Keeping the Holiday Momentum

Today’s post comes from Scott Sanfilippo, co-founder and President of Solid Cactus, a full-service web design company specializing in the development of Yahoo! Stores. Scott and his business partner Joe Palko co-founded one of the first e-commerce sites, FerretStore.com, in 1994. After years of selling ferret hats, Scott still enjoys working in the pet industry, he serves as company spokesperson for Solid Cactus and keeps busy scheduling free training webinars, “boot camps” and other interactive events for e-commerce store owners.

Sure, they love you in December. But will they still love you in January?

You’ve just invested big money in search engines to attract customers to your website for the holidays. It worked, and not only are seasonal sales up, you have a batch of new customers. Now, how do you keep them coming back in the New Year?

It’s one of the questions we’re asked most at Solid Cactus. “How do I get my holiday shoppers to come back after the holidays?” The simple answer is, marketing. The fact is; you’ve already done the hard part. You’ve already invested money to acquire that customer once, now use some creativity to get them to be a repeat shopper. Here are some suggestions:

Email Marketing

Right after the New Year, send an email to every new customer you acquired from November 1st through the end of the year and thank them for their business. Then, offer them something special such as free shipping or a price or percentage break on their next order. Or, go straight to premiums and offer a free gift with their next order. Be sure to choose something which matches their purchase profile when possible. I suggest using Got Marketing, which can be done right in the back-end of your Yahoo! Store. You can track the effectiveness of your email through Got Marketing, and you can offer the recipients of this email an easy way to unsubscribe.

Postal Mail

Email may be instant, but nothing can beat the impression of direct mail. Have a postcard created to send out to your holiday customers that not only acts as a “thank you” card but also a coupon for something off their next order. For your large orders, consider sending a greeting card. Everyone gets mail at their house and an attractive postcard that stands out, hits the message home. Best of all, postal mail doesn’t have a spam filter so your message is guaranteed to reach your customer.

The most important ingredient to the success of any follow-up via email or postal mail is “the hook” – some type of a call to action to get that customer to come back.

You may be saying “but most of my holiday shoppers buy my products as gifts for someone else.” That’s perfect! The gift givers can either keep your offer for themselves or pass it on to someone they know who can use the offer – perhaps someone new who can become a brand new customer!

Scott Sanfilippo,
Guest blogger for Yahoo! Small Business