose money every time a customer leaves. Did you know that the average cost of losing a customer is $289? When you bring existing customers back into the fold, you’ll keep more money in your pocket.
• Retention is cheaper. Eighty-two percent of brands say retaining existing shoppers is cheaper than finding new shoppers. If you’re sick of spending thousands of dollars marketing to new shoppers, you can save much more with a winback campaign.
• You already know them. The customer bought something from you in the past, so you know they have a need for your products. You’ve already cleared a huge marketing hurdle with this information alone. Why not put it to use?

Businesses make 65% of their revenue from repeat customers. It’s important to keep more of your customers around so you have a reliable source of sales for your Shopify store.

How to Get Customers Back: 3 Strategies to Try

On average, you can expect to lose 30% of your shoppers every year. While you can’t bring every customer back, the right winback campaign can certainly boost your retention rates. Try these three strategies to bring customers back.

1. Understand why customers are leaving

Why are shoppers leaving your store? It’s much easier to recapture lost customers when you know why they left in the first place. Take time to understand your customers’ pain points by looking at:

• Your product reviews
• Social media posts from customers
• Emails to customer service

You can always conduct shopper interviews or surveys to get to the heart of the problem. This might seem like an extra step, but it’s the best way to preserve your marketing resources by addressing the most important issues first.

2. Target the right shoppers

Not every lost customer is your ideal shopper. Maybe it isn’t worthwhile to target customers who bought a $10 item once—it might be more profitable to target shoppers who bought $50 worth of goods more than once. Use your Shopify data to segment your lost customers. This way, you can spend your time targeting lost customers with a higher potential value.

3. Start an SMS winback campaign

Email marketing is a popular choice for following up with lost customers, but SMS marketing is usually more effective. Try a winback campaign using SMS messaging like:

• Discounts or incentives: Make it worth their while to revisit your Shopify store. A quick “We miss you!” message with an exclusive 15% off coupon will do the trick.
• Updates and changes: Did you use shopper feedback to change your products or business? Let them know! Lost customers will often come back if they know you’ve fixed a big pain point.
• Contests: Nothing gets shoppers more excited than the prospect of freebies. You can generate a lot of engagement from lost customers by running a quick contest promo through your SMS platform. You can’t require customers to buy something to enter, but you can ask them to reshare your posts, follow you on social media, or comment on a video. Choose your CTAs wisely so you can continue the conversation with contest participants.

Bring back customers automatically

As a Shopify store, you have a lot of competition. It’s likely that shoppers can find similar products when they shop with your competitors, so give people a reason to stick around. After all, customers will come back if they think your products are valuable. These three strategies won’t recapture every lost customer, but they will definitely bring in more revenue for little added effort.

With the right toolkit, you can recapture lost customers automatically. Winback sends cart abandonment SMS messages to shoppers and brings back more of your business. Try Winback for free now.

Topics: Shopify Marketing, Best Practices