I Want You Back: Abandonment Triggered Messages
In the past we’ve used the popular dating analogy to describe relationship or lifecycle marketing. But what happens when that relationship or “date” doesn’t continue? People abandon forms and shopping carts all the time… how do we marketers deal with this breakup?
Check out this idea from JustAnswer.com. I recently was suffering from a mysterious shooting pain in my neck and stumbled across this website in my attempts to self-diagnose via the internet. JustAnswer.com is a cool resource where you can ask questions about pretty much anything – health, pets, legal, finance, electronics, houses, cars, etc. – and get a speedy one-on-one response from an expert in that field. So I plugged in my question and described my symptoms. During the registration process I discovered the catch: it’s not free. You name your price for what you think the answer is worth to you, which is fair, but I knew I could probably find my answer elsewhere on the web for free, so I abandoned the registration form.
About 30 minutes later, I received a follow-up email: click here to see it full-size:
Subject: Your Question on JustAnswer.com
Their copywriter did a great job of trying to assuage any fear of commitment I may have had with those short and sweet bullets: I’ll get my answer quickly, I can preview my answer before agreeing to pay the expert, and my deposit is fully refundable. Still, I didn’t bite.
24 hours later, they pulled out the stops and offered to give me my answer with no credit card required - another fear of commitment they likely encounter pretty often. Click here to see it for yourself.
Subject: Ask your question - No Credit Card Required
If they had offered to give me my first answer for free, I probably would have gone for it. Regardless, my neck felt better by this time so I still didn’t take them up on it. This strategy really impressed me, though, and I will remember this site in the future for myself, and probably refer others. We may have “broken up,” but we’re still friends with a potential future for more, and that’s probably the best you can ask for as a marketer.
Think about how you could take this approach with people who abandon your forms – whether they are signups, event registrations, site registrations, or even shopping cart abandoners. If you have any thoughts, ideas, or real-life examples, please share in the comments below!
Julie Waite
Email Marketing Strategist at Bronto
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About the Author
Julie Waite has a broad sales and marketing background with over 10 years in start-up and enterprise corporations in a wide variety of B2B and B2C industries. Her experience includes four years as a Bronto client herself, which helps her to understand the needs of her clients. As an Email Marketing Strategist, she works one-on-one with clients to improve and optimize their email marketing campaigns to meet their business goals, whether that be to increase conversions, brand loyalty, customer retention, and/or list growth. When not writing for Bronto Blog, Julie loves cooking, traveling, and is a self-proclaimed movie geek.
Great headline title in light
Great headline title in light of recent events surrounding the King of Pop ;)
Hi Linda, That coincidence
Hi Linda,
That coincidence didn't occur to me until I read your comment. No reference to the late King of Pop intended, just playing on the breakup theme. : )
Julie
Hi Linda, interesting
Hi Linda,
interesting article (apart from the headline ;) ), and interesting site - I didn't know it before. But honestly, I would be ennerved by getting not only one, but TWO follow up messages. One might be okay, if there is an interesting offer to be found inside, but the second one - too much.
:)
There are literally hundreds
There are literally hundreds and hundreds of things you can send to customers in the form of triggered emails such as browse based category specific emails, cart abandonment but caution needs to be exercised in offering up incentives for fear that you could train the customer to just abandon with the hopes that they will receive some incentives. It best to do a test group when offering up incentives in triggered emails to get a gauge if the customer actually would go thru with the transaction with/without the incentive. Great post Julie.
Carina: I agree, you have to
Carina: I agree, you have to be careful not to come off too stalker-y with these follow-ups. That kind of behavior can creep out your visitors, which is no good for the future of the relationship.
As Andrew suggests, it should be tested and watched for abuse (perhaps limited to one trigger per email address). I know now that if I have another question for JustAnswer.com, I may be able to get this offer again if I abandon.
[...] my clients lately
[...] my clients lately regarding ways to take advantage of abandoners. In my last post, I explored abandonment triggered message tactics, but what about people who have abandoned your email marketing communications? As marketers, we [...]
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