Tyrone Pardue

Because it is so easy for Web shoppers to find your competitor's products, online retailers must find ways of deepening the relationship and building brand loyalty. Autopia Car Care had built a substantial database of customers, but with competition online rapidly increasing, they realized they needed to do more to hold on to those customers.

I recommended a new strategy to bring more value to the customer's relationship with Autopia by creating an informative newsletter providing solutions to every day car care problems. The newsletter would take a different problem every month such as preserving and protecting a classic car's paintwork or how to prepare your car for winter and teach the reader how to solve these problems in a step-by-step manner using Autopia Car Care products.

Although the concept met with some initial skepticism at the idea of cutting the hard sell email campaign down to once a month and replacing half of it with a newsletter, the results spoke for themselves with a solid 20% increase in sales, and a very high click-through rate from the email newsletter teaser to the full article landing page. Results clearly show a direct relationship between customer education about the products and them making a purchase.

You have about 3 seconds for your email to engage the reader before he decides to dump it. So it's vital the typographic design and copy pulls the reader in with an easy-to-read headline and reading line, and a sneak-peek of the article enticing them to click to the Website landing page where the real cross-selling happens. The monthly follow-up email is a hard-sell piece offering a deep discount or a new product.

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