What can we say? Sometimes it's the simple things in life 🤷♂️
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If you’re new to DTC, welcome! You’re in good company with fellow newcomers from Awake Chocolate, Fresh Thyme Market, In Haircare, GelaSkins, SCOUT Bags, Bev, and Draft Top. 🍻
In this newsletter, you’ll find: 👇
📈 Increase your AOV through email upsells and cross-sells: Part 1.
💗 Changing the world's pleasure baseline with Jen Batchelor CEO and Founder of Kin Euphorics.
🏪 Why you should run sponsored brand ads to your Amazon store.
Read till the end to access exclusive DTC swag. 😎
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While it’s easy to get lost in acquiring new customers, lowering your CAC, and churning out new ad creative…
Almost every eCommerce business will eventually realize that increasing average order value (AOV) can be a more sustainable track to growth.
🚀 Two tried-and-true strategies for skyrocketing your AOV are upsells and cross-sells.
In a nutshell…
Upsells = Upgrades. Selling “up” by promoting higher-tier versions or add-ons.
👉 Would you like to add guac for $1? (The answer is always yes, obv.)
Cross-sells = Complements. Selling “across” by suggesting other products that complement the customer’s purchase.
👉 These penguin socks would look killer with those shoes.
While the strategies are slightly different, the overall goal is the same.
Upsells and cross-sells encourage shoppers to add more to their cart by providing them more value—whether that’s in the form of a better version, more for their money, or additional items they’ll love.
Onsite, Shopify apps are making upselling and cross-selling easier than ever.
But you also can (and should) up/cross-sell in your emails!
Best Practices for Upsells and Cross-sells 👇
1️⃣ Suggest related products
This one might seem like a no-brainer, but you’d be surprised by how many times shoppers will get marketed completely unrelated products to the one that they purchased (or worse, duplicates of the same product). 🤦
Put yourself in your customer’s shoes: If I bought this product, what would I be more likely to upgrade to (upsell) or buy next (cross-sell)? What would I enjoy the most?
For example, BOOM! by Cindy Joseph upsells new customers with their “new most popular product,” which means there’s a high chance most shoppers will like it.
2️⃣ Avoid huge leaps in price/barrier to entry
If your customer just purchased a low-priced item (or opted in for something free), they’re pretty unlikely to take you up on an up/cross-sell of your most expensive product.
Baby steps, grasshopper. 🦗
What’s the most relevant product to suggest with the next lowest entry barrier? Better yet, is there something you can offer that saves the customer money overall (such as a bundle, buy one get one, or discounted add-on)? Value, value, value.
3️⃣ Personalize, if possible
We see it repeatedly: automated up/cross-sells shown to every shopper, regardless of what they purchased.
For example, it’s common to see carousels in emails that automatically pull in “related” products from your shop feed.
However, when these aren’t customized or filtered appropriately, they can sometimes show the exact same product you just bought!
Case in point: Right after the shopper bought their GRO Hair Serum, the same product was recommended in a carousel in a post-purchase email. That means the brand lost that opportunity to cross-sell on a different yet related product. 😭
When to include upsells & cross-sells in your emails
When it comes to adding up/cross-sells to your email flows, timing matters. A lot.
🚨 Check out Part 2 in Monday’s Newsletter for tips and real-life examples for when/how to incorporate them into your emails!
Did you know premium airings like the Super Bowl are no longer just for the Budweisers and Doritos of the world?
Numerous DTC disruptors are using premium ad placements to efficiently scale on TV.
DTC brands are getting in on the action in a BIG way; leveraging data-drivenstrategies aimed to raise brand awareness with ads on high-reach shows/networks, and retargeting those interested consumers with additional linear and streaming placements for cost-effective conversions.
Fiverr applied this strategy and scored big with a third-quarter Super Bowl spot, then retargeted these viewers on streaming which allowed them to acquire customers at 75% less than their baseline CAC! 🏈
"Working with Tatari helped us be efficient, and optimize as much as possible post-Super Bowl." - Matt Clunan, Director of Brand Marketing at Fiverr.
👉 Watch the full case study and schedule a demo to discover tactics you can apply to your own linear and streaming TV strategy in 2022.
🎧 This week on the pod, we had the pleasure of chatting with Jen Batchelor, “Chief Euphoria Officer” at Kin Euphorics.
Kin is a non-alcoholic experience designed to transform the world’s oldest social ritual (drinking) into a thoughtful act of taking better care of ourselves. Their cocktail-like formulas use adaptogenic herbs, mushrooms, vitamins, and other nutrients to induce a euphoric buzz— without the hangover. 🍸
Get ready to drink in this episode full of feel-good vibes.
The Takeaways: 👇
😊 The science of “euphoria”
You may think of mind-bending mushroom journeys when you hear the word, but Jen filled us in on the actual meaning…
“‘Euphoria’ is a word that’s been in the English language since the 1700s, and you may be surprised to know it has nothing to do with drugs.”
Euphoros, the Greek root of the word, means “to bear well within,” so euphoria actually translates as a state of feeling well.
Not exactly the vibe you get from going hard on the booze. 🤢
But “feeling well” is exactly what Kin Euphorics is all about.
“The difference between the adaptogenic herbs and some of the botanicals that we incorporate is that they very specifically target the nervous system so that it smoothes out the nerves, rather than quieting it [like alcohol does].”
Cheers to that! 🥂
💋 Having a supermodel on staff
ICYMI, mega supermodel Bella Hadid is the Chief Innovation Officer at Kin Euphorics.
The partnership was sparked by Bella’s interest in wellness and genuine love of the products.
“I was blown away by [her knowledge and] the fact that she had Lyme disease… and had been incorporating supplements into her routine since she was 14 years old.”
As you can imagine, Bella’s large audience (a modest 48M Instagram followers) certainly hasn’t been a detriment to the brand’s organic growth.
Pro tip: Just find a supermodel to work with, and you’re golden. 🌟
📚 Educating on euphorics
As one of the first products of its kind, stepping into new territory with a functional alcohol replacement, Kin has realized education is vital for their customer journey.
They’ve recently focused on “brain care,” a new term in the wellness space that revolves around nourishing your precious noggin. 🧠
“There’s just so many reasons to help the brain stay in tip-top shape.”
Kin has devoted resources to teaching people why caring for their brains is important, including building a Brain Trust—a group of scientists and clinicians that educate their audience on nutrients and compounds that support the brain (many of which are in Kin’s formulas).
This group of advisors provides education to customers to help build affinity for the brand and lends Kin credibility as a science-backed, clinician-approved product. 👏
👉 Dive into the full convo with Jen of Kin Euphorics here!
Subscriptions = Predictable recurring revenue + Deeper brand loyalty + Increased LTV
Seems like a simple formula for success, right?...
While launching a subscription program can seem like a no-brainer, the truth is, many brands fail to see their subscription reach its full potential. 😔
You know what they say: When in doubt, learn from those that have succeeded before you!
In Ordergroove’s helpful booklet, How Leading eCommerce Brands Unlock Subscription Success, you’ll learn exactly how five brands achieved massive subscription results, like:
And much more!
👉 Get the secrets to subscription success right here.
Take advantage of competition-free space and run sponsored brand ads directly to your store page.
Store pages are one of the few spots on Amazon where listings and ads for competitor products won’t tempt your customer. Your store page is your time to shine!
Another benefit of a dialed in-store page? It can act as a landing page.
We recommend building out angle-specific pages that speak to targeted customer segments. You can then run brand ads straight to your store page.
Use the page to target what the customer is searching for and tell them why they should buy your product without competitors barging in.
Check out Nutrafol’s campaign. Their sponsored ad found at the top of search directs through to an excellent Amazon store page.
Skip the competition! Use sponsored brand ads to direct customers to your exclusive store page.
Thanks to the Pilothouse team for the killer Amazon insights. 🚀
🕵️♀️ Competitor sales data + social growth + FB ad activity. DTC Spy tracks it all for you. Get started today with a free report.*
🎥 Instagram expands video remix option to all videos, not just reels clips.
🤑 Google requiring all ‘G Suite legacy-free edition’ users to start paying for Workspace this year.
🎆 Instagram launches early test of creator subscriptions in the US.
🎶 TikTok adds insights on the latest trending songs by region to its trend discovery listings.
*Sponsored
💗 Changing the World's Pleasure Baseline with Jen Batchelor CEO and Founder of Kin Euphorics.
🍪 How HighKey Raised Their AOV by 40% with Chief Digital Officer Ryan Rouse.
🍫 Muddy Bites CEO Jarod Steffes on Growing 1000% YOY By Delivering Delight and Mastering Memes.
🍽 The New Non-Profit Growth Model: Wellfare CEO Cole Riley on Food Security and $12 Million Economic Impact.
Don’t forget to rate the DTC Podcast on Apple (⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️)
DTC Newsletter is written by Thomas Schreiber, Kelsey Hess, Sadie Evans, and Rebecca Knight.
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