The Golden eCom Goal: Dependency

All eCom brands should have one goal when it comes to retention: product dependency.

If you can take someone from trying out a product to becoming reliant on it, the whole landscape of your business will change.

Your revenue per customer will increase, you’ll be able to go much harder on acquisition offers and the business will scale quicker.

It's why certain brands can offer low prices to prospects and remain profitable. They know customers will stick around for months or years after their first purchase. 30% off might feel heavy duty when people are falling off the retention cliff early doors, but fine if your CAC/LTV ratio is sitting pretty.

Now, this journey to dependency will look different for different brands, products, and customers. For some the formula might look something like 2 purchases/50 usages, for others it may take longer. It depends on the pain point level and average time between use i.e. if you're solving a constant pain, people will become dependent quicker.

It goes without saying that the product quality and general customer experience are pivotal in this. But how you communicate with people also has a massive part to play. Here are 3 ways to do it properly.

1. Nudge People Into Action

After someone buys a product, you want to make sure they’re using it asap. The best way to do this? Show it in action.

For more complex SKUs this might mean guides, tips and tricks, and for products which are more clear cut (food & bev, apparel etc.) send videos with people eating it, wearing it, throwing it in the air and catching it… you get the drift.

If you want to take this a step further, run mini competitions where people win prizes if they use the product x amount of times in x days. It’s super interactive and creates an alternative reason for people to start chomping down on that energy bar or flaunt that tee you’ve sold them. Anything which asks customers to engage works extremely well.

Once you set these in motion, you’ll notice these messages will have some of the highest engagement rates across the whole lifecycle.

2. Maintain Excitement

A lot of brands seem to think once they’ve sold a product they can stop hyping it up. Not true. Consumers are busy, they are constantly being sold to, and there’s a big chance your product will fade into a sea of other creams and shirts and cereals if you don’t remind them why it’s so great.

In any post-purchase sequence always include sections which reiterate all the benefits and golden features which make you better than competitors. If you can weave this into reviews, UGC even better - it’ll make newbies feel part of a community who, like them, too a risk by buying into your brand.

3. Create Replenishment Flows

Another strange myth floating around eCom circles is that if your product is amazing, first time buyers will automatically buy again. This might be true for joint pain supplements or acne drugs (basically anything that solves a huge pain point) but for the majority of brands it just ain’t a thing. Again, people get distracted, their interests change, they find other shiny objects that lure them in and convince them to splash the cash.

So you have to remind them to come back a second or third time. Which means predicting when people will run out of the product and sending them a message a few days before it happens.

This is as easy as can be. Just set it up as an automation for every new customer and exclude people who buy before the email, SMS or notification gets sent out.

Do these three things and you'll see more and more customers reach that magic habit threshold. And once this happens, you'll see people sticking around for much much longer.