The frenzy of BFCM – Black Friday and Cyber Monday may have come to a close. However, the holiday shopping season is far from over. It’s just beginning! If you’re looking to keep the sales momentum going and make the most of this festive season, you’re in the right place.
In this blog, we’ll unveil 7 post-BFCM activities that will not only help you sustain the holiday sales momentum but also boost your revenue and customer engagement in the weeks leading up to the new year.
Don’t let the excitement die down – let’s dive in right now!
Why post-BFCM activities are important?
BFCM might be the grand kickoff to the holiday shopping season, but it’s the post-BFCM activities that truly determine your long-term success. Let’s explore the importance of what comes after BFCM and why these activities are so critical:
Maintaining the BFCM momentum
Black Friday and Cyber Monday are two of the biggest shopping events of the year. E-commerce businesses invest heavily in marketing, discounts, and promotions to attract a massive influx of customers during this period.
However, after BFCM, there’s a risk of sales and website traffic dropping significantly. Post-BFCM activities are crucial to maintain the momentum generated during these peak shopping days.
Nurturing customer relationships
After BFCM, you’ve likely acquired a substantial number of new customers who may have made their first purchase during the sales event. It’s essential to nurture these newly formed relationships to turn these one-time buyers into loyal, repeat customers.
Feedback and improvement
BFCM can be a treasure trove of data and insights into customer behavior, preferences, and pain points. Post-BFCM activities should include efforts to gather feedback from customers.
Understanding what customers liked or disliked about their BFCM experience can inform product development, marketing strategies, and customer service enhancements.
7 essential post-BFCM activities for e-commerce success
Now that you understand why conducting post-BFCM activities is crucial even after an exhausting sales period, the question arises: What are the most effective post-BFCM activities to maximize the momentum of this sales season?
We’re here to answer your question! Below, you’ll find seven post-BFCM activities that you can implement one by one after BFCM to achieve the best business results:
Evaluate your performance
The busy BFCM shopping season has passed, leaving you with a heap of data to sort through. This data is like a goldmine of insights that can help you improve your business in the upcoming period. Trust us, the holiday season is just getting started, and gathering as many insights as possible is key to your business’s success.
As we mentioned in our previous BFCM post, you should have four main goals for your BFCM selling season: revenue, profit, brand awareness, and customer engagement. Based on these goals, you’ll need to focus on specific metrics to determine if you’ve met your objectives or not. These are the key metrics to keep an eye on:
- Sales Revenue: Compare it with your predefined goals. Did you hit the revenue targets you set?
- Conversion Rate: Analyze how efficiently you turned website visitors into paying customers.
- Average Order Value: Check whether it went up or down compared to other periods.
- Product Performance: Identify your best-selling products and those that didn’t perform well.
- Channel Analysis: Break down your sales by channel, tracking the customer journey through platforms like your website, social media, and email. This helps you identify your most effective sales channels.
You might have your own way of tracking your performance, like managing results in a spreadsheet. However, we suggest using a smart tool to save you time and provide more accurate insights.
Take NestAds, for instance. It’s an all-in-one marketing attribution tool that simplifies everything. It can help you track all your ads in one place and generate easy-to-understand analyses of revenue, ROAS, CPA, and more, giving you insights into your BFCM performance. No need for complicated techniques or formulas, as the tool supports you from A to Z.
Request for testimonial
Happy customers can provide valuable social proof that can influence potential buyers. Encourage satisfied shoppers to share their thoughts and experiences with your products or services by sending them some product review emails.
Genuine testimonials can boost your credibility and help you convert more sales, both during and after the holiday season.
Remind customers with second-chance offerings
Don’t miss out on customers who might have missed your BFCM deals or delayed their purchases. Engage them with second-chance offers via email, which showcase the value of your products. Use lifecycle marketing to inspire and tips tailored to their interests and your products.
Creating engaging content builds trust and sets the stage for future cross-selling opportunities, ensuring that you maintain a connection with these potential buyers even after the holiday rush.
Email nurturing
Once BFCM wraps up, it’s easy for customers to slip off your radar. To keep that connection strong, make sure you regularly update them with the latest brand info. Email is a fantastic channel for this.
Send appreciation emails to thank them for joining in on BFCM and the holiday season, and keep them engaged with relevant and relatable content.
You can also use email to promote your products, but don’t go for those dull emails with just discounts and product info. Instead, personalize your emails to fit your customers’ needs. Consider suggesting products based on their purchase history and addressing them by name. This way, your customers will feel more valued, and you can build a deeper relationship with them.
Promote your loyalty program
To keep your BFCM customers engaged with your brand, they need to see the benefits of sticking with you. A fantastic way to achieve this is through a customer loyalty program that customers can easily join by subscribing to.
On one hand, by doing this, customers will have access to your latest and most exclusive offers. On the other hand, your business will have a much better chance of upselling, cross-selling, and increasing the Customer Lifetime Value (CLTV) even after BFCM is over.
You should consider implementing the following program options:
- Early access: When you have a new offer, make sure customers who subscribe to your loyalty program are the first to know. Regularly update them through emails or SMS so they stay engaged.
- Exclusive discounts or free shipping for subscribers: Consider offering special deals exclusively for your subscribers.
- Point accumulation: Every time your customers purchase in your store, reward them with points based on their order’s value. This gives them a reason to keep coming back, knowing they have points to spend at your store.
Make sure all your customers are in the loop about your program. Put it front and center on your website’s popup, shoot them an email or SMS, and be sure to lay out all the perks in your message.
Focus on customer self-services
After BFCM, your work isn’t finished. With a surge in orders during the event, you must be prepared to support your customers. That means being ready to help them with product issues, tracking orders, and handling returns and refunds.
It might sound like a ton of work, but you can manage it without overwhelming your team. You can do this by focusing on developing your store’s customer self-service. Let’s walk you through some effective tactics that work all the time:
Integrate a live chat system into your store
Customers hate wasting time searching for answers. That’s why it’s a good idea to have live chat on your online store. When customers need help, they can just click the chat widget and talk to your agent right away. We recommend using a third-party tool because it’s way simpler than creating your system. This way, you can save time and resources, which you can use for other things after a busy period.
Use a 24/7 Chatbot
Your customers don’t stick to your business hours. They might have questions day or night. That’s where a 24/7 Chatbot can be a huge help. You can teach your Chatbot the common questions customers ask and their answers. With this, your customers can get assistance without the need for your team.
Have a clear FAQ page
When customers have questions about your products, pricing, or shipping, they usually check your website first. To provide them with a seamless and satisfying experience, create a detailed and clear FAQ page. This not only helps customers but also saves time for your agents.
To make your FAQ practical, gather customer concerns during interactions. Organize the questions into categories like “Shipping” for topics like shipping times and product packaging. This makes your website neat and information easy for customers to find.
Here’s a handy tip: You can add your FAQ page to your live chat. This streamlines customer interactions into one easy channel.
Interested in a tool that simplifies everything? Meet NestDesk, your all-in-one customer service platform. It manages all your conversations in one place. With NestDesk, you can turn every message into a sales opportunity by personalizing the customer experience using their data. Plus, it lightens your agent’s workload with automated macros and helpdesk features.
Make a friend referral program
After BFCM, your customers will probably feel good about the deals they scored from your business. They are also more likely to share their positive shopping experience with their friends and family. By offering a friend referral program, you can tap into this enthusiasm and turn your customers into advocates for your brand.
Setting up a friend referral program is like crafting a special deal for your loyal customers. It’s simple and offers two huge benefits you won’t find anywhere else: word-of-mouth marketing and customer loyalty.
Here is how you can create a friend referral program that will work:
- Offer an incentive: You give your existing customers an incentive to refer friends. It could be store credit, a discount, or even a free product. Make the incentive appealing enough to encourage action.
- Referral link or code: Provide your customers with a unique referral link or code that they can share with their friends. This is how you’ll track the referrals.
- Friend’s benefit: The referred friend gets a reward too, such as a discount on their first purchase.
- Easy sharing: Make it simple for customers to share the referral link through email, social media, or other messaging platforms.
It’s just the beginning of our shopping frenzy season!
While these two big sale days are significant, there’s still a whole shopping season ahead. It’s time to capitalize on the momentum, maintain customer engagement, and plan for upcoming holiday sales, festive promotions, and year-end events.
Remember, nurturing customer relationships, offering valuable post-BFCM deals, and staying attuned to market trends will be key factors in maintaining a successful shopping season and setting the stage for continued growth and profitability for your online business.
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