E-commerce: $100k in one hour

[JasonR]

I wanted to share something very cool, and very actionable for all the e-com guys here. This doesn't work if you don't have a business or an email/customer list, but it works like CRAZY if:
You don't abuse your e-mail list
You email often (value driven, you just don't hammer campaigns/sales emails out)
You don't run promotions often .

First, results.

We did about $94k in ONE HOUR (just shy of $100k, hehe), BUT our total for the day ended up at $108,000. Check the Shopify screenshot. Feels good to get an over $100k deposit in your bank account for one day of sales!

We ran a 20% off our entire website for ONE HOUR only. We don't run promotions often, as we believe it dilutes your brand over time. We sell high dollar widgets (over $500) with lower-dollar accessory widgets that compliment the high dollar ones. So here was our strategy:

We announced our intention of the sale 5 days in advance. We included calendar links in the email. We made sure to reinforce that: 1) we very, very rarely do this and 2) the sale will be honored for one hour only, so be prepared.

We excluded anyone who bought a high dollar widget in the last 6 months. If they bought a high dollar widget, we sent them a separate email campaign on 20% off all accessory, lower-priced widgets.

We emailed them 3 days before the sale with a reminder and in our weekly blog post (content) promotion spot.

We sent this to 17,269 email subscribers (some customers, some not)

We reminded them a day before the sale via email.

We reminded them again, the morning of.

We then emailed them for the sale at kick off.

We emailed them one more time at the 30 minute mark "Last Chance"

We also designed the sale around peak traffic time on Sundays (specifically a weekend so fewer people will be at work).

We offered no phone support at this time (our phone is active M-F).

We were hoping for $50k, and we blew past that! Ended up at $108,000 for the day. That's about $6.25 per email subscriber (for the e-mail marketing geeks out there).

We used Klaviyo for our email campaigns. We heavily segment our customers based on a variety of factors - so our list has already been pruned and engaged for a long time.

If you use this technique/sale, post your results!

Disclaimer: this was not my own unique idea. I got the idea from a private forum, but I wanted to share our results with you.

We are now planning to do something like this at least two times a year but no more than three times. Again, you don't want to train customers to wait for sales and discount your brand. A further note, we've been running our business for about three years, so don't expect this to work at your one-month old e-com start up.

 

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[MJ DeMarco]

I remember I did something similar with a value add in my business. It was a "digital certification" which gave advertisers a reward badge, and elevated their presence on the website. Earned thousands in a matter of hours upon release.

In fact, it was one of the eye-opening, jaw dropping moments behind Fastlane mathematics.

Of course as others have mentioned, there is a big process before the event... you need a growing company with an existing list to deploy.

Marked Notable. Thanks for sharing @JasonR

 

[Tiago]

This is awesome, thank you for sharing Jason. I hope people see the last sentence you wrote and remind themselves that a three year process led to this event.

 

[JasonR]

What do you mean with "regular basis"? Like once a week?

What's your strategy to have people reading your content on a regular basis? (If you have a specific approach to provide people with quality content).

First, we continually write USEFUL content. Think of things like "How to" guides, location guides, and 10 Best Widget guides. Articles that are actually useful and want to be read. We do this to rank organically (SEO) and we also email these articles.

Here's an example of our weekly campaign strategy:

Key:
(OEW = Ordered Expensive Widget)


(DNOEW = Did Not Order Expensive widget)
Tuesdays: x2 campaigns sent at same time
Content: Blog campaign
x1 email sent to OWE segment
x1 email sent to DNOWE segment

Purpose: Provide value, plug different products at the bottom of the email based on purchase history.
>> i.e. DNOWE gets an Expensive Widget at bottom of email, OEW gets an accessory at bottom of email

Thursdays: x2 campaigns sent at same time
Content: Promotional campaign
x1 email sent to OEW segment
x1 email sent to DNOEW segment
Purpose: Send DNOEW an Expensive Widget, send OEW an accessory/collection

Note: Sometimes these emails are not segmented by audience i.e. new product launch, items that appeal to both audiences, etc

Sundays: x2 campaigns sent at same time
Content: Promotional campaign
x1 email sent to OEW segment
x1 email sent to DNOEW segment
Purpose: Send OEW an Expensive Widget, send DNOWE an accessory/collection
Note: Sometimes these emails are not segmented by audience i.e. new product launch, items that appeal to both audiences

This is our campaign strategy. We have a lot of other "flows" (abandoned cart, abandoned collection, started order, etc.) that also drive quite a bit of revenue

I've also attached a screenshot of our "Flows" for the past year - which also drive a lot of revenue. You can see even in simple emails (order confirmation) we aim to drive revenue from each e-mail (without being too pushy).

 

[Simon Angel]

I wanted to share something very cool, and very actionable for all the e-com guys here. This doesn't work if you don't have a business or an email/customer list, but it works like CRAZY if:
You don't abuse your e-mail list
You email often (value drive, you just don't hammer campaigns/sales emails out)
You don't run promotions often .

First, results.

We did about $84k-89k in ONE HOUR (just shy of $100k, hehe), BUT our total for the day ended up at $108,000. Check the Shopify screenshot. Feels good to get an over $100k deposit in your bank account for one day of sales!

We ran a 20% off our entire website for ONE HOUR only. We don't run promotions often, as we believe it dilutes your brand over time. We sell high dollar widgets (over $500) with lower-dollar accessory widgets that compliment the high dollar ones. So here was our strategy:

We announced our intention of the sale 5 days in advance. We included calendar links in the email. We made sure to reinforce that: 1) we very, very rarely do this and 2) the sale will be honored for one hour only, so be prepared.

We excluded anyone who bought a high dollar widget in the last 6 months. If they bought a high dollar widget, we sent them a separate email campaign on 20% off all accessory, lower-priced widgets.

We emailed them 3 days before the sale with a reminder and in our weekly blog post (content) promotion spot.

We sent this to 17,269 email subscribers (some customers, some not)

We reminded them a day before the sale via email.

We reminded them again, the morning of.

We then emailed them for the sale at kick off.

We emailed them one more time at the 30 minute mark "Last Chance"

We also designed the sale around peak traffic time on Sundays (specifically a weekend so fewer people will be at work).

We offered no phone support at this time (our phone is active M-F).

We were hoping for $50k, and we blew past that! Ended up at $108,000 for the day. That's about $6.25 per email subscriber (for the e-mail marketing geeks out there).

We used Klaviyo for our email campaigns. We heavily segment our customers based on a variety of factors - so our list has already been pruned and engaged for a long time.

If you use this technique/sale, post your results!

Disclaimer: this was not my own unique idea. I got the idea from a private forum, but I wanted to share our results with you.

We are now planning to do something like this at least two times a year but no more than three times. Again, you don't want to train customers to wait for sales and discount your brand. A further note, we've been running our business for about three years, so don't expect this to work at your one-month old e-com start up.

Did something very similar with a client that sells luxury sofas.

1k email list, $20k in sales in a single day (not including other sales channels).

 

[MattL]

There's another great tip in Jason's post that cannot be emphasized enough.

Don't just send one email.
Why?
Because the average office worker sends and receives 121 business emails each day (source)
Meaning:
It's incredibly easy for your email to be lost in the noise.

And!
The whole idea of teasing upcoming offers is genius.
There's even a book (of course there is) about this:

Anyhow, great post Jason and congrats on the sales/success!

 

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[theag]

It's a nice tactic. I have a friend who ran sth similar on black friday. It was even higher, I think 300k+ in an hour, and most of it in the first few minutes. Pretty crazy stuff.

What they did a bit differently, was to run lead gen ads specifically for this offer. So they collected leads weeks in advance of BF and didn't send them any other offer. Just a few reminders of the upcoming deal and to be ready when it starts at 8pm or whatever, the usual scarcity stuff

I'm not sure if its really worth it to delay the revenue though. And if it's an increase compared to continously running "normal" ads instead of the lead gen.

But it definitely helps to avoid cheapening the brand with too many sales. And easier to build hype/scarcity around these short time windows.

Thats why we only do 2-3 sales a year (usually around easter, black friday, and 1-2 more). We have a bit bigger time window though (2-3 days each). But in that timeframe we hit hard (3-4 emails/day).

Interesting note: our best performing emails is usually the "day after"-email with something along the lines of "did you miss the sale, too? we extended it for you, but it ends this evening! (image of big animated countdown)"

Works well

 

[Guest-5ty5s4]

Love it.

17,000+ email subscribers sounds a lot like process

Lots of time put in on the front end to achieve the "event" of 100k in one hour. Pretty amazing leverage, that is!

 

[MJ DeMarco]

Someone should like my comment please

Your comments get “liked” when you provide value, not when you beg.

Likewise, you earn money when you provide value, not because you beg.

 

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[JasonR]

And how do we do this value drive? can you elaborate more on this?

Yes. We write a LOT of content, primarily for SEO but also to send to our e-mail list. We make sure to e-mail content (Good, targeted content) that people want to read on a regular basis. We lead with value first, and sales pitches second.

 

[JasonR]

Lower unit margin, but you make sales that otherwise wouldn't have happened. A good tool to use in a surgical manner, and assuming the gross margin isn't cut to zero, the volume bump more than makes up for the lower margin. Key number is total gross profit, which can be several weeks worth of normal profits.

You're close...

There's another metric that is super important in business - whether you're selling a company or running a healthy one, and that's your return on capital. ROC is NOT talked about enough IMO.

Basically, think of it this way. Your return on capital decreases the longer your capital is tied up. So, the longer your inventory turns (or the slower you turn over your inventory), the less efficient your business is, as you could have used that capital for anything else (other/new products, other investments, taking personal profits, etc.).

So, all things being equal, a business that has a better/higher return on capital will generally be valued better than the same business who isn't as efficient with their capital.

Discounting/sales (like the one I ran) is a way to PROFITABLY in crease your ROC. Of course, this is a tool/lever to use in the business, and it's not one that can be repeatedly hammered. It should be used strategically.

 

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[JAJT]

Amazing!

Awesome walk-through of your promo approach and timelines.

 

[Ronak]

This also works very well with carefully chosen and executed partner deals. I did it with a client awhile back. Wasn't in one hour, but did 6 figs in 10 days.


Edit: old quote showed up, totally out of context!

 

[David Fitz]

This is what Gymshark do. I think they only have 3 sales a year and they make them big events.

 

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[biophase]

You're talking about sales, and you had a 20% discount on the widgets, so the question then remains of course how much that cut into your margins.

Generally E-commerce stores have much better margins than 20%.

Imagine your product is selling for $100. Most COGS plus shipping would be around $35-$60. So selling at $80 decreases your profits by 50%. But you are still doing very well.

It’s hard to believe someone would have $80 COGS on a $100 product. That store would last long, unless it was a dropship store.

I don’t do a 20% sale but rather a buy one get something free. In the example above you can give up $20 cash or instead give them a $20 product for free that costs you $5. Same value to the customer but you make an extra $15.

 

[WillHurtDontCare]

Good stuff. Congrats on the big day man.

 

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[JasonR]

Would you have any pointers where I can learn more about the flows? Our business at this point makes the same turnover in 2 months rather than one hour (gulp) but we are getting there. Definitely agree on don't oversaturated with sales and get creative in marketing meaningful content.

Hey don't knock yourself! $50k a month is a great start and you shouldn't have to worry about a job any more. Pat yourself on the back.

We plan to run sales like these 1-3 times a year, no more. Our annual turnover is in currently in the mid-to-high 7 figures, and we have quite a lot of customers and do a lot of paid acquisition as well.

As for flows, are you on Klaviyo? Is your business e-commerce? Let me know and I can try and point you in the right direction.

 

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[MTF]

That's super cool. I wonder if this would work for a launch of a digital product. I might actually test it myself.

 

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[JasonR]

I remember I did something similar with a value add in my business. It was a "digital certification" which gave advertisers a reward badge, and elevated their presence on the website. Earned thousands in a matter of hours upon release.

Love that idea - it's pretty amazing some of the levers you can pull that don't cost you much but are very valuable to customers.

I'm working on an extended warranty product/upsell for our big ticket items. Amazon is already offering it on our products (argh), so why not do it ourselves?

 

[MitchC]

Generally E-commerce stores have much better margins than 20%.

Imagine your product is selling for $100. Most COGS plus shipping would be around $35-$60. So selling at $80 decreases your profits by 50%. But you are still doing very well.

It’s hard to believe someone would have $80 COGS on a $100 product. That store would last long, unless it was a dropship store.

I don’t do a 20% sale but rather a buy one get something free. In the example above you can give up $20 cash or instead give them a $20 product for free that costs you $5. Same value to the customer but you make an extra $15.

Not to mention that the promotion was an email which saves the ad cost.

20% of your gross sales being your ad spend would be a 5x ROAs which is almost unheard of, especially at this scale.

I calculate my email sales and referral sales based around my typical CPA since I am saving that cost anyway.

 

[Fasoon]

First, we continually write USEFUL content. Think of things like "How to" guides, location guides, and 10 Best Widget guides. Articles that are actually useful and want to be read. We do this to rank organically (SEO) and we also email these articles.

Here's an example of our weekly campaign strategy:

Key:
(OEW = Ordered Expensive Widget)


(DNOEW = Did Not Order Expensive widget)
Tuesdays: x2 campaigns sent at same time
Content: Blog campaign
x1 email sent to OWE segment
x1 email sent to DNOWE segment

Purpose: Provide value, plug different products at the bottom of the email based on purchase history.
>> i.e. DNOWE gets an Expensive Widget at bottom of email, OEW gets an accessory at bottom of email

Thursdays: x2 campaigns sent at same time
Content: Promotional campaign
x1 email sent to OEW segment
x1 email sent to DNOEW segment
Purpose: Send DNOEW an Expensive Widget, send OEW an accessory/collection

Note: Sometimes these emails are not segmented by audience i.e. new product launch, items that appeal to both audiences, etc

Sundays: x2 campaigns sent at same time
Content: Promotional campaign
x1 email sent to OEW segment
x1 email sent to DNOEW segment
Purpose: Send OEW an Expensive Widget, send DNOWE an accessory/collection
Note: Sometimes these emails are not segmented by audience i.e. new product launch, items that appeal to both audiences

This is our campaign strategy. We have a lot of other "flows" (abandoned cart, abandoned collection, started order, etc.) that also drive quite a bit of revenue

I've also attached a screenshot of our "Flows" for the past year - which also drive a lot of revenue. You can see even in simple emails (order confirmation) we aim to drive revenue from each e-mail (without being too pushy).

This is an amazing read thanks for sharing so much insight.
Would you have any pointers where I can learn more about the flows? Our business at this point makes the same turnover in 2 months rather than one hour (gulp) but we are getting there. Definitely agree on don't oversaturated with sales and get creative in marketing meaningful content.

I have been hesitant to send out How To's but that's probably my personal thing to overcome as I don't see the value and not sure if someone would but will give this a try to keep subscribers engaged.

But before all that having more flows in place would be a great place to start if you can share any pointers.

 

[Conor Foley]

I wanted to share something very cool, and very actionable for all the e-com guys here. This doesn't work if you don't have a business or an email/customer list, but it works like CRAZY if:
You don't abuse your e-mail list
You email often (value driven, you just don't hammer campaigns/sales emails out)
You don't run promotions often .

First, results.

We did about $94k in ONE HOUR (just shy of $100k, hehe), BUT our total for the day ended up at $108,000. Check the Shopify screenshot. Feels good to get an over $100k deposit in your bank account for one day of sales!

We ran a 20% off our entire website for ONE HOUR only. We don't run promotions often, as we believe it dilutes your brand over time. We sell high dollar widgets (over $500) with lower-dollar accessory widgets that compliment the high dollar ones. So here was our strategy:

We announced our intention of the sale 5 days in advance. We included calendar links in the email. We made sure to reinforce that: 1) we very, very rarely do this and 2) the sale will be honored for one hour only, so be prepared.

We excluded anyone who bought a high dollar widget in the last 6 months. If they bought a high dollar widget, we sent them a separate email campaign on 20% off all accessory, lower-priced widgets.

We emailed them 3 days before the sale with a reminder and in our weekly blog post (content) promotion spot.

We sent this to 17,269 email subscribers (some customers, some not)

We reminded them a day before the sale via email.

We reminded them again, the morning of.

We then emailed them for the sale at kick off.

We emailed them one more time at the 30 minute mark "Last Chance"

We also designed the sale around peak traffic time on Sundays (specifically a weekend so fewer people will be at work).

We offered no phone support at this time (our phone is active M-F).

We were hoping for $50k, and we blew past that! Ended up at $108,000 for the day. That's about $6.25 per email subscriber (for the e-mail marketing geeks out there).

We used Klaviyo for our email campaigns. We heavily segment our customers based on a variety of factors - so our list has already been pruned and engaged for a long time.

If you use this technique/sale, post your results!

Disclaimer: this was not my own unique idea. I got the idea from a private forum, but I wanted to share our results with you.

We are now planning to do something like this at least two times a year but no more than three times. Again, you don't want to train customers to wait for sales and discount your brand. A further note, we've been running our business for about three years, so don't expect this to work at your one-month old e-com start up.

@JasonR, really great & practical story! What really stands out to me here is when you mention "we heavily segment our customers"...

Having personally worked with some of the fastest growing companies in the UK & Ireland this is one area companies are seriously lacking!

Not every individual thinks the same or is influenced in the same manner but by using the right metrics we can place customer into brackets and create a promotional offer to suit them at scale. When done right we see results like the above and even higher when we consider the LTV (Lifetime Value) of customers

 

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[BDR]

I wanted to share something very cool, and very actionable for all the e-com guys here. This doesn't work if you don't have a business or an email/customer list, but it works like CRAZY if:
You don't abuse your e-mail list
You email often (value drive, you just don't hammer campaigns/sales emails out)
You don't run promotions often .

First, results.

We did about $84k-89k in ONE HOUR (just shy of $100k, hehe), BUT our total for the day ended up at $108,000. Check the Shopify screenshot. Feels good to get an over $100k deposit in your bank account for one day of sales!

We ran a 20% off our entire website for ONE HOUR only. We don't run promotions often, as we believe it dilutes your brand over time. We sell high dollar widgets (over $500) with lower-dollar accessory widgets that compliment the high dollar ones. So here was our strategy:

We announced our intention of the sale 5 days in advance. We included calendar links in the email. We made sure to reinforce that: 1) we very, very rarely do this and 2) the sale will be honored for one hour only, so be prepared.

We excluded anyone who bought a high dollar widget in the last 6 months. If they bought a high dollar widget, we sent them a separate email campaign on 20% off all accessory, lower-priced widgets.

We emailed them 3 days before the sale with a reminder and in our weekly blog post (content) promotion spot.

We sent this to 17,269 email subscribers (some customers, some not)

We reminded them a day before the sale via email.

We reminded them again, the morning of.

We then emailed them for the sale at kick off.

We emailed them one more time at the 30 minute mark "Last Chance"

We also designed the sale around peak traffic time on Sundays (specifically a weekend so fewer people will be at work).

We offered no phone support at this time (our phone is active M-F).

We were hoping for $50k, and we blew past that! Ended up at $108,000 for the day. That's about $6.25 per email subscriber (for the e-mail marketing geeks out there).

We used Klaviyo for our email campaigns. We heavily segment our customers based on a variety of factors - so our list has already been pruned and engaged for a long time.

If you use this technique/sale, post your results!

Disclaimer: this was not my own unique idea. I got the idea from a private forum, but I wanted to share our results with you.

We are now planning to do something like this at least two times a year but no more than three times. Again, you don't want to train customers to wait for sales and discount your brand. A further note, we've been running our business for about three years, so don't expect this to work at your one-month old e-com start up.

Now that's what I call engagement! I love this. Very inspirational. Thanks a ton for showing the process

 

[BlackMagician]

You email often (value drive, you just don't hammer campaigns/sales emails out)

And how do we do this value drive? can you elaborate more on this?

 

[Ing]

I wanted to share something very cool, and very actionable for all the e-com guys here. This doesn't work if you don't have a business or an email/customer list, but it works like CRAZY if:
You don't abuse your e-mail list
You email often (value drive, you just don't hammer campaigns/sales emails out)
You don't run promotions often .

First, results.

We did about $94k in ONE HOUR (just shy of $100k, hehe), BUT our total for the day ended up at $108,000. Check the Shopify screenshot. Feels good to get an over $100k deposit in your bank account for one day of sales!

We ran a 20% off our entire website for ONE HOUR only. We don't run promotions often, as we believe it dilutes your brand over time. We sell high dollar widgets (over $500) with lower-dollar accessory widgets that compliment the high dollar ones. So here was our strategy:

We announced our intention of the sale 5 days in advance. We included calendar links in the email. We made sure to reinforce that: 1) we very, very rarely do this and 2) the sale will be honored for one hour only, so be prepared.

We excluded anyone who bought a high dollar widget in the last 6 months. If they bought a high dollar widget, we sent them a separate email campaign on 20% off all accessory, lower-priced widgets.

We emailed them 3 days before the sale with a reminder and in our weekly blog post (content) promotion spot.

We sent this to 17,269 email subscribers (some customers, some not)

We reminded them a day before the sale via email.

We reminded them again, the morning of.

We then emailed them for the sale at kick off.

We emailed them one more time at the 30 minute mark "Last Chance"

We also designed the sale around peak traffic time on Sundays (specifically a weekend so fewer people will be at work).

We offered no phone support at this time (our phone is active M-F).

We were hoping for $50k, and we blew past that! Ended up at $108,000 for the day. That's about $6.25 per email subscriber (for the e-mail marketing geeks out there).

We used Klaviyo for our email campaigns. We heavily segment our customers based on a variety of factors - so our list has already been pruned and engaged for a long time.

If you use this technique/sale, post your results!

Disclaimer: this was not my own unique idea. I got the idea from a private forum, but I wanted to share our results with you.

We are now planning to do something like this at least two times a year but no more than three times. Again, you don't want to train customers to wait for sales and discount your brand. A further note, we've been running our business for about three years, so don't expect this to work at your one-month old e-com start up.

100 k in one hour.
6.5.200.100k= 600m a year...
just kidding, but calculate down the hours you need, 3 times a year...much respect!

 

[CedricN]

I wanted to share something very cool, and very actionable for all the e-com guys here. This doesn't work if you don't have a business or an email/customer list, but it works like CRAZY if:
You don't abuse your e-mail list
You email often (value driven, you just don't hammer campaigns/sales emails out)
You don't run promotions often .

First, results.

We did about $94k in ONE HOUR (just shy of $100k, hehe), BUT our total for the day ended up at $108,000. Check the Shopify screenshot. Feels good to get an over $100k deposit in your bank account for one day of sales!

We ran a 20% off our entire website for ONE HOUR only. We don't run promotions often, as we believe it dilutes your brand over time. We sell high dollar widgets (over $500) with lower-dollar accessory widgets that compliment the high dollar ones. So here was our strategy:

We announced our intention of the sale 5 days in advance. We included calendar links in the email. We made sure to reinforce that: 1) we very, very rarely do this and 2) the sale will be honored for one hour only, so be prepared.

We excluded anyone who bought a high dollar widget in the last 6 months. If they bought a high dollar widget, we sent them a separate email campaign on 20% off all accessory, lower-priced widgets.

We emailed them 3 days before the sale with a reminder and in our weekly blog post (content) promotion spot.

We sent this to 17,269 email subscribers (some customers, some not)

We reminded them a day before the sale via email.

We reminded them again, the morning of.

We then emailed them for the sale at kick off.

We emailed them one more time at the 30 minute mark "Last Chance"

We also designed the sale around peak traffic time on Sundays (specifically a weekend so fewer people will be at work).

We offered no phone support at this time (our phone is active M-F).

We were hoping for $50k, and we blew past that! Ended up at $108,000 for the day. That's about $6.25 per email subscriber (for the e-mail marketing geeks out there).

We used Klaviyo for our email campaigns. We heavily segment our customers based on a variety of factors - so our list has already been pruned and engaged for a long time.

If you use this technique/sale, post your results!

Disclaimer: this was not my own unique idea. I got the idea from a private forum, but I wanted to share our results with you.

We are now planning to do something like this at least two times a year but no more than three times. Again, you don't want to train customers to wait for sales and discount your brand. A further note, we've been running our business for about three years, so don't expect this to work at your one-month old e-com start up.

Wow what a cool story you shared! You did a great job. I started e-com about a year ago but haven't got any big results yet. I still got some hard work to do but what you posted motivates me.

 

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[Helen Pham]

This is awesome, thank you for sharing Jason. I hope people see the last sentence you wrote and remind themselves that a three year process led to this event.

spot on Tiago

 

[Helen Pham]

thanks for sharing, this is such a great inspiration for newbie like me stepping into ecomm world. Really love it! and congrats!

 

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[Jonny Marciano]

I wanted to share something very cool, and very actionable for all the e-com guys here. This doesn't work if you don't have a business or an email/customer list, but it works like CRAZY if:
You don't abuse your e-mail list
You email often (value driven, you just don't hammer campaigns/sales emails out)
You don't run promotions often .

First, results.

We did about $94k in ONE HOUR (just shy of $100k, hehe), BUT our total for the day ended up at $108,000. Check the Shopify screenshot. Feels good to get an over $100k deposit in your bank account for one day of sales!

We ran a 20% off our entire website for ONE HOUR only. We don't run promotions often, as we believe it dilutes your brand over time. We sell high dollar widgets (over $500) with lower-dollar accessory widgets that compliment the high dollar ones. So here was our strategy:

We announced our intention of the sale 5 days in advance. We included calendar links in the email. We made sure to reinforce that: 1) we very, very rarely do this and 2) the sale will be honored for one hour only, so be prepared.

We excluded anyone who bought a high dollar widget in the last 6 months. If they bought a high dollar widget, we sent them a separate email campaign on 20% off all accessory, lower-priced widgets.

We emailed them 3 days before the sale with a reminder and in our weekly blog post (content) promotion spot.

We sent this to 17,269 email subscribers (some customers, some not)

We reminded them a day before the sale via email.

We reminded them again, the morning of.

We then emailed them for the sale at kick off.

We emailed them one more time at the 30 minute mark "Last Chance"

We also designed the sale around peak traffic time on Sundays (specifically a weekend so fewer people will be at work).

We offered no phone support at this time (our phone is active M-F).

We were hoping for $50k, and we blew past that! Ended up at $108,000 for the day. That's about $6.25 per email subscriber (for the e-mail marketing geeks out there).

We used Klaviyo for our email campaigns. We heavily segment our customers based on a variety of factors - so our list has already been pruned and engaged for a long time.

If you use this technique/sale, post your results!

Disclaimer: this was not my own unique idea. I got the idea from a private forum, but I wanted to share our results with you.

We are now planning to do something like this at least two times a year but no more than three times. Again, you don't want to train customers to wait for sales and discount your brand. A further note, we've been running our business for about three years, so don't expect this to work at your one-month old e-com start up.

Fantastic stuff!! Thanks for sharing.

 

[GManz]

I wanted to share something very cool, and very actionable for all the e-com guys here. This doesn't work if you don't have a business or an email/customer list, but it works like CRAZY if:
You don't abuse your e-mail list
You email often (value driven, you just don't hammer campaigns/sales emails out)
You don't run promotions often .

First, results.

We did about $94k in ONE HOUR (just shy of $100k, hehe), BUT our total for the day ended up at $108,000. Check the Shopify screenshot. Feels good to get an over $100k deposit in your bank account for one day of sales!

We ran a 20% off our entire website for ONE HOUR only. We don't run promotions often, as we believe it dilutes your brand over time. We sell high dollar widgets (over $500) with lower-dollar accessory widgets that compliment the high dollar ones. So here was our strategy:

We announced our intention of the sale 5 days in advance. We included calendar links in the email. We made sure to reinforce that: 1) we very, very rarely do this and 2) the sale will be honored for one hour only, so be prepared.

We excluded anyone who bought a high dollar widget in the last 6 months. If they bought a high dollar widget, we sent them a separate email campaign on 20% off all accessory, lower-priced widgets.

We emailed them 3 days before the sale with a reminder and in our weekly blog post (content) promotion spot.

We sent this to 17,269 email subscribers (some customers, some not)

We reminded them a day before the sale via email.

We reminded them again, the morning of.

We then emailed them for the sale at kick off.

We emailed them one more time at the 30 minute mark "Last Chance"

We also designed the sale around peak traffic time on Sundays (specifically a weekend so fewer people will be at work).

We offered no phone support at this time (our phone is active M-F).

We were hoping for $50k, and we blew past that! Ended up at $108,000 for the day. That's about $6.25 per email subscriber (for the e-mail marketing geeks out there).

We used Klaviyo for our email campaigns. We heavily segment our customers based on a variety of factors - so our list has already been pruned and engaged for a long time.

If you use this technique/sale, post your results!

Disclaimer: this was not my own unique idea. I got the idea from a private forum, but I wanted to share our results with you.

We are now planning to do something like this at least two times a year but no more than three times. Again, you don't want to train customers to wait for sales and discount your brand. A further note, we've been running our business for about three years, so don't expect this to work at your one-month old e-com start up.

Hi, I’m new to this and don’t have an E-commerce store set up. Wondering where to start or the first steps to take? Thanks-