THE NEW DORMANTS: I would like to introduce you to Sara and Bob, the new dormants. They are email subscribers you acquired several months ago via an aggressive and expensive digital marketing campaign. We have several points of valuable data on Sara and Bob that were captured during the sign-up process and have been sending them 3 emails a week for months.
The problem is that they have not converted. In fact, they haven’t engaged with your email program for 9 weeks despite our amazing creative and offers.
The new dormants are subscribers who have signed up in the last 3-9 months to email marketing campaigns and have not converted, and their email engagement has gradually disappeared unbeknownst to the program. In fact, the new dormants are subscribers that would become eligible to take part in the journey of a re-engagement program soon.
A RE-WELCOME/RE-ENGAGEMENT PROGRAM IS FOR CUSTOMERS
A Re-Engagement program has been talked about quite a bit over the last decade. We have seen great examples of re-engagement programs and have heard amazing results that we all try to replicate. However, re-engagement programs should be reserved for “customers.”
A “customer” can be defined in many different ways, but for the sake of argument, let’s define it as someone that has converted. A conversion means that they understood your value proposition at one point and believed enough in your brand to do something like give the organization money, download a whitepaper or do something that would generally produce some sort of revenue for your company.
Why? Re-engagement programs typically skew the messaging to things like “We miss you” or “Come back, and here is XXX incentive to do so.” In some cases, the re-engagement program focus on email engagement as the driver for a message that skews more about the open or clicks so that they remain on the list.
The new dormants are not the same as “inactive” customers and should not be treated the same way in email. Sara and Bob deserve better.
THE RE-WELCOME PROGRAM
The new dormants need to be re-introduced to your brand, via a re-welcome program. Whether you had one welcome email or an entire series, it didn’t work the first time, so we need to try something different. You can certainly continue to send them 3 emails a week like you always have, but if they haven’t worked yet, the likelihood of them working now is pretty slim.
No Blueprint or Best Practice With Re-Welcome Email Program
There is no blueprint or “best practice” around a re-welcome email program because your brand is unique, so a commitment to test different things such as tone, messaging, urgency, and frequency is critical. The central pillar of this program is that the messaging has to be different from all other communications sent previously. A re-welcome program can be a series of dedicated emails; it can be accomplished via banners in the primary marketing program, be multi-channel, or a multitude of different digital delivery streams.
This is a New Email Campaign Type
This is a new type of welcome program that marketers need to embrace because of the potential value and payoff. It does not come without risk, but then again, there is risk in every email you send.
Next Steps
You have two choices when it comes to dealing with the new dormants:
- Do nothing and hope they will convert.
- Do something.
If you chose #2 and didn’t know where to start, iPost would LOVE to work with you to develop this type of program. You don’t have to be a current iPost customer, just an email marketer who wants to grow and optimize your program.
