#33. How To Turn Your Hard-Earned Sales Into Repeat Customers, Smile.io | Podcast

Vira  0:00 

Today on the show, we’ll be talking to Tim from Smile IO. He’s a senior manager of marketing and community at Smile IO, and Tim has created a gazillion of fun resources about loyalty, retention and E commerce, and in fact, he’s one of the masterminds behind Smile IO blog.

Alissa  0:41 

Hello everyone, and welcome to yet another episode of Email Einstein, Vira and Alissa here, and a very special guest. But before we get into that, as you all surely know, Vira and I, we are two email marketers at an email marketing agency called Flowium. We are super passionate about email marketing, and because we love what we do, we are here to share our insights with you. Flowium is one of the fastest growing email marketing agencies in the world. We specialize in providing a premium, full service e commerce email marketing experience for all of our clients. Our service is tailored specifically for your business and is designed to help increase your online retail revenue by 20 to 50% that’s five zero, not one, five, 50% we deliver the right message to the right person at the right moment, and that’s what we’re all about here at Flowium. And without further ado, we have a very special episode in store for all of you. Definitely didn’t mean to make that rhyme, but Vira, take it away for us.

Vira  1:39 

Hey everyone. Welcome to another episode of Flowium podcast. Thanks for hanging out with us today, guys, and today on the show, we’ll be talking to Tim from Smile IO. Tim is my fellow Canadian. He’s a senior manager of marketing and community at Smile IO. And Tim has created a gazillion of fun resources about loyalty, retention and E commerce, and in fact, he’s one of the masterminds behind Smile IO blog. If you haven’t read that blog, go and check it out. It’s really awesome. A lot of good stuff there. So we’re so excited to have you on this podcast today, Tim, say hi.

Tim  1:39 

Hi everyone, thanks for having me. I’m really excited to join you guys.

Vira  1:39 

You’re actually our first Canadian guest on this podcast.

Tim  1:39 

I hope I do as proud.

Vira  1:39 

Let’s make Canada proud, Tim.

Vira  1:39 

Before we go to all of the serious questions, and we do have, like, a bunch of questions that we want you to answer. Tim, let’s play a little game. Alissa has like, a bunch of fun little blitz Q and A like question and answer, so just answer with the first thing that comes to your mind.

Tim  1:39 

All right.

Alissa  1:39 

Okay, here we go. Okay, Tim, what is your favorite brick and mortar loyalty program?

Tim  1:39 

Oh, brick and mortar loyalty, probably right now it’s gonna be Domino’s Pizza, which is not a great answer, but.

Alissa  1:39 

That’s great. No, that’s amazing. That’s amazing.

Tim  1:39 

I’ve been, you know, with everyone staying at home, my family, we’ve been ordering probably too much pizza, and so I’ve, that’s probably the one that I’ve been getting the most value out of recently.

Alissa  1:39 

That’s awesome. That is awesome.

Vira  1:39 

So you’re just, like, collecting those cards, or, like, the part of the cardboard or the box, right, or how does it work?

Tim  1:39 

The piece of the pie. So it is, it is through their app, but you can, you earn points, whether you’re ordering online or in store.

Alissa  1:39 

That’s awesome.

Tim  1:39 

Every I think, I can’t remember how many exactly it is, but I’ve, for every so many purchases, you get a free medium pizza. So definitely, I’ve earned too many free pizzas this year.

Alissa  1:39 

That’s great. That’s a great answer. That’s way better than what I was expecting. So thank you for that.

Tim  1:39 

No problem.

Alissa  1:39 

Okay, next question, Are you part of the Star Wars or Star Wars Starbucks Rewards program? Do you take advantage?

Tim  1:48 

So I am a member. I was telling you guys earlier that I actually I moved to a small town over the summer, and there’s no Starbucks here, so I haven’t been able to use it as much as I used to.

Alissa  4:25 

Oh my gosh, no Starbucks there. Wow, that’s criminal. We got to call them.

Tim  4:32 

Exactly.

Alissa  4:33 

What is your favorite place in Canada?

Tim  4:37 

Ooh, that’s a good one. I do love the East Coast. I did live out on the East Coast for a little bit. I haven’t been to the west coast and quite a long time. That’s a really tough one. I’ve maybe I’ll just say home, like Ontario.

Alissa  4:48 

Okay.

Tim  4:49 

I mean, there’s, there’s so much to see here and do. So I’ll stick with Ontario. Actually, my answer.

Alissa  4:54 

Awesome. Awesome. What is your favorite perk that you guys offer within Smile IO for like, within a loyalty program that a customer can basically offer to their customers?

Tim  5:06 

Who something that we allow our customers to do, I think I’d say is the best, because it’s one that I utilize a lot. Is free shipping. You know, if, if I have to purchase something and they’re shipping on top of it, I am often like, oh, I don’t know, but if I’m, if I’m able to earn some points and cash them in for free shipping, that makes that, that initial purchase, that much easier.

Alissa  5:27 

Yeah, agreed. And I think it’s funny, because a lot of us, I think, take free shipping for granted now, but without it, and when you don’t have it, you’re like, not gonna make that purchase.

Tim  5:36 

Yeah, even if it’s only like, five or 10 bucks, you’re like, I don’t know.

Alissa  5:40 

Yeah, yeah, it quite he puts everything into question for you.

Vira  5:43 

Another one that stops me from buying. It’s the capture thing. You know, when you have to pick the parts of the road or all of the bicycles have that, even though I’ve spent, like, literally our shopping on that website, I’m like, forget it. I’m not gonna do that.

Tim  6:02 

Actually. I know a trick for those so if you’re on a laptop and you do on the little checkbox thing before you even have to, like, click on the cars or whatever it is, if you do, like, a long press on your trackpad or your mouse instead of just a quick one, usually that skips having to actually click the pictures, yeah.

Vira  6:22 

Oh my goodness. It’s like life changing.

Alissa  6:25 

Wow. That is, give it a try. Next time, that’s the biggest email ever,

Vira  6:29 

I will try it for sure.

Alissa  6:31 

Wow. Oh my gosh, I’m gonna try it immediately after we’re done recording this.

Tim  6:36 

Where can I find a CAPTCHA?

Alissa  6:40 

Oh my gosh, that’s nuts. Okay, good to know. Wow, really. Good to know. Yeah, okay, we have two more questions. Favorite show on Netflix right now?

Tim  6:49 

Ooh, we just wrapped up watching through all of Brooklyn Nine-Nine, so I probably say that.

Alissa  6:54 

Okay, how did you like it good?

Tim  6:57 

Oh, it’s so good. It’s, it’s, yeah, it’s one of the best shows on there I think.

Alissa  7:02 

Oh, wow. Okay, cool. Yeah, my husband and I are always looking for stuff, so that’s partially why I asked this question as well. Okay, and last one, if you had to describe yourself as a food, what would you be?

Tim  7:15 

Oh, that is tough. One of my favorite foods is pierogies. So I will say, pierogi.

Alissa  7:22 

Oh my gosh, that’s amazing. That is great. A cheese pierogi?

Tim  7:27 

Oh yeah, potato and cheese for sure.

Alissa  7:29 

Okay, nice. That’s amazing.

Vira  7:31 

Do you have Ukrainian roots? By any chance?

Tim  7:34 

I don’t, but Ukrainian pierogies are like the best pierogies you can find.

Vira  7:38 

I know, right? That’s that’s one thing that I miss the most about Ukraine. I moved to Canada, like, seven years ago from Ukraine. So pierogi.

Tim  7:45 

Oh, really?

Vira  7:45 

Yeah. Like, yeah. It’s, like, the best thing ever. And in Ukraine you can buy them everywhere. They have sweet, they have celery, they have like, all kinds. Want to go home.

Alissa  7:56 

Wow.

Tim  7:56 

I’m hungry now.

Alissa  7:57 

Yeah, I need a pierogi.

Vira  8:00 

Yeah. So let’s wrap up this podcast. You guys, yeah, wrap it up and go and have some pierogis.

Alissa  8:08 

Thanks for that, Tim. Okay, that’s the Q and A you pass with flying colors. We can continue the podcast.

Vira  8:14 

Cool, cool. Yeah. Let’s talk some loyalty programs. You guys, I don’t know if if you had it when you were growing up. But do you remember getting those like little punch cards at your local coffee shop or book shop growing up because my local shop, coffee shop or coffee house? Well, technically, for me, it more. It was more like a cookie house, because I thought coffee was growth until I was like 25 so they had this little like punch cards. And you could basically punch your card for every purchase over like $10 or 10 Ukrainian local revenues or whatever you made with them. And once you got that, like 10 Little punches on your cart, you got $10 gift card to use on anything in the store. It was like a pretty cool idea for 10 year old me, like, with my little pocket money elements, it took me probably like forever to collect those, like 10 punches, but Yeah, and like, having that punch card made me choose that specific coffee house or any other coffee house in town, and I knew I’d be getting that sweet reward after I collect like 10 of them. Now if you do the math like spending $100 I would not otherwise spend to get $10 back. Well, it might not be the smartest financial decision I made, but it just shows you how powerful those loyalty programs can be, and how effective they are. And I mean, I’m not 10 anymore, I’m not 10 year old anymore, but I still go to Starbucks over any other like coffee shop in my area, just because I’m gonna collect those freaking stars there. So that’s I’m just like, come on. Like, I work in Marketing. I know how this work? Why do why does it still work for me every freaking time? So there is actually no reason not to have a customer loyalty program for your e commerce store if you and if you don’t have one, we hope that after this episode, you are gonna be convinced to get one. So Tim, let’s talk some e commerce loyalty program, do they really work? And do rewards program really move the needle when it comes to, like, e commerce specifically?

Tim  10:28 

Yeah, absolutely. And it’s kind of like you said, like there’s, it’s one of those things where, even if you you understand how they work, and you’re in marketing, and you want anyone that runs an e commerce store, like you work in marketing in one way or another. And if, if you understand how they work, it’s really just because the psychology behind a loyalty program, and there’s, there’s a whole bunch of different types of pieces of psychology and psychological principles that are going on, but it just works because it gets into our brains and your customers brains, so they can’t help but want to purchase more to come back and spend more and 100% they work. And you know, some of the biggest brands, the brands that are really making waves in E commerce in general, and then especially over the past 12 months, a lot of them have loyalty programs set up, because it really does work.

Vira  11:16 

That’s awesome. That’s awesome. What is your favorite e commerce store that offer the loyalty program. Or what’s your favorite loyalty program?

Tim  11:26 

It’s hard to pick a favorite. So one of the the perks that we have at Smile, actually, is we, we get an E commerce credit that we can spend with merchants that are running Smile. And so I’ve been able to purchase from, you know, dozens and dozens of different e commerce stores that are running Smile and a lot of them are great because of different things. There’s not a specific reason why one is a good one versus another. Some of them have great return on points. You get a good percentage back compared to others. Some of them that have great VIP tiers set up give you special perks that you just don’t get anywhere else, things like, you know, behind the scenes, access to like a special Facebook group, or early access to products or sales. So I don’t know if I could really pick just like one specific that’s my favorite, because I have different programs that I I enjoy engaging with for different reasons.

Vira  12:16 

Yeah. Nice.

Alissa  12:17 

So Tim, would you be able to give us, kind of like or for listeners anyways, because we, we have experience with with Smile, but would you be able to kind of give, like, a quick introduction to Smile IO and, like, just, like, very high level how it works, and primarily, just what makes it different from other loyalty programs?

Tim  12:36 

Sure. So Smile, if you’re not familiar with it, is the largest e commerce loyalty program provider for scaling e commerce brands. We have over 50,000 merchants running Smile. Back in November, we hit a benchmark where our our customers, so e commerce merchants running Smile, they have rewarded over 150 million customers with points. So we’re, we’re the, the largest e commerce loyalty program provider in the world. And one of the reasons why so many merchants are using Smile is because it’s so simple to get started. Um, you can literally go from having zero loyalty program to a fully branded, fully optimized loyalty program in like 10 minutes, you can have all of your brand colors. You can have it really just like esthetically designed so it looks and feels like your brand, having all the different VIP tiers, referral program, points program, all encompassed in a really sleek on site launcher and panel that like, literally, you can have it set up in a matter of minutes. You don’t need to have any coding experience. You can fully integrate it with all of the other tools that you’re using as part of your your E commerce stack in just a couple clicks. So it’s one of the biggest differentiator for us, is that it’s it’s so simple to get started with Smile and start rewarding your customers and start generating that value for your business in like, literally minutes.

Vira  14:00 

Yeah, let’s talk more about getting started with Smile Io, would you say that Smile is for everyone? Is for all e commerce, businesses? What kinds of people should actually work with Smile? Who can really benefit from Smile? Say, if I, I’m just starting my I don’t know, like a socks brand, I’m starting to selling socks, and I like launching my business in a month from now. Should I start with Smile right away, or should I wait until I have more sales and stuff like that? So what is, what are your thoughts on that?

Tim  14:33 

So I’d say Smile really is for every business, because we we do have many different features depending on what plan you’re on. We have a free plan. You can get started with a points program for free. So it’s even if you’re one of those businesses, like you talked about, where you’re a Sox brand, and you like, haven’t even launched your store yet, you can create a loyalty program right off the bat to start capturing those customers, getting that interaction, that engagement, building your social networks with. Smile program for free. You don’t need to pay for it in order to get results. But as you grow, as your business picks up, as you get more customers, more sales, you can upgrade to get different features that will make your program more engaging. Be able to integrate with the different you know, your ESP, your reviews platform, your customer service platform, to be able to inject that little team information into the rest of your stack, and just all those features that just make it even more powerful, adding VIP tiers and that sort of thing, I would say it really is for everyone, but how you use Smile and the different features that you’re going to utilize will kind of be gated by where your business is on your life cycle trajectory.

Vira  15:40 

So you would say that there is not just points and Smile. There are other like, variations of the program. Or how does it work?

Tim  15:48 

Yeah, so there’s there’s points programs, there’s referral programs, and there’s VIP programs. So points is just your simple, you know, spend, place an order, get points, maybe engage, follow on social those kind of micro earning actions to earn points, and then customers cash those points in for reward, whether it’s a discount or free products. That sort of thing. Referrals is, you know, you copy and paste a referral link or share on social, and if your customers friends click on the link and make a purchase with your store. The depending on how you set it up, both the person who’s referred the new customer, they get some sort of discount, as well as the person that’s sending it, they can also get a discount as well, or points or discount, or however you actually structure your referral program. Oh, that’s pretty cool. And then there’s, there’s VIP programs as well, which is on at Smile. It’s one of our more advanced features, because it does take a little more optimizing to be able to set it up in a way that’s going to be valuable, both for your business and your customers. Where, as customers earn those points, they move up through different VIP tiers, you give them, you can give them bonuses for moving into tiers, or points multipliers and different perks like that, and it’s really a great way to be able to segment and really take a look at your customers to see who your most valuable customers are, and engage with them in valuable ways at the same time.

Vira  17:12 

Yeah, and I feel like a lot of brands, they overlook that segment, because a lot of brands are focused on getting that first sale with a customer, yeah, and then they are sort of like, neglect that customers who have placed like, two, three plus orders with them. But it’s actually your most valuable leads, if you think about it, it’s your most raving fans, right? So why would you neglect them? So why?

Tim  17:37 

Yeah, when? And the statistics show that your loyal top 10% of customers actually spend three times more than the bottom 90% of your customers. So investing in those top spenders your most loyal customers, it’s just good for business.

Vira  17:53 

Oh yeah. Oh yeah.

Alissa  17:53 

So what would you say is kind of like the best way to start the loyalty program, like, obviously you mentioned the VIP side of things, which we tried, we try to not push on our clients, but like, when we’ve been working with them over a longer period of time and they still don’t have anything in place, we’re like, Hey, you should really consider this now that we’re building your subscribers and your customers and everything. But what are the stepping stone, stepping blocks, I guess, to, like, get to that point, like, how should you start? What should the middle look like? Like, what’s that life cycle look like.

Tim  18:21 

So I think one of the most important things you can do, whether you’re thinking about starting like any loyalty program or especially maybe with VIP, is really making sure that you understand what motivates your customers to be able to move them up through those tiers. There’s a concept that I talk about a lot called trivialization, where if you basically signal to your customers that an action isn’t valuable, then they’re not going to interpret it as valuable, right? It’s there’s a study that was done at a hotel where guests that were leaving the hotel were asked how I think, how much they enjoyed their stay, and then for responding to that, they were either given just a verbal thank you or five cents, and then after they were asked how appreciated they felt, and because the five cents is so low, the people that were offered just like a verbal thank you in exchange for their opinion, actually felt more appreciated than the people five cents. Wow. And there’s a few different studies like that, and the same thing kind of happened with of happened with your loyalty program if you’re not really in tune with what your customers find valuable. So if, if you’re only giving them, you know, a very small percentage back in the rewards, or if you’re asking them to sign up for your blog newsletter, but you’re only giving them, like, pennies worth of points in return, they’re they’re not going to want to do it, because it just doesn’t seem like, like it’s valuable. And you’re telling them, Hey, this isn’t really a valuable thing to do.

Alissa  19:47 

Yeah, that makes a lot of sense, because now that I’m thinking about it, like when we talk to clients about this stuff, and we’re like, oh, you should offer perks. And they’re like, Okay, great, we’ll offer a point for when they do this. I’m like, in my head, I’m like, that doesn’t quite run render correctly, because. As as a customer, if I saw that, I was getting one point for doing this thing, even though it’s so beneficial for the company. Like, where’s the value for me as a customer, and then also your guy, it’s not demoralizing. What’s the proper word for this? Like, you’re you’re just diminishing.

Tim  20:14 

Motivating.

Alissa  20:15 

Yeah, exactly, exactly. So that’s really interesting, yeah. And I guess that is a huge focus for for the clients that we work with.

Tim  20:22 

One and it’s it’s not just the points and the the monetary value, either, but especially with VIP, to make it more engaging, we often offer different experiential rewards, like I had talked about, like the behind the scenes, or like, special access to Facebook groups. But you know, if you’re a brand where you know, 90% of your sales are coming from, you know, Tiktok ads. Or, like, you have really great Tiktok organic, and then you’re saying, oh, for our VIPs, you get access to our Facebook group. That’s just not going to jive with your customer base, right? And so it’s really understanding like, Hey, where are my customers engaging with me? What do they actually find valuable about my brand, about engaging with my brand. And so what can I offer them that’s going to be motivating, like you talked about, for them to want to spend more, engage more, to reach those like upper echelon, VIP tiers?

Alissa  21:12 

Yeah, right. Yeah. That totally makes sense.

Vira  21:15 

How would you recommend to approach that same thing for brands who who are against discounts? So we have a few brands. They don’t do discounts at all. They are against discounts, just maybe for Black Friday or Christmas or stuff like that. Where would you recommend to start for this kind of businesses?

Tim  21:32 

Ooh, that’s a good one, because typically you do see, you know, you’re earning points and cashing those points in for discounts. It depends how averse they are. So like, are they? Would they be completely opposed to free products? Because that’s something we see quite often, to where your points to get, you know, a free T shirt, or, you know, a free, you know, makeup accessory, or whatever your brand sells, something that’s usually, it’s not like, you know, not your your prime products, but something that’s product adjacent, that’s kind of like an add on that’s worth caching other points to get while they’re making another purchase.

Vira  22:06 

Oh, that’s a good one. That’s a good one. Or even, like, offering some sort of, like exclusive products that you can only get through this, like reward program that you can’t buy, or something like that.

Tim  22:17 

That’s, yeah, we see that. We see that quite often, actually, customers getting special access to things on their VIP tiers, or early I mean, I guess if you’re sale averse, you’re not going to give them early access to sales, but early access to product launches or, Oh yeah, good one, depending on what the brand is. We even see a different VIP tiers brands letting customers in on the product development. So we’ve seen, like, hair a hair company, hair product company, let their customers pick, like, what color dye they make next, or different food and beverage brands offering, you know, letting their customers get on what flavor of something they make next. You know, that’s something that’s worth striving towards. So, like, customers are going to want to get to the point where they can be part of that brand story.

Alissa  23:01 

Yeah, for sure. Very cool. Yeah. And I Yeah, yeah. Okay, that makes a lot of sense as well. On the on the marketing side of things, where it’s like, you’re not only engaging with your customers, like, Hey, this is what we’re doing. We’re giving you that information, but letting them be a part of that information.

Vira  23:18 

And I was actually surprised when every time we are sending campaign where we are asking customers opinion, like, hey, like, what would you like to change, or what product would you like to see next? I was actually super surprised with the engagement that we were receiving. It’s like they want not just to hear from you, but they want you to hear them as well. So that’s like, two way communication is very important, yeah, in E commerce, that’s for sure.

Tim  23:47 

And I’ll just throw in there too, is that all of those interactions too? That’s just data points to help you, like, further optimize your campaigns. Like, right? If, if you’re getting customers to help you choose what flavor of milkshake you make next and you know all of the customers that voted for what flavor that you didn’t actually pick, but that’s still data points to know that. Hey, you know Tim from Canada is interested if we ever made a blueberry flavor. So right store that away, but it’s all data points to help you know your customers and get to know them to be able to add that hyper personalization.

Vira  24:22 

Right. And you can build the excitement as well. You can build that anticipation for the product. So that’s an awesome, awesome approach, yeah. Well, let’s get back to those customers who already purchased from us, like one time. So basically, how I see there are basically like two different ways to grow your business. The first one is to acquire new customers all the time, to put a lot of money to get those people to buy from you for the first time. And the second one is to focus on retaining existing clients and increasing their customer lifetime value. So tell us more about it. How can Smile IO help you increase your customer’s lifetime value? Are there any like proven tactics that you can recommend our customers to use when it comes to increasing customer lifetime value?

Tim  25:12 

Yeah, there’s a lot of different tactics you can use that impact. CLV, either directly or indirectly. Like one of the things that we see a lot of our customers run our bonus points campaigns. These are especially popular right before the bfcm season, where, you know, let’s say, normally, you give customers one point per dollar spend. You run a campaign where, for a weekend, you offer two points per dollar spend. So it’s just that much more valuable to make purchases or engage with your brand. And so you can, you know, email your customers a month before, two weeks before, and all of those one time customers that you have email them to let them know that, hey, if you come back and place another order over this weekend, you’re going to earn twice as much as you did before. And then the flip side of that is a bonus points redemption campaign where, if customers could, usually, you know, cash in 100 points to get $5 off this weekend, they can cash in those 100 points to get $10 off, or $20 off, or whatever your multiplier is, and.

Vira  26:12 

I realise you can, like, do so much on the back end.

Tim  26:17 

Yeah, some of it’s really manual, and it’s, you know, You got to have the dates and everything ready to increase the points balances and everything or the multipliers. But some things are more automatic, automatic as well. But I think the redemption campaign is especially valuable for reactivating or re engaging those first time customers, because if, if they placed an order with you once, and they’re part of your loyalty program, they’ve earned a points balance. And so now that points balance is sitting there idle waiting to be used. And so running that points redemption campaign is letting them know that, hey, you have this built up balance with our brand that you can cash in for more than what is typically worth. And that’s that’s a really great tactic that we’ve seen be highly successful for some brands to bring those customers back, to get them spending more, and then, you know, they spend during the campaign, and then they’re earning even more points, and then it’s kind of creates a cycle of earning and spending, earning and spending.

Vira  27:09 

It’s a really good idea. How would you approach those like holiday buyers? Because lots of the businesses that we work with, they specifically have this group of people who only come back, like once a year for Black Friday, Cyber Monday. Like, what would you do? Let’s say, in January, are there any like, specific campaigns that you would do for this kind of people?

Tim  27:31 

I think, you know, the bonus earning thing that I talked about, I think, or bonus redeeming campaign, is something that could be really valuable for re engaging those, those bfcm customers, but also just making sure that they know the value of your loyalty program. If you’ve earned a bunch of customers over Black Friday, Cyber Monday, and then they’re all just kind of sitting in your database, they might not even know that you have a loyalty program or know the value of engaging with it, because if they were just there for the initial sale over Black Friday, and then if they don’t, they don’t plan on coming back. But if you’ve captured their email, then you know you’re able to market to them, and you’re able to share with them the value of your brand. One thing that I think is really important is across the entire loyalty program, marketing is to kind of share your brand story and kind of try to inject that into a lot of the communication you have. Customers really fall in love with brands that they can identify with and that they have shared value with. And so you have customers that you know made a purchase because you had a 50% off sale on Black Friday. They probably aren’t really connected to the story of your brand. And so using your emails, your social media, whatever channels you’re marketing in, to kind of share that brand story helps you build those relationships with your customers that make them love your brand and want to come back before there’s another sale.

Alissa  28:47 

So what would you say is kind of the best way to actually let customers know about the loyalty program, like these kinds of people, so they’ve obviously they’re sitting in the bank and they don’t really know that you have this stuff in place. Like, how would you say? And I guess maybe we’ll try and take that pitch from more of like, an email marketing standpoint. Like, what would you say is the best way to approach these people?

Tim  29:08 

I mean, having an email that goes out that just explains, like, hey, you know, thanks for joining us for 2021 or like, welcome to 2021 here’s, you know, you’re a member of our loyalty program. Here are all the benefits that you are already receiving, even if you don’t know it yet, and especially if you have VIP tiers in place, you can share some of the information about like, you know you’re the silver tier, but you only need 60 more points in order to get to the next tier and get all these benefits. It’s kind of FOMO that you’re sharing with your customers, yeah, to let them know that, like, hey, if, if you’re not going to engage with us, here’s all the things you’re not going to get.

Alissa  29:46 

Gotcha, okay, yeah, which is FOMO. We talk about that a lot on a personal level, and also on, like, a an email marketing level.

Tim  29:57 

And it’s because it really does work in. It’s, you know, customers really like that achievement, that motivation, especially with VIP tiers. I think of some like, you know, even Starbucks that we talked about, if you buy any amount of Starbucks, you’re probably on their gold tier. And I don’t even know if they still do it anymore, but they used to, like, send you out and mail you, like, that physical gold card.

Vira  30:18 

Oh, yeah, good old days. They don’t do it anymore. No.

Tim  30:21 

They don’t do it anymore. I think I still have mine somewhere, app, I think, but like, if you you used to be able to go on social media, and I think search like, you know, hashtag, Starbucks Gold Card on like, Instagram and see, like, 10s of 1000s of posts of people, just like, posing with their Starbucks card. Yeah, because it’s just that like, sense of like, I’ve made it. I have reached the pent ultimate Starbucks loyalty member. And it’s the same, like, no matter what your loyalty program is, like, having that motivation to, like, reach at the next tier and get those perks, even if you’re not, you know, physically mailing out a status symbol. It’s just that sense of accomplishment that people are really looking for.

Vira  31:00 

Right, right. And we work with Smile IO a lot, and Smile IO and Klaviyo, and that’s the platform that we use most of the time. They work great together from a technical standpoint, yeah, what would you say are like the best ways to use Smile IO data to create those like targeted and very timely campaigns and flow?

Tim  31:26 

There’s a few different ways. I mean, the basic use case of Smile and Klaviyo together is that you can inject your loyalty program information right into those emails. So you can tell someone how many points they have, you can tell them what VIP tier they’re on. You can get fancy and tell them, like I said, you know, how far away they are from their next VIP tier or from being able to cash in their points. And I think that’s kind of like the basic basics of using Smile and Klaviyo, being able to just always have that loyalty program information in every email you send to them, whether it’s, you know, updating them to let them know that, hey, you’ve earned enough points to cash in. You should probably come back and use that. Or if it’s a product launch, you can just remind them that, oh, by the way, you have so many points saved up. I think those are both really valuable use cases for just always having that loyalty program information be present. But then at the same time, you know, the great thing about Klaviyo is that you can do so much segmentation, and I think that’s where the real power is. I’ve often said that, you know, try to personalize as much as you can until it’s borderline creepy. And that’s kind of like, just scale it back a little bit from there. And that’s kind of like the personalization that customers want is like they want it to feel like you custom wrote them an email. Yeah. And so with all of your loyalty program information, just all of the data you have as well, you can really hyper personalize all those emails. You can send an email to, you know, customers in your silver VIP tier who have purchased something in the past six months that are, you know, X amount of points away from reaching gold. And you can, like, have it structured specifically for those customers in order to have them come back and make that additional purchase to push them into the next VIP tier.

Vira  33:11 

Yeah, that’s a good one. I really like that borderline creepy mentioned, because that’s like, exactly what we are doing when we were setting up those campaigns. For like, yeah, that’s good, but I think that’s too creepy. Let’s step back a bit. So that’s a good one. That’s a good one. Alissa, you worked with Smile Io, a lot.

Alissa  33:29 

Gosh, wow. You put me on the spot here. Vira, oh my gosh, I need, I need to look into this. Can we come back to me for this? Because I’m like, I’m trying to think, and I’m like, Whoa, yeah, you’re right. There are some, the nice thing about them is that it’s because Klaviyo and Smile IO they they function so well together and so easily. It’s like, you just, you said it, and you don’t really think about it. So it’s like, one of those things that it just becomes part of, like, the the, I guess, the loyalty program grind, if that makes sense. Hold on, I’m just pulling this up. What would you, Tim, what would you say is the top performing flow across the board for most of your clients, like on average, usually.

Tim  34:15 

I would say the ones probably that that let customers know that they’ve earned enough points to cash in for a reward is just like a reminder thing, yeah, like, if I’ve earned five bucks worth of points, but I don’t even realize it. You know, I’m probably not going to your website every day just to, like, check to see how many points I have. So having that flow set up where once they hit X number of points, send them an email to let them know that, hey, you can cash that in. That’s just bringing them back to your site. And that’s, that’s an additional purchase, right? That’s, that’s increasing your CLV like, right then and there, just by letting customers know about something that they already have waiting for them.

Alissa  34:53 

Yeah.

Vira  34:54 

Yeah. For me, those like points, statement, emails, they are the most successful ones. As well. You’re just like telling them, hey, here are the ways you can redeem your points. You can get $5 off. You can get this free socks. Or, why am I talking about socks so much?

Alissa  35:15 

Mattresses and socks.

Vira  35:10 

Mattresses and socks. That’s the examples that we’re usually using in this email. Yeah. So for me, definitely those, like statement ones, and also, I’ve seen a lot of conversions come from that VIP emails, even the simple email saying something like, Hey, thank you for being our VIP, here are the perks of reaching this level. You don’t even need to give them any like, additional discount, any additional points or anything. Just like acknowledging the fact that they are VIP is just like in that example, was Thank you versus five cents. So that’s Yeah, it’s like, yeah, thank you email, yeah, thanks for being awesome. Exactly, yeah. It works magic. I was shocked when I saw those numbers for the first time.

Alissa  35:52 

Is Smile IO also one that offers, there’s like, a video review request flow that you can incorporate as well, or am I thinking of something different?

Vira  36:04 

I think, I think you’re talking about, like, looks, probably, or something.

Tim  36:07 

So we do integrate with all, like, all of the the reviews platforms too. It’s like there, I’m sure, between, if you’ve got, you know, Smile and looks, or whatever your reviews platform is, I’m sure there’s a way to integrate the two together in a Klaviyo flow, where it does prompt for that like because I know that our customers are able to reward for, you know, regular reviews, picture reviews, video reviews, they are able to segment it like that depending on the the other apps that they have installed. So together with Klaviyo, I’m sure that’s that’s definitely possible.

Alissa  36:39 

Okay, I’m trying to think of what I was thinking of, because I have a I have a client who uses Smile, and we just set up a submit video review flow where it’s triggered by the actual metric in Klaviyo submitted review video. But I’m like, it must have been Smile, like, I don’t know who else it would have been. But anyways, I’m going on a tangent. I don’t even know what I’m talking about these days. Tim, what would you say is kind of the best way to measure the actual effectiveness of your loyalty program, and even if you have, like, a before and after kind of case study that you can share with us, that would be awesome, too.

Tim  37:17 

Yes. I mean, the the easiest way to tell if your loyal program is working is to look at like your retention rate, like how many customers that purchased in, you know, this quarter, this month, had purchased previously. That’s kind of like the the benchmark for is my loyalty program working is, is it actually bringing customers back? And then, as far as the actual loyalty program itself, your points redemption rate is kind of that, that threshold of saying, like, hey, my customers are finding this valuable. So that’s the number of points that you’re giving compared to the number of points that customers are cashing in. So if you’ve given out, you know, 50,000 points to across your entire customer base, and none of them have cashed them in yet. That tells you that, like something’s wrong with your loyalty program. Your customers aren’t engaging enough to get to a point where they can even redeem their points for anything. So that’s kind of like a an early metric that you can look at to know where, if your loyalty program is heading in the right direction, and as that percentage increases, as more points you’re being redeemed, of the ones that you’re giving out, you’re going to see that as, like, a leading indicator of your your CLV and your repeat purchase rate from there.

Alissa  38:27 

When something like that happens, is it usually because you’re just not, like, you’re not offering enough points for certain things, or, like, the points don’t add up properly so people can actually make purchases. Or is that more of like me as the E commerce owner, I didn’t strategize correctly when I decided, when I determined what points would be redeemable for what or is it just because people aren’t interested in actually cashing in their points.

Tim  38:50 

I think usually it’s not optimized correctly. Like you said, it’s it’s usually a case where you have set either your points aren’t worth enough, or the the amount of points that you need to be able to cash in. Got it, whatever it is, is set too high. Like, there’s, there’s been a couple times where I’ve been just poking around on different brands loyalty programs, and it’s like, you know, you need to spend $1,000 before you can get, like, a $5 coupon. It’s like, well, my average order value is going to be like, you know, 3040 bucks on the store. So I’m never going to come back that many times right, to be able to cash it in. So like their their redemption rate is probably going to be really low, because there’s not going to be very many customers that actually come back enough times to be able to cash them in.

Alissa  39:32 

Gotcha. Gotcha.

Vira  39:34 

What strategy would you recommend to those brands who have, like, a longer customer journey? For example, they are selling mattresses. That’s example that we are using all the time. But seriously though, like, Can they still use Smile if, let’s say they are customer cycle, it’s like one year, two years, yeah, I don’t know. How many mattresses do you need?

Tim  39:58 

So like, Smile does work? For luxury brands, there are, I guess, there’s a difference to, I guess, between luxury and, like, having a high AOV and having that long life cycle, like a mattress. I think generally, for those kind of programs, referrals are more powerful. And so like Points, points are still useful, because having that balance saved up is like having, you know, a digital wallet where you’re you can cash those in for your next purchase. But usually it’s with referrals that makes that happen, like you’ve rather than just social engagement, social engagement. But you know, if someone makes 10 referrals, they can earn a mattress or something like that, where it might take you a few years to be able to, like, have that many referrals build up in and get the points balance to cash it in. But I think it is still valuable. It’s it’s a harder business case to build out and strategize, because you’re going to have a lot more points outstanding with that redemption rate that I talked about, because it takes so long for people to be able to cash them in. But something that we have seen, I can’t think of which brand it was at the top of my head, where you kind of use your loyalty program for those product adjacent products, like I talked about. So even if you’re a mattress company, you know, I think of probably Casper is not a good example. But, you know, Casper has their mattresses, but then they also sell like pillows and lights and dog beds and all those product adjacent things. And so even if you’re a mattress company, you’re going to have some of those accessories that are product adjacent and so your loyalty program can be building up value for customers to purchase those things rather than your main product.

Alissa  41:34 

Got it. Got it. Okay, yeah, which, yeah. And I guess that’s something that we you kind of think about, but you don’t really, because you’re so focused on and the clients that we work with as well, you know, the E commerce brands, they’re typically focused on, like, what’s the highest value item? Like, what’s like our goal, our top shelf item that’s always selling. But the thing that we tend to kind of like push to the side, and we try not to, are those adjacent or complementary products that fit along with those bestsellers. So once the person buys the mattress, it’s like, okay, great. You bought the mattress and we offered a 50 year warranty on it, so I see you in 50 years. Yeah, exactly. And it’s like, well, no, we don’t want that. We want them to keep coming back. But how do you do that? So the referral side of things makes a lot of sense, but then also offering some kind of perk with those items that are complementary also makes a lot a lot of sense, which means brands that are selling one item kind of tough, whereas brands that are little more spread out and have a little more variety, I would imagine, tend to probably do a bit better, especially on the loyalty program side of things.

Tim  42:37 

Yeah, it really depends on what the AOV is too. Like you said, if you’re selling only mattresses and that’s all you’re going to sell, you’re going to struggle to optimize a program. But if you are only selling $3 snack bar or something like that, like you can certainly create a low to program that helps optimize for additional purchases, yeah, something like that. And something I’ll throw into is for back to the mattress company is all of those complimentary adjacent purchases. Each order that they place, even if it’s small, is just building brand loyalty, right? So even though your AOV over the lifetime of that customer might drop, you know, once that 50 Year mattress warranty is up and they need new mattress if they’ve been buying from you every couple years on one of your complimentary items, like, the whole point of loyalty is that they’re loyal now, right? So they, they’ve built it that brand loyalty, you’re going to be top of mind when they think of a Mattress Company, and so they’re going to come back to you 50 years later.

Alissa  43:32 

Yeah, yeah, yeah. It’s true 50 years. Gosh, what’s the world going to be like in 50 years? Who knows?

Vira  43:41 

Oh, yeah.

Alissa  43:42 

Awesome, Tim. Thank you so much. This has been, like, super insightful, and I hope for everyone that’s listening, it’s also been pretty insightful too, because we we’ve talked about loyalty programs quite a bit in the past, over multiple episodes recently, just because that tends to be kind of the we switch, we switch gears a little bit in the E commerce world, as I’m sure you’re aware, in like, January, February timeframe. So for us, it’s like, okay, like, Where can we kind of switch gears, and how can we try to optimize our clients in the best way possible, without, like, focusing too much on, like, oh, you know, January, February. It’s a slow those are slow months in E commerce, we’re not going to get the sales and stuff like that. So rather than harping on that too much, we’re like, okay, what can we do? What can we do to help?

Tim  44:28 

So there’s, there’s really so much you can do to get things going, like, right off the bat.

Alissa  44:32 

So as like, a final, final question, what? What would you say is kind of the biggest piece of advice that you would give to new businesses who are wanting to start out with Smile IO, like, right now, in this kind of time period that we’re in, this season that we’re in.

Tim  44:48 

I would say, like, just remember that, like, sooner is better than later, like the getting started sooner is only going to be valuable. You know, you can install Smile for free and start building that loyalty. You. Even if you don’t have your full like, points, referral, VIP, if you’re not ready for that, that’s that’s like, more than fine. Like, just get started building that brand loyalty so that your customers just, like, love engaging with you and love interacting with your brand.

Vira  45:13 

Yeah, yeah. That’s a good yeah, that’s a good one. Well, thanks so much. It was awesome having you on this podcast. We love Smile IO, we strongly recommend everyone to use this soft because it has been life changing to many of our clients, especially in that slow first quarter of the year. So definitely check it out. Just as Tim said, it’s free to try if you like it good if you don’t, which I highly doubt, you don’t have to keep using it. So thanks so much for for being on this podcast. And guys, if you want to try Smile, if you have any questions, just like, go to their website. They do have a lot of awesome, awesome blog posts, a lot of good information. Tim, if our customers, if our listeners, have any questions, where they can find you, how they can?

Tim  45:59 

They can find me on LinkedIn. Tim Peckover, that’s P, E, C, K, O, V, E, R, if they send an email to info@smile or hi@smile, and just mention that they are directing it to me, it’ll make its way to me some way or another.

Alissa  46:14 

Cool. That’s awesome. Thank you so much. Thank you.

Tim  46:17 

Thank you so much for having me. This has been great.

Alissa  46:20 

Yeah, yeah. Of course, of course, guys, make sure that you don’t forget to subscribe and share this podcast with your friends. Also, if you have any questions at all that you’d like us to feature on our podcast episodes, make sure that you send them in at flowium.com/ask that is also including any questions you may have around Smile IO or any questions that you may want us to refer to Tim if you are a little anxious about reaching out to him, we promise he’s not a scary guy, so feel free to reach out anyways. So yeah, and for next week, we’re excited as well.

Vira  46:54 

And don’t forget to come next week, because we have prepared a really cool episode for you. We’ll be talking about the best list cleaning practices, so how to clean your unengaged segments, how to keep your active profiles happy, and how to make sure that you don’t damage your sender’s reputation. So definitely come back next week. It’s going to be interesting, and it’s going to be very, very informative. And thank you for listening you guys. We hope to see you next week.

Alissa  47:21 

Thanks again, Tim and thank you all for listening in this week.

Tim  47:25 

Thank you.

Vira  47:25 

Bye.

Tim  47:26  

Bye.