How to Win Customer Loyalty

It doesn’t get better than having lots of loyal customers right? To be able to have a group of customers who love your product and aren’t afraid to tell others is a huge win! Word of mouth marketing and repeat customer’s costs 0 marketing dollars and is a sure fire way to ensure you are keeping everyone happy.

Who Participates in Loyalty Programs?

There are really two tiers to loyal customers. You have your early stage customers and your later stage customers. Let’s break it down.

Early Stage Customer Loyalty Can Come From:

  • Surveys and Feedback
  • Email Subscriptions
  • Open Rates and Click-Through Rates
  • Mobile Alert & Notification Responses
  • Social Engagement

Later Stage Customer Loyalty Could Include:

  • Customer Satisfaction
  • Purchase Frequency
  • Customer Spending
  • Upsell/Cross-Sell Purchases
  • Testimonials/Reviews/Referrals

It is important to be able to distinguish between the two categories as it will determine how relevant your campaigns are depending upon the customer. Being able to identify this allows you to feature the right tone, frequency, and benefits. If you continue to engage customers frequently, you can easily build customer loyalty. This can result in higher rates of purchasing and advocacy from your already-loyal customers and additions to the ranks of customers you already consider loyal.

Testimonials can do wonders. Check out some of the loyal testimonials from this Chicago based Maid Service. This is great example of how to show your customers overall satisfaction.

If you want to achieve this, you will need to leverage your customer engagement platform to paint a complete picture of what you know about your loyal customers including preferences and interests, purchase behavior and frequency, order details, and more. Campaigns like this enables you to gather more information about their hobbies and interests or reasons for purchasing. All of this information makes it easier to accelerate purchase cycles, cross-sell, and upsell.

Harness Insights

InsightsKnowing the attributes of your loyal customers makes life easier when trying to find additional prospects who could one day become loyal customers. This way, you are not starting from scratch with these prospects, but pursuing those customers with similarities.

Using a customer engagement platform is a great way to perform personalization at scale and can cultivate relationships and learn more about consumer behavior.  For my clothing store, I use a platform to learn the habits of my customers, such as what trends they like, what age group they are in, and what interests they have socially such as entertainment, leisure, and sports. The customer engagement platform has also motivated my staff to set up strategies, such as automated birthday campaigns, that help drive merchandise sales and enhance the value of being a fan.

Who Are Your Customers?

Getting into the minds of individual customers is vital to engaging and keeping them loyal. It pays to keep customers happy! Maybe you have a lot customers who aren’t loyal…yet. Don’t overlook the value of the non loyal customers. They will take a different type of engagement than your typical loyal customer. Look at the data CUSTOMERSthat you have about loyal and non loyal customer behavior to determine if there are behaviors or activities that differ between the two groups and identify any commonalities amongst the groups that can help you communicate with them in a more personal way. This way, you can tailor your communications to your non loyal customers to guide them toward the behaviors and activities that build loyalty and help nudge them to the next stage of their customer lifecycle.

There may be non loyal customers that may not engage with you at all anymore. In fact, they may no longer be customers. Most consumers are willing to switch brands if it means getting more benefits. However, just because they have churned away from your brand doesn’t mean they are gone for good! You just have to win them back and focus on re-engaging them with relevant communications based on what you have learned about their behaviors. This includes insights you’ve taken from social channels and paying attention to negative word of mouth, such
as an online review.

Win Them Back

A Win back can be anything from a personalized email or letter telling them you miss their business, or aWin-them-back survey as to what would make them want to come back to your brand. People love deals, so maybe offering a discount or special code just for them to draw them back in. There are a variety of ways to win someone back and even convert them in to a loyal customer, you just have to give them some personal attention and learn about what they really want, not what you think they want.

Many times, marketers invest their hard work and precious dollars in campaigns and promotions aimed at getting customers to make that first purchase. But once those customers are in the door, they’re left largely to their own devices. By consistently engaging those customers over time with relevant, appealing offers, you can cultivate long-term loyalty that translates into higher revenues and advocates who drive even more business for you through powerful
word of mouth.

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Why not try Extendware’s Loyalty Program extension for your Magento store? This extension allows you to incentivize customers based on order history, average order amount, and account age.

Why is it Beneficial to be a Part of an Affiliate Program

The marketing world today is exciting and dominated by affiliate trend. Those who don’t know what an affiliate marketing program is should learn it fast. For that, it is the latest way for marketers and bloggers to make money by flexing their marketing muscles. Affiliate networking is all about getting the piece of the action and getting paid handsomely for it. Widely known for the win-win situations they create and the great results they can provide, affiliate programs seem to be the new golden child of marketing.

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What is an Affiliate program and how does it work?

Launched by 2Amazon in 1996, affiliation has managed to earn true popularity only in recent years. Affiliate programs are a form of the performance-based marketing through which a company, also known as a merchant, agrees to pay its affiliates (or webmasters) for the visitors or clients that they bring in through their efforts. Based on the object of the contract, the affiliate will advertise certain products and pay a flat fee or a previously negotiated percent per every sale or visit which was brokered through the referral.

Why Opt for an Affiliate Program – The Benefits Associated

An affiliate program is structured on the idea of a mutually beneficial relationship through which both the advertiser and the publisher can draw consistent benefits. However, the affiliate market is a fiercely competitive performance-based, result-orientated market which will require good marketing skills to bring about consistent income and professional success. Overachieving affiliates tend to be well connected, thus marketing passionate people, a fact which usually brings bloggers and online marketing specialists to the front of the pack.

Leaving that aside, providing you have some marketing skills of your own, here are a few of the benefits brought about by affiliate programs and why they are totally worth giving it a try:

  • You are your boss meaning that you set your own goals to chase after.
  • You have a flexible schedule which you design however you deem fit.
  • It is one of the fastest, free ways to make money online (not to be confused with the easiest).
  • The affiliate program is a transparent agreement which functions on clear, well-defined terms. Affiliate programs usually function on simple contracts which leave little to no room for confusion and misinterpretation.
  • The better connected you are, the easier it is to create real impact and get paid.
  • You get paid based on your results, This means every time someone uses your referral to visit and buys a product which you are advertising, you are paid a commission amount. While SEO and digital marketing require constant ticking and are often paid per project, an affiliate program will pay you the commission you agree upon every time a sale is facilitated through your referral.
  • Affiliate marketing is cemented on ROI and sales, a fact which makes it a very powerful online marketing tool. If you can sell, these numbers will turn into hard cash.
  • Most of the affiliate programs which the companies are running can be joined free or with a certain charge and without a tedious set-up process.

Which affiliate program to choose?

Choosing the right affiliate program is not easy, considering that one can easily find a variety of affiliate networks in every field of 3the market. However, some of the fields are saturated, hyper-competitive areas which make them unattractive for most marketers out there.

If you are a seasoned affiliate marketer or want to become one and you are looking to join a rewarding affiliate network, try the Extendware Affiliate Program. The affiliate program is free to join and is based on the Magento Extensions and various development/configuration/customization services associated with them. Once you log in, Extendware’s backend has readymade links and banners you would need to promote and states so that you can track your progress all of which already include your personal code so that when people click on them you automatically get the set commission. In addition to the exceptional quality of the products and the great price Extendware is selling them for, you will get bi-weekly newsletters, exceptional support and extra prizes at the top tier level, this affiliate program is quite generous with its top-performing marketers.

The commission section is organised in 4 Tiers which range as follows:

  • Tier 1 ($0–1,499 in sales) earns 10% of every purchase to the affiliate
  • Tier 2 ($1,500-2999 in sales) earns 15% of every purchase to the affiliate
  • Tier 3 ($3000-4,999 in sales) earns 20% of every purchase to the affiliate
  • Tier 4 (above $5000 in sales) earns 25% of every purchase to the affiliate

The affiliate program also includes clear steps and detailed suggestions that educate you on how to best advertise the products. Doing affiliate work is quite fast and rewarding even for a novice who has just entered. When done right, it has every potential to pile up a significant income. So what are you waiting for? The time to affiliate and collide with success is right here!

 

The Magento Tools You Need to Succeed at Any Level

Stop Reinventing the Wheel

Only an idiot keeps trying to reinvent the wheel – so why would you venture out on your own to make your own mistakes trying to find the right tools for your Magento store?

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Many others – including us – have already made all those mistakes for you. All you have to do is just listen to the hard-won “wisdom” we all have learned the hard way.

TestAt Extendware, we are out here – every single day – learning what works and what doesn’t work with Magento and the Magento eco-system. We’re testing various CRM Systems, Customer Service Tools, Magento extensions and plugins, Magento hosting solutions, you name it, we’ve likely tried it.

We know it feels better to always try out something on your own, hoping you’ll stumble on some great new tool that others haven’t found yet. Maybe you’ll find the next ConvertKit before anyone else does, but more likely you’ll end up wasting time and money on something that doesn’t fit your company or goals…(we’re looking at you, ZenDesk)

Trust us, we’ve been there…and now, after years of testing different tools, we’ve settled on a few products and services that we believe are best for our customers and we use them on a daily basis for everything we do.

Best of Breed Magneto Resources

One of the first things that we wish we had when we started working on Magento was a list of “Best of Breed” tools and utilities to help us optimize our Magento installation and make our store “just work better.” Now that we’ve been through years of figuring these things out, we wanted to share what we’ve learned in multiple blog posts and collect all of that information into one resource for our community.

We’ve put together our own Extendware Resources Page where we list out exactly what tools we use, why we use them, and someweb other tips and tricks to help with your Magento store configuration and implementations.  We have tested and relied upon every recommendation on our Resources page for at least 6 months or more. Many of the resources listed there are crucial to running our business (or were crucial to developing Extendware to where it is today).

We hope this resource helps you cut down on searching for the right tools and brings you success faster than you would have otherwise. As always, send us any suggestions or ideas to [email protected], we love to hear from you.

That’s it for today, Extendware Community! Thanks for tuning in. Have an profitable and resourceful week!

Drive Magento Marketing Strategy by Adding in Cost Data to Each Item

Magento includes a large library of attributes you can enable within your store. One field that many stores fail to unlock is Cost of Goods Sold. In Magento, Cost of Goods Sold is called “Cost” and it lives in the Prices section of each of your products.

Cost of Goods Sold (COGS) is the amount of money spent on raw materials to create product, or the amount of money used to purchase a product from a wholesaler. COGS is important because it helps stores calculate Gross Margin by product.

Revenue – Cost of Goods Sold = Gross Margin

Gross Margin (also called Gross Profit) is an important driver of store strategy and should be well understood for each product. Gross-MarginBecause Gross Margin represents cash available after paying a supplier, it’s good to use as a primary consideration when managing marketing expenses. Products that have high Gross Margins, such as electronics, are better suited for pricier marketing campaigns, while low Gross Margin items may be a better fit for scalable marketing such as email campaigns.

In some cases, increasing marketing spend on low-margin items may actually make sense. By combining sales volume with Gross Margin data, you may learn that a low-Gross Margin item is generating a healthy amount of cash thanks to a large number of orders. For instance, selling one bracelet may generate six dollars of Gross Margin, but selling 500 bracelets may generate $3,000 of Gross Margin. While it may seem intuitive that you would spend more cash to market high sales-volume products, knowing the exact Gross Margin for an item will help you understand how much of a product’s Gross Margin can comfortably be allocated to marketing. It will also help you track the return on your advertising spend by product. Keep in mind, marketing is just one of many operating expenses. You’ll want to consider other expenses as well when you budget for advertising spend.

Tips for Using Gross Margin to Dictate Strategy

  • Place items that have a healthy Gross Margin and that convert well in the prime real-estate positions of your store.
  • Bundle low-margin items with high-margin items to justify the time and effort spent on merchandising and shipping costs. Or where appropriate, only sell your low-margin products in packs of three or five.
  • Raise advertising spend for items that generate high amounts of Gross Profit, but be sure to analyze the effects of increased spend on sales volume to understand the return on this spend.
  • Negotiate with your vendors to reduce Cost of Goods Sold. Consider switching out expensive materials for options that don’t compromise quality.

Ready to get started? Here are the steps for enabling Cost attributes to appear on each product:

Step 1: Log in to your account and go to Catalog > Attributes > Manage Attributes.

01-Step-(edited)

Step 2: Under Attribute Label search for ‘Cost’ and click on the row.

02-Step-(edited)

Step 3: Scroll down to Apply To and change the setting to be ‘All Product Types.’

03-Step-(edited)

Step 4: Save your work and go to Catalog > Manage Products.

04-Step-(edited)

Step 5: Click on a product and go into the Prices tab. Enter the Cost for each product and save your work.

05-Step-(edited)

All done! I hope that helps with your Cost Attributes and Gross Margin calculations. Anything that can give you a better idea of exactly how you’re making money is a step in the right direction. Until next time!

Sheryl Davis is a digital marketer at Glew, an E-Commerce analytics software provider, where she focuses on helping online stores understand and act on their data. Each week she publishes practical strategies for ways to rock E-Commerce.


Abandoned-Cart-Email

Abandoned Cart Extension Overview

Extendware’s Magento Abandoned Cart Email extension allows you to capture additional sales by emailing customers who have abandoned their shopping cart without making a purchase. You can send an unlimited number of follow-up emails to the potential customer and even attach an automatically generated coupon to the follow-up email in order to incentivize a new purchase. This extension pays for itself within just a few orders. 


Starting a Store on Magento: Time-Saving Tips

For businesses looking to establish an e-commerce store, Magento is an indispensable tool. As an open-source platform, Magento can be adapted to meet the needs of individual businesses. Big brands and small businesses alike can use Magento to create a profitable and user-friendly online storefront.

But while anyone can go to Magento’s website and set up a basic store, creating a successful e-commerce business can be considerably harder.

Magento offers so many different options for customization that many new users feel overwhelmed and intimated. So many different tasks go into running a successful online store:  SEO, web design, marketing, and many more. Magento extensions help online business owners to complete necessary tasks on time and without hassle. Here are some common problems that Magento users encounter—and how extensions can help solve them:

Lagging Loading Times

All research suggests that today’s web users are more impatient than ever. If an online store takes too long to load, visitors to your site won’t buy. While you can’t always control the speed with which users browse your site, there are ways to lower your load times. An extension such as the Full Page Cache will speed up your site by caching it whenever a user visits. This extension serves as a replacement to expensive investments in hardware.

Google Analytics Overload

Traffic is essential to the success of your business, so it can be tempting to visit Google Analytics constantly. But this is an inefficient use of time. With the Google Analytics Dashboard extension, you can see your Google Analytics data right from your dashboard.

Spam, Spam, and More Spam!

There are bots looking to spam your inbox. If you have a contact page on your website, you may be vulnerable to spam. The Anti-Spam Captcha prevents this annoyance, requiring users to enter a short string of characters before their message goes through.

Conversion Confusion

E-commerce is a global phenomenon, but international customers may be turned off if they can’t easily figure out how much they will need to pay for a particular item. Customers also may be unaware that you have separate storefronts for buyers from different countries. The Store/ Currency Switcher extension will enable your Magento store to redirect to the correct storefront.

Abandoned Carts

The bane of every online retailer, abandoned carts can seriously reduce your profits. In 2015, the average rate of cart abandonment was a whopping 68%, meaning that more than two-thirds of online orders were never completed. For e-commerce business owners, few things can be more frustrating. But with the Abandoned Cart Email extension, you can send a friendly reminder e-mail to customers who abandon their carts on your store. The e-mail sequence can be completely customized. You can even include a coupon for customers to incentivize them to complete their purchase.

 

Running an online store is already difficult. By making strategic use of Magento extensions, you can make better use of your resources and increase the profits of your online store.

All ExtendWare extensions come with the option to return within return within 30 days and receive a full refund —making this investment risk-free.

Imagine 2016 Magento Conference

Imagine 2016
Imagine 2016

Imagine 2016

Extendware is excited to say that we got to attend the Imagine 2016 Magento Conference. Now in its 6th year, Imagine 2016 brought together 2,500+ merchants, partners, developers and commerce experts from 45+ countries to network, exchange ideas and build relationships.

Speakers such as Earvin “Magic” Johnson of Magic Johnson Enterprises, Mark Lavelle of Magento Commerce, and Jamie Clarke of LoveOutThere.com took the stage along with many other informative entrepreneurs, business owners, and Magento’s top professionals. Magic Johnson, spent lots of time in the crowd answering questions. It wasn’t hard to find him.

Magento 2016
Magento 2016

Magento News

Magento 2 Momentum: 228,000 downloads of Community and Enterprise Edition, over 800 sites live, and 100+ Magento 2 Trained Partners

Magento Enterprise Edition 2.1: The next release will include enhanced staging and preview, ElasticsSarch, and payments functionality

Magento Marketplace Launch: A better place for developers to show off their best work

Magento Enterprise Cloud Edition Launch: New PaaS environment built to power innovative commerce experiences

Conference Goers
Conference Goers

 

The conference began with awards recognizing the 20 most active users within the Magento developer community, recognizing the exceptional creativity, innovation and success of merchants across the global Magento ecosystem.They also unveiled the Inaugural Magento Trailblazer Award to Vandy Santos, Global Omnichannel Solutions Leader for Nestle and A.J. Nahmad, President of Watsco, Inc.

Schedule Imagine 2016
Schedule Imagine 2016

It is no wonder that the Community itself, is what makes Magento so special and unique. Mark Lavelle, CEO of Magento, used the words “We Are Magento” to acknowledge the community of developers, system integrators, merchants, and partners that make up the powerful ecosystem.

We are happy to congratulate the Magento team on the release of Magento 2.1 and the announcement of the Magento Enterprise Cloud Edition. Both are examples of exciting new tools for the hundreds of thousands of Magento merchants from all over the world.