Give Q4 a Flying Elbow

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Banter

Monday, October 17, 2022

Are you really in marketing if you don’t occasionally wake up in the middle of the night wondering if you replied to that email?

Yours stressfully,

DTC ❤️

In this newsletter, you’ll find: 👇

📦 Email Q4 content guide: how to get leads and send campaigns that land

📦 Is your brand ready for the 31% spike in returns that happens after BFCM?

📦 Tips to maximize your brand growth and reach this holiday season

📦 Start planning your next winning campaign with Aspire’s Influencer Marketing Budget Template

📦 Adding zero-volume keywords to your SEO strategy

Read till the end to access exclusive DTC swag. 😎

👉 If a pal forwarded this to you, subscribe, so you never miss out.

Email

Q4 Email Content Guide

News shock: your emails need to be either educating or entertaining (preferably both!)

This week on the All Killer No Filler podcast, we chatted about how big of a piece of the pie email can be for your business. 🥧

Steal these tips and insights to make sure you’ve got your emails on lock this Q4. No missed sales opportunities happening here.

😳 P.S. You’re wrong

The biggest hesitation the team sees when onboarding new clients is that email is hard work. Email is so technical that most don’t understand the nuances of how to effectively build, manage, and segment your list.

If you’re a brand that’s been putting email on the back burner, it’s time to switch it to the beloved front right burner (everyone’s favorite, right?!).

The buildup to Q4 is so important and needs to be prioritized. If you haven’t already, start running your lead gen campaigns yesterday.

😇 Where you lead, I will follow

There are so many offers to consider for lead gen: early bird access, exclusive discounts, first dibs on product drop day, VIP access… However, the goal is to get quality leads who actually intent on converting.

It may cost you a few extra bucks for acquisition, but we suggest running your lead gen ads on Meta and directing users to a specific landing page.

When you take the time to create your own landing page, you’ll find yourself with better quality leads with higher intent. Trust us here, quality leads are worth the money.

You may also want to consider offering discounts for new leads on the list, e.g, giving them a discount right off the bat and also an exclusive offer.

🎨 Getting crafty

Your email design and copy are vital to your campaign success. If you’re not offering education or entertainment, chances are you’ve lost your audience. 👋

Here are some elements you can’t miss out on:

• Present your offer strongly. Don’t use vague wording, show specific numbers, and be clear and concise
• Implement a merchandising section. Show off your best offers/products.
• Communicate the savings. Present the audience with “then vs. now” pricing.
• Highlight any installment plan options. Demonstrate accessibility and ease of purchase.
• Test a more personalized approach. Send an email from your founder, why your brand has created the offer, etc.
• Have fun! Make pun and be relatable. Don’t be afraid to get a little weird with it (and test to see what lands!)

For more tips on adding scarcity and urgency to your Q4 email campaigns and creating a creative and compelling offer that shines through, listen to the full pod here! 🔥

Sponsor

Are your returns ready for BFCM?

✅ Your inventory is stocked

✅ The ads are ready

✅ The support team is primed

...But are you ready for the 31% spike in returns that happens after BFCM?

In a year where customers cost more to acquire, eCommerce growth is slowing, and consumer spending is down, retention matters more than ever. That's why an optimized returns experience is one of the best levers you can pull to delight customers and maximize retention this BFCM and beyond.

So do yourself (and your customers) a favor and grab a copy of the BFCM Returns Checklist.

You'll learn how to:

• Level up your returns ahead of BFCM
• Segment and deliver personalized return experiences
• Incentivize exchanges to retain more revenue
• Win repeat customers with a delightful post-purchase experience

👉 Download your copy here.

Q4

It’s Our Time of Year Again!

We get it, the holidays can be overwhelming. 😮‍💨

But with a few swift actions, you can use the holiday season to enhance your brand’s credibility, communicate effectively with your audience, and curate a stellar post-purchase experience.

Make it the most wonderful time of year with a holiday plan that supports the culture of your brand and its consumers. Let’s dive in! 👇

☎️ For the cost of a quick phone call…

Meta has one of the lowest CPC rates across all the social media giants ($0.94), so don’t discount the channel from your holiday campaigns.

While the audience can be difficult to navigate, optimizing your campaigns for more targeted demographics can help reduce your overall ad spend and increase your ROI.

Feeling burnt out on Meta? 🧑‍🚒 Consider shifting some of your ad spend to other platforms and experiment with:

1️⃣ Twitter

2️⃣ TikTok

3️⃣ Reddit

4️⃣ LinkedIn

5️⃣ Amazon

6️⃣ Quora

🔭 Discoverability relies on credibility

It’s time to update your social media profile pages and ensure each page has valid contact information. This will help support existing relationships and help deliver an exceptional post-purchase experience. 💪

Remember, transparency leads to positive first impressions. So if you fail to provide shoppers with reviews, fair return policies, and valid contact info’, your brand integrity might fall into question.  

💸 Less clicks = more sales

Focus on cutting down friction in the customer journey and reduce the amount of clicks it takes for a customer to buy something.

Review the checkout process on your website. Let multiple people, including yourself, reach the cart with a product and reflect on these questions:

• How long did it take?
• Were there any pauses in the process?
• Could they find their product(s) easily?
• Did any questions arise without visible answers?

These details greatly affect your conversion rate when people need last-minute gifts. 🎁

If you’re in the US and qualify for Instagram Shopping, Checkout on Instagram is a must! Within 3-5 seconds, customers have likely decided if they will be choosing your brand over another. Make every second count.

🤫 Don’t use your words

Hashtags and emojis can be used on just about any major social media platform and here at DTC, we use emojis to communicate tone and voice. Mimic this for your brand!

Emojis are tools that communicate emotion. Use short descriptions to accompany them and enhance your message or punctuate something important. 😉

Keep your hashtags brief to make them memorable and to support your brand discoverability.

Start a hashtag trend with one of your products to keep your community engaged. Hashtag trends also allow you to mine social media for user-generated-content (UGC) which can be leveraged to reach new audiences and grow your organic socials.

💪 Get physical, stay digital

Though the return to physical spaces can be a refreshing experience, continue your enthusiastic approach to eCommerce and social media marketing.

Provide VIP experiences through targeted marketing, tailored customer support, and a ‘customer-first’ return policy. All of these factors lead to a confident brand that your audience will swear by in recommending your products to their family and friends without even setting foot in a store!

Got a DTC holiday season hack to share? Hit reply and let us know! 💝

Sponsor

Planning your influencer marketing budget? You need this template!

What’s better than hiring an influencer to brag about your DTC brand? 👀

Budgeting properly so you can hire more influencers to talk about your DTC brand across social media.

Influencer marketing has extremely high ROAS rates, but with the right tools, you can get even more bang for your buck. 💵

We recommend checking out Aspire’s latest tool—their Influencer Marketing Budget Template.

This template helps you:

• Make strategic decisions on how to best spread your influencer marketing budget
• Build high-level estimations of reach and engagement to guide campaign objectives
• Spread budget tactically across nano, micro, mid, macro, and mega influencers to maximize ROI

👉 Get Aspire’s Influencer Marketing Budget Template and start planning your next winning campaign.

SEO

Zero Volume, Infinite Possibilities

Zero-volume keywords are search phrases that seemingly generate zero traffic but have the potential to accelerate the growth of your website. 🚀

In case you’re not up to speed…

Search volume refers to the number of times a word is searched within a timeframe. Normally, a word with a high search volume would be a key indicator to include it in your optimization strategy but *shockingly,* high-volume words are highly competitive.

✏️ Finding the right words

Brainstorm some words that are relevant to your business and determine their recent search volume. Identify the words that have the lowest volume by using free online tools like Ahrefs.

Try typing a statement into a search engine using your newfound keyword(s).

Here’s an example: If you’re a DTC brand selling running shoes and you want to target the zero-volume keyword ‘elastic’, you would type: “Do running shoes contain el…..”

If the search engine is able to autofill to complete the word elastic, you’ve discovered a potential high-volume keyword with minimal competition!

Next, we can take that word or phrase and search it to generate SERPs . Analyzing these results help you to confirm the value of your keyword. If we see forum posts asking questions about the keyword with high traffic, this is another indicator of a high value word.

📱 Is it proven? Try it for yourself!

Twitter user @princessniche claims they’ve seen success using this method by generating over 1,400 page views each month using zero-volume keywords. For more information and examples, check out the full thread here!

Could zero-volume keywords be your next opportunity for growth and lead generation? Let us know what you’ve discovered! 🔐

Quick Hits

🏆 Instagram’s working on new ‘Achievement’ badges to incentivize Reels creators.

🐦 Twitter’s making it easier for professional account users to link to their content and services.

🎨 Microsoft launches Designer, its answer to highly valued startup Canva

🎵 ByteDance, the parent company of TikTok, has initiated talks with music labels in order to expand its music streaming services globally.

🔊 Have you heard our latest podcasts?

‍

🥦 High Performance, Nutritionally Complete Marketing to $150M with Huel's Ben Bokaie.

⭕️ Turn Your Returns Into Exchanges With Aaron Schwartz from Loop.

🧦 Making a 5X Return on Affiliate Sales with Rob Fraser from Outway Socks.

🔋 Two Hacks to Increase Subscriber Conversion by 50% with Tea Drops and Recharge.

🦷 Thinking in Billions with Josh Elizetxe Founder of Snow Oral Care.

👟 Retail Giant Steve Madden on Retention at Scale with Hannah Sinclair and Bluecore's Sarah Cascone.

Don’t forget to rate the DTC Podcast on Apple (⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️)

DTC Newsletter is written by Rebecca Knight and Michael Venditti. Edited by Claire Beveridge and Eric Dyck.

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