Welcome Program

I always face a challenge from marketers when I talk about implementing a Welcome Program. When I tell marketers that a Welcome Program generates a ton of profit, I get the kind of blank stares that scientists get on their face when somebody tells them they won't be wearing a mask to fight a virus.

The reality is that marketers don't want to implement a Welcome Program ... because the program doesn't fit into a campaign-centric style of marketing.

The reality is that when I've observed Welcome Programs, they work.

At the very end of my tenure at Nordstrom, we experimented with a Welcome Program. If a customer bought for the first time, bought online, and lived within 10 miles of a store, my team sent the nearest store manager the phone number and/or email of the customer who just purchased. The store manager then reached out to contact the customer within 7 days of the first purchase, welcoming the customer into the brand, offering to help the customer in any way possible.

An online newbie had a 30% chance of buying again in the next year. 

An online newbie contacted by the store manager had a 50% chance of buying again next year, with an approximate 30% chance of buying again in the next month (based on what I remember and the relationship we fit to the data).

It's not everyday that you increase annual rebuy rates from 30% to 50% for a segment of customers, now is it?

Shortly after I began my consulting career I worked with a B2B brand that executed a Welcome Program ... a different email cadence, a different print cadence, and outbound calls / emails to first-time buyers. The results were staggeringly positive.

In B2B marketing, it is common for somebody to reach out to the customer, and it is not unusual to see different print/email campaigns for first-time buyers ... in B2C? It is rare to observe a credible Welcome Program.

So we're going to spend some time talking about "why" you should have a Welcome Program ... we'll analyze data that supports the case for having a credible program. More on the topic tomorrow, ok?