Struggling to convert new subscribers into loyal customers? Join Bogdan Birtom as he breaks down the essentials of crafting an impactful welcome series in Klaviyo.
- Importance of a well-crafted welcome series for D2C brands
- Common mistakes to avoid in your welcome series
- Key elements every welcome email series should include
- Detailed breakdown of each welcome series email type
- Advanced tips for personalizing and optimizing your welcome series
Inflation isn't easy on anyone, but it's especially not easy on D2 brands trying to scale profitably with the increased customer acquisition cost. It makes a welcome series a well crafted welcome series even more important, the actual asset to your email marketing stack
Okay - let me introduce meself to you - I'm Bogdan and I'm the head of strategy innovations at Magnet Master.
So, let's get down to business. Let us understand:
- What is a welcome series flow?
- Why you need a welcome series flow?
- What you should have in it, and
- How to build a welcome flow in Klaviyo
So you might be wondering, why is this so important? Well, indeed - Why is a welcome series that important?
Well, think about it. The first few days after someone subscribes to your email list are the most crucial moments. They are excited about your brand, curious to learn more and open to engagement with your brand, with your products.
A well-crafted welcome series flow taps into this enthusiasm, helping to establish trust and connection right from the start. It's your chance to make a killer first impression, boost engagement rates, and ultimately drive more conversions.
Think about the welcome series as a first date. You want to put your best clothes on, make a good impression, boast about your accolades, but not make it too arrogant and then hit for the second date.
At Magnet Monster, we found that most subscribers purchase within the first ten days upon subscribing, so it makes the content of the welcome series crucial to the first impression and to your first conversion with a new visitor.
Mistakes D2C Brands Make While Creating Welcome Series
From my experience with working with so many D2C brands when it comes to crafting welcome series, I found the following common mistakes.
Mistake #1 - Not being aggressive
Number one, they are not aggressive with the purchasing window being on average on ten days. Lots of brands tend to be more laid back because they are afraid of actually giving information to the new subscriber. They are afraid of sending them emails every day, but that it's a mistake because those leads are worm leads and you want to provide information and value as soon as they subscribe to your brand.
Mistake #2 - Not providing social proof
Number two, when it comes to mistakes that brands make when crafting the welcome series, not providing social proof, not boasting about their brand.
Maybe your brand has awards, maybe they have been mentioned in newspapers, media. You should boast about it, showcase to people those words that presence in media and provide value to them. Additionally, if you have social proof, if you have great UGC, don't be afraid to include them in the welcome series. Important for people to have that trust in you and get it from other people who previously purchased.
Mistake #3 - Thinking discounts will do the job
The third common mistake I see on the brands when it comes to the welcome series is not providing valuable content you might be aggressive, you might offer the welcome discount, and you think I gave them a discount? That should be enough for them to drive the conversion, but that it's not always the case. You want to educate the customer. You want to introduce them to your brand and show them why your product is important and how that will help them in their life. So make sure that you provide value to your new subscribers.
Mistake #4 - Mixing welcome series with regular campaigns
The fourth mistake is when you combine the welcome series flow with your regular cadence of campaigns. Mixing those two not only dilutes the meaning and the goal of your welcome series, but it also confuses your first subscriber. To avoid that, make sure that you exclude anyone who subscribed to your welcome series from your regular campaigns.
So, how many should you have in a welcome series?
A minimum of four to five emails.
But, it really depends from one brand to another. If you have a lot of content, if you can provide people with value, then go for it. Additionally, you can also add your best performing campaigns in your welcome series. Now let's get into the nitty-gritty part.
What should your welcome series include? Here is a breakdown.:
Email #1 - Warm welcome email
Start with a friendly introduction thanking your subscriber for joining your community. Make them feel valued right away.
Email #2 - Brand story
Share your brand's journey, values and what sets you apart from your competition. This helps in building a personal connection.
Email #3 - Value proposition
Highlight what they can expect from your emails and from your brand. Exclusive offers valuable content Insider News make sure that you highlight these in the emails.
Email #4 - Social proof
Include testimonials, UGC reviews or case studies to build credibility and trust.
Email #5 - Engagement
Five, engagement email encourage them to follow you on social media. Encourage your subscribers to connect with your community outside the email marketing or check your blog if you have any valuable content to educate your customers.
Email #6 - Special discount
First give them a special discount or offer as a thank you for subscribing. This can incentivize their first purchase.
Email #7 - Hero product showcase
Showcase some of your best selling or new products to pique their interest or drive traffic to your website.
Email #8 - Personalization
Personalization and zero party data. If you collect zero party data through your opt in methods, try to personalize your welcome series and give your subscribers a more genuine way of connecting to your brand. Let's say you track what products someone is interested in, gender. You can use that information to personalize your welcome series and improve conversions.
How to create a welcome series on Klaviyo?
Let's start with the beginning. You first want to double check your trigger for the flow, so the trigger should be the main list. You your subscribers are added in your welcome series.
Another thing that you should triple check are your flow filters. You want to exclude anyone who places an order while going to the welcome series. You want to exclude anyone who started checkout while going to the welcome series because they will drop in the abandoned checkout flow. And also you want to exclude anyone who previously purchased from you because the welcome series should target new subscribers, not new purchasers
Okay, so that's the first thing. In this blog, we discussed about not missing your welcome flow with your regular cadence of campaigns.
Why is that important?
Because welcome series has its own goal. If you mix them with your regular campaigns, it dilutes the goal and it dilutes the importance and the messaging of the welcome series.
To do that, you should create a new profile property and update the profile property of unit subscribers. And I'm going to show you later on towards the end of this blog, how to update the profile property and how to exclude these subscribers from your campaigns.
First email
Let's move on to the first email. Okay, first email has a punchy headline that recognizes that someone is a new subscriber. New around here, but also highlighting the welcome offer. 20% off.
You want to highlight in the hero with a CTA above the fold scrolling down. We showcase the value proposition to people we welcome to our brand and we introduce them on our values and why the brand is a good fit for them.
Second email
Okay, second email social proof another important email in your welcome series flow Stack. We need to provide value to our new subscribers and add trust. How you can do that by adding genuine reviews from your previous customers. In this case, we use reviews from our best selling products, hero products that we know will drive conversions.
Third email
Number three, educational email. By this time, people still haven't purchased from a brand, meaning that they are still not convinced they should do so. If you have a quiz, drive people back to that page and help them in making the decision and help them in finding the right product for them. If you don't have a quiz app, use this email to educate your customers and guide them in finding the right product for them by asking questions such as:
- What is your skin type?
- Where do you live? Or.
- How young is your skin?
These questions will help people find the right product for them.
Fourth email
Number four, best selling products. Showcase people your best selling products, your hero items from the store. Highlight them in the hero and tell people why they are the best sellers. Use again reviews or highlight their unique selling points. It's important for people to find out what others have purchased and why they did so.
Fifth email
Number five is a qualitative research email. Not a lot of brands are doing it.
But this is a great addition to your welcome series because at this point people haven't purchased from you and the chances of them converting are slim to none. So why not ask them about their experience with your brand? Ask them why they didn't purchase.
You can use a plain text email coming from your customer support team asking them about the common reasons they haven't purchased. Was it our prices weren't sure about the products they should pick?
They were concerned about the quality of your products or there was something else. Redirect them back to a survey and have them answer these questions. This can boost your conversions on site or can help get answers that you didn't think about previously.
That could help increase the conversions not only on the email side, but can improve your whole business. The last thing that you need to do is to update the profile property that we set initially in the flow.
This will update the segment that you're going to create using these properties and make sure that it's regularly updated and it's close to the truth of their journey.
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