Posts by: Nikki Jones

How to Create Squeeze Pages That Convert with 5 Real-World Examples

26th January 2021 (updated 17th November 2022) | By Nikki Jones | 0 Comments

If growing your email database is top of the agenda for 2021, you need to start utilizing squeeze pages.

These particular type of landing pages are a great way to quickly build your email list in conjunction with other list growth solutions

If you’re completely new to squeeze pages, then this guide is perfect for you! We detail everything you there is to know about squeeze pages and look at some of the best examples from leading eCommerce brands, including PlayStation, Karen Millen, Subway, and others.

We will cover:

1. What is a squeeze page
– Squeeze page vs. landing page
– Squeeze page benefits
2. Real-world examples of eCommerce squeeze pages
3. Squeeze page design best practices
4. Best squeeze page builders

What is a squeeze page?

A squeeze page is a type of webpage that is used solely to collect contact data from website visitors. The page “squeezes” information, such as email address or phone number, by offering a single conversion action.

In order to persuade visitors to share their personal data, squeeze pages often feature some type of incentive: A special offer, discount, access to exclusive content or community.

Squeeze page vs landing page: What’s the difference?

In a nutshell, a squeeze page is a stripped-down version of a landing page. But it also serves a slightly different purpose:

A landing page is created to inform and can feature several conversion actions, eg: email opt-in, content download, product purchase, etc.
A squeeze page is created solely to generate email or SMS opt-ins.

Now, that doesn’t mean that a squeeze page equals a signup form. These pages still feature the typical elements of a landing page, such as heading, value proposition, social proof, etc.

What squeeze pages don’t usually offer is deeper navigation into the rest of the website. In other words, when you land on a squeeze page you have only two options: To convert or to exit. On a typical landing page, you’re allowed and even encouraged to navigate to other pages, including the website’s homepage.

Here’s a typical landing page layout:

Compare it to a typical squeeze page design: The latter contains a single call-to-action, does not offer deeper navigation, and puts all the focus on getting that email opt-in.

Do squeeze pages really work?

You may be wondering: But why wouldn’t I want to restrict visitors from navigating to other parts of my website?

The simple answer is that by eliminating distractions, such as links to other pages, you force the visitor to focus on the message and offer that’s in front of them right now.

As a business, of course, you need to make a conscious decision when to use squeeze pages and when are you better off with a typical landing page. The usage really depends on your campaign goals.

One such example could be a fashion brand that’s running a PPC campaign to draw attention to its newly launched newsletter. A typical landing page can feature the opt-in form, but it will also have lots of other distractions. So you’ll be better off optimizing the post-click experience to include a single conversion action: Get people subscribed to your newsletter.

Another scenario would be a wine merchant offering a free wine tasting guide as a download on their website. The download can surely be initiated via a single signup form or an email capture overlay, but chances are you need a bit more space to explain the value of downloading this free guide.

A squeeze page here serves the purpose of providing more details about the guide, and also effectively squeezing the desired information, i.e. email address, from the visitor.

5 real-world examples of eCommerce squeeze pages

Now that we’ve covered some theoretical scenarios for when squeeze pages can benefit eCommerce, let’s take a look at real-world examples. The below come from a variety of eCommerce brands: From beauty to fashion to electronics.

Malin+Goetz

As part of its Black Friday marketing strategy, beauty brand Malin+Goetz ran a giveaway campaign enticing people to “play their cards right,” or, in other words, unlock prizes by joining the brand’s mailing list. The prizes ranged from £5 off your next order to miniature samples.

The campaign was effectively promoted via multiple channels, from social media to email. It featured a responsive squeeze page that rendered well and was easy to use both on desktop and mobile.

Once the visitor has chosen their card and unlocked their prize, Malin+Goetz also sent a reminder email containing a unique code to redeem the prize. The email naturally includes a nudge to start shopping for the holidays with links to their best offers.

Notice how cohesive this entire campaign is across channels and devices. It’s simple yet effective, because the visual identity and the messaging stays embedded in the consumer’s mind.

Key takeaway from Malin+Goetz: Keep your squeeze page design cohesive with other assets, and copywriting to-the-point.

Karen Millen

Here’s another Black Friday example, only this time from the fashion industry.

A well-known retailer, Karen Millen, capitalized on the influx of peak season traffic by creating a squeeze page inviting people to sign up for Black Friday deals alerts and the possibility to win £500.

To add a sense of urgency and encourage users to sign up they have also added a live countdown timer to enforce the message of missing out. Again the design is simple with one email capture field.

Key takeaway from Karen Millen: Use interactive elements, such as countdown timers, to instill urgency.

Sony PlayStation

The launch of PlayStation 5 was a highly coveted event in the gamer community. Recognizing the high demand, Sony created a way for people to “register their interest” in the new console ahead of its official launch.

Whilst the squeeze page design is rather bare bones, this is still an effective way to collect customer data with little to no friction.

Key takeaway from PlayStation: Include enticing, high-quality imagery of your products.

Shavekit

Shavekit utilized a couple of smart engagement tactics to get their website visitors to convert. Besides their simple and straightforward homepage, the brand also uses a browse abandonment overlay to stop people from leaving their website.

This particular overlay leads the user to a perfectly-crafted squeeze page.

Shavekit use bright and attention-grabbing imagery and feature the sign-up form above the fold where it gets the most eyeballs.

They also break down the unique selling points of their product into easily digestible bits. Even at a glance, the visitor is receiving all the information they need to know that could tempt them into subscribing.

To persuade visitors further, Shavekit also makes sure to include social proof from real-life customer reviews, supported by their social media handles. Plus, a quick FAQ section aims to remove additional signup barriers.

Key takeaway from Shavekit: Include social proof (reviews, testimonials, trust badges, etc.) to instill trust in your visitors and make it easier for them to convert.

Subway

Finally, let’s take a look at a squeeze page that is geared towards SMS opt-in.

Subway wants to keep their customers engaged with their latest offers, and to do so, they’ve created a simple squeeze page to get people to sign up to SMS notifications.

Starting with a high-impact hero image that clearly explains the offer, to a further incentive (6-inch sub for $2.99) down the line, Subway makes it clear for people to opt-in.

Key takeaway from Subway: Make sure you include links to your Privacy Policy and T&Cs in case visitors want to double-check that their data is going to be handled safely.

How to design a high-impact squeeze page: Best practices

To make your squeeze page is highly converting and correctly optimized, there are some best practices to follow. Ensure your squeeze page includes:

1. An enticing value proposition. If visitors don’t feel that they will benefit from your offer, they won’t engage. Make sure your squeeze page makes the value proposition clear and enticing. Keep the details concise so that they’re quick to understand, but try and include as many persuasive or unique selling points as possible.

2. Social proof. Social proof can be included on squeeze pages to instill FOMO, or to reassure customers that the exchange is worth doing. Testimonials and reviews can be added that highlight happy customers’ feedback, as can social proof counters such as “X loyal members and counting,”, or “X people downloaded in the last 24 hours.”

3. Keep it brief. A squeeze page should only contain an encapsulating headline, three or four bullet points that highlight the benefits of your proposition, and a one or two field form designed to capture email addresses without distraction. Providing too much information and too many visuals can overload your visitors with information and be detrimental to your list building efforts.

5. Obvious CTA. Squeeze pages should contain no more than one call-to-action and it should be clear but also creative. You can opt for something simple like “Subscribe” but also for something a bit more whimsical, like “Join the VIPs.”

3 tools to help you create squeeze pages faster

InstaPage: InstaPage is a dedicated landing and squeeze page builder offering over 100 already made and highly optimized page templates. Pages are easily created with a drag and drop builder and items such as buttons, headlines, images and videos, and different length forms can all be added.

ClickFunnels: ClickFunnels gives various funnel options optimized for lead capture, sales, event, and even membership funnels. However, most notably ClickFunnels includes a Squeeze Page Funnel option. This option collects visitors’ email address, then directs them to a further Thank You page when sign up is completed. The editor is drag and drop, so the pages are simple to create and can contain customizable elements like headlines, images, input forms, and video widgets.

PageWiz: PageWiz is designed to be a versatile page builder that allows for the easy creation of various marketing pages including lead capture pages and landing pages. The landing pages come with pre-installed A/B testing tools, which supply real-time stats to help you identify which pages are converting. PageWiz stands out from the crowd with its built-in lead management system. A section dedicated to leads compiles leads generated from your page, as well as sending them to your chosen email service provider.

In conclusion

Squeeze pages are useful list building tools that can help eCommerce retailers capture email addresses in a way that overlays and pop-ups cannot.

Squeeze pages are versatile, meaning they can be deployed for a number of different campaigns. Merchants could set up a squeeze page to entice visitors to sign up for loyalty programs, just as travel agents could direct their audience to download supplementary guides.

Make sure the benefit of converting is clearly and concisely displayed, then ensure that you deliver on it once a visitor has entered their email address. Provided you offer something of value and you follow our tips, your squeeze page will elevate your conversions.

7 Steps to Creating a High-Converting Email Sign Up Form [+ Tips and Examples]

18th December 2020 (updated 31st March 2023) | By Nikki Jones | 0 Comments

An email sign up form is the first thing you need to consider when implementing a list building strategy for your business. Here we share 7 secrets that will help you create high-converting email forms and exponentially grow your subscriber base.

Across industries, the average email sign up rate varies between 1.95% and 4.77%. Whilst the numbers may seem small, there’s a lot that goes into making that 3% difference.

Factors such as the number of fields or the types of fields featured on an email form can make a huge difference in its conversion capacity. For example, Omnisend research suggests that sign up forms with three fields have the highest conversion rate averaging 10%. Similarly, forms that asked for an email and name converted higher (7.41%) than those with email and birthdate (5.73%) or email and gender (5.93%) fields.

These numbers simply go to show that how you present your email sign up form, and the information you ask for, really matters. If you haven’t been able to achieve success with your forms so far, don’t worry! We’ve got plenty more information to share – just keep on reading.

A quick recap…

? What is an email sign up form? An email sign up form is used to collect first-party customer data, most notably email address, name, phone number. This data is then used to provide relevant email communication from the brand to its subscribers.

The harsh truth is that the process of creating a sign up form can be as easy or as difficult as you’d like it to be.

On one hand, you can always use an embedded sign up form on your webpage footer. It’s not going to drive an incredible amount of new subscribers, but it’s quite an easy, nonintrusive way to get that occasional email into your database.

However, for a truly powerful email form that helps you increase conversion rate and gets your eCommerce store visitors excited about subscribing to your list, you will need to go the extra mile.

Not only does your form need to work from a technical standpoint, it needs to be visually appealing, trigger at the right time as to not irritate the user, offer an enticing value exchange, and also be trustworthy enough so that people don’t feel wary of handing over their personal information.

Below you’ll find our best practices for creating an email sign up form that converts.

1. Balance your form fields

We’ve already established that the number of form fields is an important factor in designing an effective email capture form. But how do you choose which fields to include and which ones to ditch?

The answer lies in your campaign goals.

For example, if your goal is to keep people updated with your company’s blog content, the only data that you really need is an email address.

However, as an eCommerce business, you might want to keep people updated with new product arrivals or recent promotions. In order to deliver personalized email communications, you’ll need more data than just an email address: The subscriber’s name, gender, location, category interest might all be super helpful.

Lastly, if you’re promoting a loyalty program to your returning customers and your sign up form ultimately leads to account creation, you might want to include additional fields that will help you personalize the loyalty program.

Here’s an example from Sephora. In order to sign up for its Beauty Insiders program, visitors need to input their first and last names, email address, phone number, birth date, ZIP code, and create a secure password.

One thing to caveat here is that while single-field email sign up forms generate more leads, longer forms tend to generate higher quality contacts. A prospect who is willing to fill in five or more fields is likely to have higher purchase intent and thus convert faster.

Fewer fields = higher volume of leads.
More fields = higher quality leads.

2. Provide value exchange

The vital part of any successful acquisition campaign: The value proposition. To make your website visitors hand over their precious personal data, you need to show them why it’s valuable to them.

Thankfully, eCommerce brands can approach this in several different ways. Your value props can range anywhere from small discounts, to convenient product notifications, exclusive community benefits, interesting content, and more.

Yieldify worked with the pizza behemoth Domino’s to create high-impact list building campaigns aimed specifically at new and abandoning website visitors.

Customers who were set to abandon their shopping cart were prompted with a 25% discount overlay that featured a single-field email sign up form. This simple tactic captured over 58,000 new email leads and increased Domino’s conversions by 13%.

Why such a success? Domino’s campaign not only featured a significant incentive, it was also timed perfectly to match the website visitor’s behavior. A person who was hesitant to convert in-session is now happy to do so and hand over their personal data in exchange for a juicy discount.

Always remember – you don’t have to sacrifice your margins to effectively grow an email list. Our internal data suggests that email sign up forms without a discount still have a decent 3.8% opt-in rate when compared against the slightly higher 5.9% opt-in rate of those with a discount.

Form with a discount = 5.9% CR
Form without a discount = 3.8% CR

3. Choose the right CTA

A great value proposition must be followed by a strong call-to-action. One way of crafting effective CTA phrases is to write them from your reader’s point of view, highlighting the instant benefit they’ll receive from acting.

Benefit-oriented power words such as create, explore, join, save, and upgrade can replace archaic click, submit, and subscribe. Consider changing plain call-to-actions like “Subscribe now” into engaging CTAs like “Get instant access” or “Save money now!”

See this creative example from our client Moscot. As a five generation family-owned business, they’ve chosen to make their call-to-action a bit more personal by inviting website visitors to “Join the family.”

You can also write in first-person to make the CTA buttons even more engaging. Instead of “Sign up” you could say “Sign me up!” or “Enroll me!”

Here’s an example from Mavi Jeans. The brand uses a Facebook Messenger integration to connect with its visitors on social media. The button copy says “Send this to me” speaking directly from the visitor’s perspective.

4. Create an eye-catching design

Email sign up forms don’t have to be void of creativity and limited to the confines of a box.

Unorthodox formats, eye-catching visuals, and interactive design elements, such as images or GIFs, can help break the ice between your business and the website visitor, especially if you can insert humor or brand personality. Here’s a (inconclusive) list of ideas on how to make your form designs really stick out:

Use interactive content, such as video or GIF in your form.
Use gamification, such as wheel of fortune or scratchcard elements.
Turn your form into a quiz.
Use transparency and shadows to make your form pop off the page.
Add social proof (eg. Join 10,000 subscribers) to instill trust.
Include drop-down menus and/or radio buttons to learn more about your subscribers.

5. Consider the overall user experience

Whilst it’s really important that your visitor sees your form, it’s also imperative that it doesn’t distract from the rest of the user experience.

Sign up forms that forcibly deter the visitors’ attention, for example by appearing as full-screen modals covering the content underneath, are often perceived as annoyances and therefore can do more harm than good.

At Yieldify, we always advise our clients to opt for a harmonious approach that compliments the customer journey. Here’s an example of how we did this working alongside Australian chef, Teresa Cutter, for her website The Healthy Chef.

When performing the initial website analysis and creating a customer journey map, our experts realized that The Healthy Chef’s blog content was highly engaging but rarely facilitated conversions. To make use of this premium spot without interfering with the content, we deployed a floating button campaign.

The button would appear at the bottom left corner of the screen offering a 10% off discount. Once clicked, the button would extend into an overlay. that featured an email sign up form. The subtle approach reached a 54% increase in email sign-ups!

The lesson here is to identify high engagement and conversion areas of your website and to think outside of the box with your email capture form placement.

6. Pick your timing

Just like the placement of your email form, the timing needs to be right too. The basic rule is: Don’t jump the gun. Email sign up forms that appear at inconvenient times can distract your visitors from performing higher value conversions, such as adding an item to the cart or finishing a purchase.

Here are some of the timing parameters available at Yieldify:

Upon page load, i.e. immediately when someone lands on a page.
Upon % of page scrolled, i.e. when someone scrolled a certain percentage of the page.
Upon time on page, i.e. when someone spent a certain amount of time on the page.
Upon click or hover, i.e. when someone interacts with a pre-defined element on the page.
Upon pages visited or number of sessions, i.e. when someone interacts with your site on multiple occasions.
Upon exit intent, i.e. when someone indicates they’re about to exit the page.
Upon rapid scroll, i.e. when someone quickly scrolls through your site (typically on mobile). See an example below…

In order to pick the timing that works for you, you will likely have to go back to your campaign goals. If you’re running a “welcome new users” campaign, then triggering the sign up form shortly after arrival makes sense. However, if your goal is to collect emails from highly engaged visitors, you’ll want to wait until they’ve browsed around a bit.

Similarly, if you want to incentivize visitors without hurting your margins, showing a form with a discount code only to visitors who are about to exit the page is the best way to go about it.

3-5 targeting criteria is the sweet spot for a high email submission rate.

7. Comply with privacy regulations

Privacy policies and mentions of other legalities can help your forms convert. In the age of GDPR, CAN-SPAM, and CASL users from Europe, the United States, and Canada come to rely on these acronyms to reassure them that their data will be handled confidentially and correctly.

Ensuring your forms and email practices are compliant can help remove barriers associated with handing over personal information. Make sure you get consent from your subscribers and offer them transparent ways to opt-out from marketing communications.

Madewell: Great call-to-action

Fashion eCommerce brand Madewell has many different list building tactics deployed on its website, but we’d like to pay attention to the humble embedded email sign up form located in the brand website’s footer.

The form is super clean with only one field. However, it brings extra personalization into the mix by asking subscribers to choose which product groups they’re mostly interested in: women’s, men’s, or both? But the main reason we chose this example is the headline, which acts as a call-to-action.

Madewell instills trust by stating they take “email-making very seriously” and go even further by linking to an email preference page, which allows subscribers to manage the communications they receive from the brand.

Kathy Kuo Home: Amazing incentive

As part of its holiday eCommerce marketing strategy, our client Kathy Kuo Home created an exciting 12-day giveaway. Complete with a custom landing page, the giveaway is also teased on the brand’s homepage using a subtle sticky notification.

This is an incredible strategy to supercharge your email list: It is topical, beautifully designed, and offers a set of amazing incentives in return. From a business perspective, this is also an effective way to keep your brand top of mind and introduce new subscribers to your product range.

Student.com: Perfect timing

Student housing provider Student.com makes great use of exit-intent technology to recover browse abandoners with a perfectly-timed email capture form.

The form has a strong call-to-action offering to alleviate the visitor’s pains by solving their accommodation needs: All they need to do is subscribe! The form also transparently showcases the subscription process by using a progress bar.

Liquid IV: Memorable design

Yieldify client, electrolyte drink mix manufacturer Liquid IV, does a great job at communicating the drop of their limited edition strawberry flavor by featuring it on the hero image and the email capture form as well.

Although simple in its format, the sign up form is beautifully designed with a high-quality background image showcasing the product and a contrasting call-to-action button that follows the brand design guidelines.

Now that we’ve covered the best practices and looked at some examples from innovative eCommerce brands, let’s see what are the easiest way to go about building an email sign up form. Generally, you can choose from the following options:

Form builders, such as Paperform or Typeform.
Email service providers, such as Klaviyo or MailChimp.
Fully-managed personalization solutions, such as Yieldify.

Form builders are great for businesses that are on a budget and want to test the waters before committing to a more fully-fledged list building tool. Similarly, lots of email service providers (ESPs) and customer relationship management software have native email sign up form builders.

Alternatively, if your business needs a more encompassing lead capture software solution that includes cutting-edge email personalization strategies, advanced integrations, data-rich analysis and reporting, a fully-managed service like Yieldify is a good way to go. Get in touch with our team to learn more!

Email lists are essential tools for any business. It’s the best way to reach your customer base, introduce them to your brand, sell products and foster long-term relationships. But to begin that process, you must get your email sign up form right.

At Yieldify, we’re witnessing the benefits of high-converting email forms first-hand. With the help of our lead capture software, our clients see an average of 10-25% database growth, with some reaching as much as 116% increase in the leads captured. Not to mention the increased AOV and CLV that email marketing brings over time.

We hope this article was useful and enables you to create super high-converting email sign up forms. If you want to test your email capture strategy further, take our quiz and get more tips on how to improve!

How to Use Content to Drive eCommerce Sales: 5 Tried and True Techniques

12th October 2020 (updated 16th November 2022) | By Nikki Jones | 0 Comments

Don’t let your content be drowned out by the competition. Here are five simple but effective techniques to create compelling eCommerce content that engages and converts your customers.

The internet has never been more important than it is now. The COVID-19 situation led to a massive increase in online sales, driving eCommerce platforms forward faster than ever: In three month’s time, U.S. eCommerce achieved 10 year’s worth of growth!

On the flip side, standing out from the competition has never been more important – or more difficult.

Some 24 years later, content is still the reigning king when it comes to standing out in a saturated market. And with eCommerce getting more crowded than ever before, quality eCommerce content is what can help you cut through the competition and straight into customers’ hearts (and pockets).

Using personalized content in your sales cycle is an effective method to persuade prospects into converting, customers into returning, and loyalists into promoting your business through word of mouth.

Keep reading, and you’ll find out what eCommerce content to create in order to drive more visitors to your website and effectively convert it into paying customers.

5 types of eCommerce content that boosts traffic and sales

1. Educational content

Educational content is arguably the most important type of eCommerce content your business can create. Why? Because it allows you to answer audience questions about your brand and products before they are even asked: Why is your product better than others? How much does it cost? What are the benefits it provides?

But before you can create good educational content, you have to figure out what your visitors want to know.

Search Engines such as Google or Bing can provide these answers in related search phrases or commonly asked questions sections that appear when you search for your target keyword.

Let’s say you type in a search query “button-down shirt” – the SERP will show related searches, such as “button-up shirt vs button-down shirt” and “button-down shirt meaning.” What this tells you is that people want to know the difference between button-up and button-down shirts, as well as the origin of the term. Use this knowledge to create content that answers these queries and positions your business as a problem-solver in the customer’s psyche.

Alternatively, sites such as Answer the Public, an online keyword tool that collates autocomplete data from various search engines, can present relevant phrases and questions users are searching around your keyword.

In fact, when it comes to educational content, the playing field is vast and far-reaching. You can write texts, shoot videos, draw illustrations, etc. Each has positive and negative sides, so the best approach is to mix things up. Below are some of the most popular types of educational eCommerce content that your business can make use of:

Text-based educational content

Text-based content is the most common way of informing customers about products and their uses. You can’t sell anything without some form of textual content: Product name, description, care guidelines, etc.

The length and breadth of the text usually depend on the product itself. For example:

If you’re selling white goods (various home appliances and other electrical goods), lengthy poetic texts aren’t going to get you anywhere. All your customers want to see are product specifications, price, customer ratings, potentially some kind of comparison chart;
Whereas if clothes are being sold, feel free to include descriptions that highlight the product’s comfort, unique design details, various styling options, real-life examples from customers who purchased in the past, etc.

The ultimate goal of educational eCommerce content is to provide more details about the product, how it works, and its benefits. A great example is ProFlowers – a US-based flower retailer who created an entire Florapedia® to provide their customers with in-depth flower guides.

Included in the Florapedia is their 151 Types of Flowers Common in the U.S. list complete with images, seasonality, soil needs, and more. When you hear marketers reference high-quality content this by far is one of the best examples to illustrate what they mean!

The results of this piece of content speak for themselves as well. A quick look into Ahrefs shows this piece bringing in over 16,000 visits every month.

Visual content (photos and images)

We all know the old saying about an image being worth a thousand words. The same applies to content marketing. Attention-grabbing product images can attract new customers right away, while the text provides more information.

About 60% of customers are attracted to images or presentations showing why they need the product and how it helps. This is because, according to research undertaken by the conglomerate corporation 3M, visuals are processed 60,000 times faster than text. This allows your storytelling to gain speed, potentially helping consumers to move through their decision making faster.

A fine example of this is outdoor brand Jack Wolfskin who uses high-quality shots of their clothing items in action accompanied by clear product photography showcasing the item in more detail. This allows customers to picture themselves owning the item, as well as research their unique qualities.

Infographics

Infographics are really a mix of text-based content and images. They are perfect for reaching out to a specific niche audience by showing statistical data, timelines, trends, and tutorials. Infographics provide relevant information that is easily shared across other websites and social media. You should aim to make infographics around topics and questions related to your industry. These can address common myths, or even tips that can help potential customers.

Take a look at this example from Dreams, a UK supplier of beds, mattresses, and other sleep equipment. The infographic highlights common problems people face whilst trying to get to sleep and provides actionable tips to overcome these.

Video content

Videos are still a big thing in digital marketing. Technology giant Cisco projected that by the year 2022, online video will be responsible for 82% of all consumer internet traffic – 15 times higher than the amount in 2017. Their predictions are only supported by findings from Hubspot, who discovered that 72% of customers would rather learn about a product or service by watching a video.

Their reason for becoming one of the most used methods of promoting products in the near future may be related to research undertaken by Insivia which also revealed that video viewers retain 95% of a message when watching it in a video, compared to retaining 10% when reading it in a text. As video content is easily shareable across all platforms, it possesses the power to captivate people for extended amounts of time.

Primarily, eCommerce videos allow you to quickly inform customers about your products and offers, nudging them to purchase without thinking twice. However, other benefits of eCommerce video marketing include their ability to drive organic traffic if they are optimized correctly for search engines.

According to the animation studio Moovly, if a video is embedded on your website you’re 53 times more likely to rank on the first page of Google. As YouTube is also now owned by Google, uploading the right content and ensuring to have an engaging thumbnail and search-optimized titles can send traffic back to your website provided you have put the link in its description.

See UK-based folding bike manufacturer Brompton. These guys have completely occupied the top results by answering a query that’s crucial for their businesses: “fold a brompton.”

For eCommerce websites especially, videos also serve as vital tools in helping to build trust. Explanatory videos alleviate consumer fears regarding the quality of the product by allowing viewers to vicariously experience its usages and benefits, helping to sway them to a purchasing decision.

One company that does this particularly well is Yieldify client cosmetics brand Milk Makeup with their subscriber count sitting at an impressive 92K. Their makeup tutorials go down pretty well with most clearing the 20k view mark. You can see a great example of an informative and engaging video below:

Driving traffic to your website is vital in ensuring eCommerce sales. Whether the traffic is paid or organic, without it, your website will not be visited by potential new customers, let alone convert.

For small retailers, organic traffic is of greatest importance because the costs associated with it are zero to none. How?

Well, to get organic traffic up you’ll obviously need to invest in some SEO tools, such as Ahrefs or Moz, maybe an SEO agency or a freelance specialist, outsource some content creation if you don’t have the resources in-house. However, the achievements gained from search engine optimization are long-lasting and don’t require an additional budget to support them.

On the contrary, a paid advertising campaign is only effective until it’s running. This means you only get exposure when you throw money at it – whereas with SEO you get money long after the initial investment.

To climb Google’s rankings, your eCommerce content must be optimized in such a way that when visitors type your target keywords into Google, your eCommerce site appears. In the beginning it can be a trial and error process, but some tips to help you increase organic traffic are:

Optimizing landing page text, website copy, blog content, and product descriptions for long-tail keywords;
Adding optimized alt-text to any product or site images;
Optimizing page meta titles and descriptions;
Adding well-written user-generated content to product pages;
Writing blogs around popular search queries;
Adding schema markup to product and landing pages.

Below we’ll detail two good examples of websites with high organic traffic. First, we have Gymshark. Gymshark is one of the fastest-growing and well-known brands within the fitness industry. Their core target market is those living an active lifestyle.

Whilst their primary target keywords may be queries such as “mens gym clothing” or “womens gym leggings,” Gymshark doesn’t limit itself to these keywords alone. As you can see below their blog section drives a considerable amount of traffic, according to Ahrefs.

As part of Gymshark’s content strategy, they target anyone who shows they are into health and fitness. You can see some examples below.

Targeting people who search for these keywords allows Gymshark to reach their target audience, provide valuable content, and build brand awareness. While these users may not purchase on their first visit, they can be retargeted with social media ads or subscribe to a newsletter and receive email nurture sequences that will nudge them to convert later.

Our second example comes from Best Buy. Their Canadian website has its own blog subdomain that targets non-commercial keywords that Best Buy’s target audience is searching for. As you can see below it also drives a large amount of organic traffic.

A lesson to take from both of these examples is to explore your niche and think of as much content as possible around it. As you can see, when you finally optimize everything, your organic traffic can provide results you never thought possible and drive 1 ,000% more traffic than organic social media.

3. Gated content

Gated content is content that requires any form of information submission in order to unlock it. This usually means that visitors have to leave their email address to access content that is otherwise unavailable, i..e behind a gate.

Gated content is widely used as a B2B lead generation tactic in the form of whitepapers, eBooks, reports, etc. But it might as well be utilized by B2C retailers. In fact, all those “Subscribe to get $10 off” messages can be treated as gated content in the context of eCommerce.

In terms of eBooks, this could also link back to the informational content we mentioned earlier. Creating a product guide, or a how-to eBook could be a great way to collect customers’ email addresses and build your email list. It’s also pretty simple to do using a PDF creation tool, you’ll just need to make sure the content is good!

Another way to deploy gated eCommerce content on your site is to invite customers to pre-order something. Pre-ordering is a popular tactic among musicians and brands, especially those releasing limited edition vinyl records. However, recently fashion and beauty retailers have started utilizing the pre-ordering tactic as well. Here’s an example from Typology Paris:

4. Curated and user-generated content

The content that you create about your brand, products, and services can only go so far. You need real, unbiased opinions from your customers or subject matter experts to prove the true value that your business brings.

Curated content is perfect for that. Curated content comes in many different forms: From user-generated content (UGC) like photographs, video reviews, and testimonials to magazine features, guest interviews, etc. Depending on the format, you can republish this content on your company blog, reshare on social media accounts, include in email sequences, and more.

Two great examples of curated content campaigns come from Apple and J.Crew. Both of them utilized branded hashtags and took user-generated content to another level: Apple with its #ShotOniPhone campaign that’s turned into an annual contest, and J.Crew with its #NationalStripesDay that is now bigger than the brand itself.

6. Content advertising

The concept of content advertising is commonly confused with content marketing and content strategy. However, content advertising has to do with the promotion of the content rather than its creation.

E-commerce businesses can choose to promote their content through PPC (pay-per-click) advertising options offered by Facebook Ads, Google Ads, Google Display Network, AdSense, and so on.

It’s a good way to nurture prospects without being too pushy. By using tracking pixels to know when somebody landed on your website, you can create retargeting ads and serve relevant content until the person is ready to make a purchase with you.

Target is a brand that does this quite often. Besides retargeting customers with the products they viewed, they also run content advertising campaigns promoting useful assets, such as the Stroller Guide in the example below:

In conclusion

There are dozens of methods you can use to increase sales, but they all come down to promotion, sharing, and advertisement. To run a successful eCommerce business, you must first gain the trust of as many clients as possible, and after that, your website will be self-sustaining, and it will generate its own traffic.

You must take care of every step in the buying and selling process to increase sales and make your brand stand out in the crowd. Connect with other websites, including high-authority resources that prove your claims, and watch as your sales go up at a steady pace. Utilize everything you can to spread the word about your product, and success will follow!

Behavioral Segmentation Defined with 4 Real-Life Examples

9th September 2020 (updated 31st March 2023) | By Nikki Jones | 0 Comments

Behavioral segmentation definition and examples

What is behavioral segmentation and why is it important to your eCommerce business?

Let’s answer this question and define some key behavioral segmentation examples.

Marketing Segmentation has always been a key component of the most effective marketing strategies. Dividing customers into smaller groups based on their needs and actions ensures you are best placed to efficiently solve their problems and in turn, sell more of your products.

Whilst understanding information such as your average customer’s location, age, and gender are essential first steps to begin addressing those needs, sometimes it is necessary to go one step further.

Leveraging other useful customer metrics like behavioral data can help you identify how your customers interact with your business.

For example, behavioral segmentation can answer questions like How many times they visit your online store before purchasing?; or Which promotional message – a discount code or a free shipping guarantee – is more likely to nudge them towards a higher-value purchase?

This level of insight is what makes behavioral segmentation a must-have marketing strategy for eCommerce businesses. In this post we’ll cover:

1. Behavioral segmentation definition
2. Behavioral segmentation benefits
3. Four main types of behavioral segmentation
– Purchase behavior
– Occasion and timing
– Benefits sought
– Customer loyalty
4. Behavioral segmentation examples
5. Other types of behavioral segmentation
– Customer journey stage
– Engagement
– Satisfaction
Conclusion

What is behavioral segmentation?

Behavioral segmentation refers to a process in marketing which divides customers into segments depending on their behavior patterns when interacting with a particular business or website.

These segments could include grouping customers by:

Their attitude toward your product, brand or service;
Their use of your product or service,
Their overall knowledge of your brand and your brand’s products,
Their purchasing tendencies, such as buying on special occasions like birthdays or holidays only, etc.

Going beyond the traditional demographic and geographic segmentation methods and utilizing behavioral data allows for the execution of more successful marketing campaigns.

At the very least, behavioral segmentation offers marketers and business owners a more complete understanding of their audience, thus enabling them to tailor products or services to specific customer needs. Below we take a look at four more benefits of behavioral segmentation.

Why is behavioral segmentation so important?

Identifies the most engaged users. Being able to filter existing customers and potential prospects that display highest levels of engagement – for example, those regularly opening your emails, or spend the most time with your product pages – enables marketers to make more informed decisions on how and where to best allocate time, budget, and resources. In return, this makes your marketing more cost-effective, as you’re not burning through budget trying to warm up predominantly cold leads. You can focus on those most likely to make a purchase.

Improves messaging accuracy. Behavioral segmentation allows marketers to optimize their positioning and marketing messages toward the customer data at hand. Imagine you’ve already identified that 24-35-year-olds are the most active segment on your fashion eCommerce store. Behavioral segmentation allows you to enrich this demographic data by splitting the segment based on their interests and preferences, such as “interested in activewear” vs “interested in formal attire,” or “one-time shopper” vs “wardrobe overhauler.”

Provides refined personalized experiences. To provide a sense of brand persona and uniqueness, deeply analyzing your audience and resonating with customer needs, wants, concerns, and demands can make noticeable differences. Specifically, personalized approaches, such as displaying complementary products on the website or sending an upsell email after a recent purchase can not only lower bounce rate, reduce cart abandonment, or speed up the purchasing process, but also cement customer loyalty.

Builds brand loyalty. Customers who feel they are being attended to throughout their customer journey will instinctively favor the brand over competitors. Behavioral segmentation enables eCommerce businesses to reach extraordinary levels of customer satisfaction & retention, increase customer lifetime value, and boost long-term revenue. All due to increased targeting accuracy and higher levels of personalization.

What are the 4 types of behavioral segmentation?

There are four main types of behavioral segmentation that help form a complete customer profile throughout their buying journey. Each nuance provides actionable insights, which can be embedded in a variety of marketing channels and encourage customers to act on their purchase decisions.

You can break these down into four main behavioral segments.

1. Segmentation based on purchase and usage behavior

Segmenting by purchase behavior disentangles the varying trends and behavior patterns that customers have when making a purchase decision.

This form of behavioral segmentation provides insight into the buying stage that your customer might be in, their role in the purchasing process, the obstacles they are facing, the incentives they’re most likely to respond to and much more.

For example, customers who prefer to undertake research will often turn to search engines or reviews to be assured they are making the right decision purchasing from you, whilst customers that are particularly thrifty may only interact with your brand or product when on sale.

Ultimately, both of these customer types can fall into the same product affinity category. However, targeting all of them with the same marketing materials and messaging is destined to waste resources. The aforementioned careful consumer may not respond to discount promotions in the same manner as the thrifty one.

This is where segmenting by purchase behavior comes in. You can break these behaviors down into categories depending on:

How many interactions with your business does a customer need before proceeding to conversion;
What search queries a customer used to locate your brand, product or service;
What questions a customer asks when using a live chat or virtual assistant; etc.

Knowing this information allows you to respond to your customer’s needs in a relevant manner.

For example, customers who are in the research phase and are likely to leave to compare prices could be retargeted with a “best price” or “price match” guarantee. Alternatively, a shopper that is keen on social proof and buys in accordance with popularity trends could be targeted with a message suggesting that the item is in high demand, and moving fast.

2. Occasion or timing-based segmentation

Occasion-based segmentation categorizes customers who are most likely to interact with your brand or purchase from your website on either specific occasions or set times.

Occasions could include national holidays like Labor Day, a holiday season like Thanksgiving or Christmas, or life occasions, such as a wedding, new house, or vacation.

Occasion-based purchasing can also occur in a customer’s daily routine. Purchases like a happy hour round of drinks after work and a caffeinated morning drink are all types of occasion-based purchases as they are only bought at precise times.

Grouping customers using this form of segmentation involves monitoring a customer’s purchasing behavior to establish a pattern so that you preempt the targeting process.

For example, if your store has customers that participate yearly in your Thanksgiving promotions, but do not buy anything else from you throughout the year, you can use this information to market to the customer in weeks in advance.

3. Benefits sought segmentation

Segmenting by benefits sought refers to dividing your audience based on the unique value proposition your customer is looking to gain from your product or service.

Let us explain further. When we make purchases, we do so based on the belief that we will receive a certain value or benefit from using the product or service.

Even when purchasing something as mundane as toothpaste, we lean towards different value propositions: Some may be looking for whitening benefits while others seek comfort to their sensitive gums. Dividing consumers based on these factors embodies the benefits sought segmentation.

Grouping your data by benefits sought helps you narrow down the specifics of what drives customer purchases, revealing which product feature or service aspect they feel most attuned to. Divide data by these benefit categories when using this form of behavioral segmentation:

Quality: What makes your product better than your competitors?
Usage: How will it benefit your customer when they use it?
Customer Feedback: Are your customers happy with the product or service, or are there areas for improvement?
USPs: What makes your product unique from other already existing products?
Additional Benefits: Are there other advantages a customer could receive from purchasing your products or services?

4. Segmentation based on customer loyalty

Loyalty-based segmentation measures the level of loyalty a customer has with your brand, either through a rewards program, number of purchases, or general engagement with your marketing efforts.

Using loyalty-based behavioral segmentation helps you to zero in on existing repeat customers, their needs, behavior patterns, and more. Besides generating repeat revenue from your business, loyal customers are incredibly useful in terms of referrals, word of mouth, and feedback.

Extracting valuable information from this segment can help you optimize future campaigns, improve your value proposition, strengthen positioning, and more. Consider identifying factors such as:

What the key behaviors were throughout the customer journey that nurtured loyalty;
Which customers are the most appropriate or ideal type for loyalty programs;
What factors are most essential in keeping those segments of customers happy;
Which ways value received from loyal customers can be maximized.

The most common examples of customer loyalty segmentation can be reflected in the travel industry which regularly promotes frequent flier programs and the finance industry who offer rewards for big-spending platinum credit card members.

Behavioral segmentation examples for eCommerce

When used effectively, behavioral segmentation can produce astounding results, transforming previously cold leads or customers into newly engaged and retained ones. Here we list some real-life examples, so you can see behavioral segmentation at its subtle, very best.

Usage behavior: BabyCentre UK

Part of the Johnson & Johnson multinational corporation, BabyCentre UK is a pregnancy and childcare resource located in the United Kingdom. The company uses a Facebook Messenger app to suggest personalized advice and make targeted recommendations based on the input that it receives from the user, through a series of questions and answers.

For example in the promotional images above, when the parent selects weaning as the problem they are encountering, the BabyCentre app engages the user by giving them a list of signs to look out for, as well as then suggesting recipes for when the child is ready for solid food.

This tailored experience provides BabyCentre with actionable data that it can use to segment the user by the information obtained through their selections: For example, their child falling into an age category that experiences weaning. Categorizing by this data can help target the customer with repeat, relevant information – such as recipe guides or other helpful advice.

When Babycentre investigated what drove the highest levels of traffic to its website – the chatbot or email marketing – it revealed that the messenger bot recorded a read rate of 84% and click-through rate (CTR) of 53%. Together the stats made for an overall engagement rate that was 1,428% higher than its email funnel, adding further evidence to how effective segmentation can be when categorized correctly.

Occasion-based: Guinness

One out the box example of occasion-based purchasing segmentation came from a campaign initiated last year by famous Irish stout manufacturer, Guinness.

Guinness gives their brand name to sponsor the Guinness Six Nations Rugby Cup each year and regularly experience sales boosts through fans purchasing their drinks to complement the matches.

However, with industry stats showing that 6.1 million people now actively choose not to consume alcohol, Guinness wanted to find a way to diversify their marketing strategy to appeal to those who don’t drink, whilst also aiming to retain previously existing customers, and those most likely to purchase again from them throughout the time of the tournament.

So, just before the Rugby Tournament was due to begin they aired a 30-second advertisement advertising their new product: Guinness Clear.

The campaign used slogans such as “Make it a night you’ll remember,” and “Sometimes less is more” while alluding to the brand new ingredient of H20. The campaign reached 21 million people and immediately generated global media attention, with customers confused as to whether the product was a new product, or whether it was just water – which in the end, it turned out it was.

This process of segmentation worked across multiple audiences. For existing loyal customers, they immediately flooded manufacturers with questions as to where they could purchase the product, whilst those consumers that Guinness knew were more likely to buy, but only in conjunction with the event, were also targeted with a timely reminder of their brand to be enticed once again into purchasing.

Additionally, it had the potential to acquire any new or occasional drinkers who could be won over by a creative marketing campaign.

Benefits-sought: Olay

American skincare brand Olay used benefits sought behavioral segmentation when creating its Skin Advisor. The artificial intelligence beauty tool collects data from customers by asking them five to seven quick questions about their skin. The advisor then reveals the true age of the customer’s skin, and recommend products accordingly.

By asking the customer questions based around their skincare routine, and their preferences, Olay can collate data that can influence its product development, allowing the brand to bring out products that are most sought after and most relevant to their customers.

For example, through its Skin Advisor app, Olay gleaned that a large percentage of its consumer base wanted fragrance free products. Originally, these products were not even considered by Olay’s development team, but they were then able to be actioned for manufacturing.

Olay did the same when data from the Advisor revealed that many customers were seeking Retinol based products, and the subsequent lack of Retinol products in its range was contributing to the brand losing custom. In response, Olay released Retinol 24 which has gone on to be one of the brand’s best selling products and which helped to completely transform their sales.

Loyalty-based: DavidsTea

Another behavioral segmentation example is that of DavidsTea who uses behavioral segmentation in their loyalty programs.

DavidsTea is a Canadian specialty tea seller who wanted a fun way to personalize their messaging to their most valued customers. Their timeline style emails won general applause across the internet and are ranked as one of the best email marketing examples, ever.

As the above screenshot shows, when a customer reaches a specific anniversary with the company, they receive a “look back” email that contains data such as where their first purchase took place and uses the recording of data such as their most purchased teas to give a fun, by weight, comparison.

By receiving this email the customer feels unique and valued throughout their customer journey and will be more inclined to continue purchasing.

Other types of behavioral segmentation

Whilst we have covered the four main types of behavioral segmentation, there are other strategies that encompass different behavioral segments. These include:

Segmentation based on customer journey stage

A customer’s buying journey develops in four main stages, which make up the widely known AIDA model. The AIDA model recognizes this process of deliberation as a sequence of 4 steps:

Attention: The consumer becomes aware of the brand, product, or service.
Interest: The consumer’s curiosity develops into a deeper interest.
Desire: The consumer starts imagining the product in their everyday lives.
Action: The consumer is ready to purchase.

It’s important to note the eCommerce buyer’s journey doesn’t end with the purchase. After the initial conversion follow Adoption (your customer makes repeated, regular purchases) and Advocacy (your customer becomes a loyal supporter of your brand, product, or service, frequently purchasing and actively promoting you by word of mouth, social proof, etc.).

Segmenting by the customer journey optimization opportunities gives direction to your business objectives: To pull customers into the attention stage you’ll need strong advertising campaigns, media coverage, influencer support, and all that jazz.

However, to nudge customers from desire to purchase you’ll need well-positioned USPs, clear and informative FAQs, associative product imagery, and good website UX. Not to forget that 8 in 10 customers often leave products in their cart, strong remarketing campaigns via email, SMS, or browser will also come in handy.

Our client, Vinomofo, used this type of segmentation to develop a strategy that targeted specific audiences including new, returning visitors, returning clients, and more. New visitors were served with a $15 off incentive, whereas returning clients saw premium services depending on their basket value. Check out the Vinomofo case study in full to learn about the results!

All in all, gaining a comprehensive idea of the stage your customer is in, as well as the touchpoints they interact with, allows you to provide more relevant and timely communication that can lead to higher conversion rates.

Segmentation based on engagement

Customer engagement can be categorized by three levels:

Occasional: Customers sometimes have contact with your brand, product, or service but not regularly.
Regular: Customers regularly interact with your products or services, but fail to use them to the full extent.
Intensive: Your products or services are embedded in your customer’s life and they buy from you at any opportunity.

Just like customer journey stage segmentation, grouping customers based on their engagement levels can also help you to understand the reasons why their behavior falls into the appropriate category.

For occasional customers, surveys could be a useful tool in determining whether they lack the motivation or trust to purchase. Providing regular customers with marketing material that highlights all the features of your product or service may display changes in their behavior. Those who are intensive advocates of your product or service could benefit from loyalty or reward schemes in order to retain their custom and incentivize further word-of-mouth marketing.

Use this information accordingly and adjust both your marketing messages and strategies to appeal to each segment. This will aid customer retention by dividing the relevant materials between those engaged, and those unengaged, and ultimately help to reduce churn.

Segmentation based on satisfaction

Behavioral segmentation based on satisfaction is the most straightforward of them all. Utilizing customer feedback can help you to enhance your product or service by understanding which features your customers most desire, or which could help you edge ahead of competitors.

Use marketing tools like surveys and offer incentives for completing the feedback such as a discount off of their next purchase. These will be worth it in the long run.

In conclusion

Behavioral segmentation is a vital part of any marketing strategy, and implemented in one of the above methods can display data trends and insights that you may have otherwise never have uncovered.

By understanding customer behavior you can use this to improve performance across other channels such as email marketing, SMS marketing, social media marketing, and chatbot marketing to diversify your results.

By segmenting your users by their behavioral data, you gain a more comprehensive look at how you can adjust your messaging, brand, marketing materials, and ultimately products or services in order to stay ahead of the competition and reduce your customer churn.

Behavioral segmentation FAQ:

What is behavioral segmentation?

Behavioral segmentation refers to a marketing segmentation process in which customers are divided by their behavior patterns when interacting with a business.

What are the four types of behavioral segmentation?

The four main types of behavioral segmentation are based around purchase behavior, occasion-based purchases, benefits sought, and customer loyalty.

What is an example of behavioral segmentation?

Examples of behavioral segmentation include loyalty programs, happy hour events, survey collection, and recommendations, such as possible travel destinations, or ancillary products.

We will cover:

What is a squeeze page?

Squeeze page vs landing page: What’s the difference?

Do squeeze pages really work?

5 real-world examples of eCommerce squeeze pages

Malin+Goetz

Karen Millen

Sony PlayStation

Shavekit

Subway

How to design a high-impact squeeze page: Best practices

3 tools to help you create squeeze pages faster

In conclusion

A quick recap…

7 steps to a high-converting email sign up form template

1. Balance your form fields

2. Provide value exchange

3. Choose the right CTA

4. Create an eye-catching design

5. Consider the overall user experience

6. Pick your timing

7. Comply with privacy regulations

Get inspired! 4 email sign up form examples from eCommerce brands

Madewell: Great call-to-action

Kathy Kuo Home: Amazing incentive

Student.com: Perfect timing

Liquid IV: Memorable design

How to build an email sign up form?

In summary: Why nailing your email sign up forms is so important

5 types of eCommerce content that boosts traffic and sales

1. Educational content

Text-based educational content

Visual content (photos and images)

Infographics

Video content

2. SEO content

3. Gated content

4. Curated and user-generated content

6. Content advertising

In conclusion

What is behavioral segmentation?

Why is behavioral segmentation so important?

What are the 4 types of behavioral segmentation?

1. Segmentation based on purchase and usage behavior

2. Occasion or timing-based segmentation

3. Benefits sought segmentation

4. Segmentation based on customer loyalty

Behavioral segmentation examples for eCommerce

Usage behavior: BabyCentre UK

Occasion-based: Guinness

Benefits-sought: Olay

Loyalty-based: DavidsTea

Other types of behavioral segmentation

Segmentation based on customer journey stage

Segmentation based on engagement

Segmentation based on satisfaction

In conclusion

Behavioral segmentation FAQ: