We’ve all met them, clients that are no longer engaged. They are no longer generating revenue and aren’t showing up in your shop anymore. With email marketing you can easily compose a message to wake up those hibernating clients. That’s what Ibis Hotels did right before the summer started.
But make sure that you are wide awake when you’re creating a reactivation message. If you want to wake a sleeping client, you have to do so with attitude. We had a look at the message and we found 10 critical and less critical remarks!
1 This one’s a classic. Try to get your own sender address into the address book of your contact. If you succeed, you will easily go through the many spam filters. But this email address is not easily recognizable. It sort of looks like a mnemonic from a computer nerd who needs to manage it all. What’s wrong with welcome@ibis-hotels.com?
2 As a sleeping customer, maybe I don’t know what Ibis stand for. Yes, there is the word “Hotels” in the logo, but what if I’ve missed that? I immediately spot the smiling lady. Friendly, yes, but when I book a room, I’m pretty sure this lady isn’t included. What’s wrong with an image of a beautiful room? Showing the product for a classic “aha-experience” is key for this type of messages.
3 Yes, hotels, now I remember… You can hear the reaction coming. The only problem is that that form doesn’t work in email. A lot of email marketers would pay big money to be able to do this. So they try to suggest something with an image of a form. Clicking on it to fill out our city takes us to the website. Something that your contact wasn’t really expecting. The last thing you need to do is cause confusion. Also, options city and country are enough. Asking for a hotel code takes the fun out of it. Just checking for fun if there are nice hotels in Paris isn’t something I would do now. A graphical element with a form with a CTA like “search for your favorite destination is much more inviting.
4 Thank you for addressing me with my own name. But what I don’t really like is that you rub this in: “You haven’t responded on … for a while”. The last thing you want to do is let your contact feel guilty. Of course you want to present them a great offer. But a client doesn’t feel motivated to respond if you’re not making this a fun experience. Try “We’ve missed you” or “Maybe we can tempt you with this summer offer”.
5 It’s great that Ibis wants to make the life of their contacts easier. Service still means something. I would love to see this custom offer. So I click through. But the landing page doesn’t make a sleeping contact happy. The website asks me to login. Only then can I see what they have to offer me. Hello ladies and gentleman, just a couple of moments ago I didn’t remember you existed. What makes you think that I still remember my user name and password? You can easily include that in the url of your link. And that would allow me to immediately see your tempting offer. And if you can personalize the email with my firstname, you can easily personalize it with the custom offer as well!
6 Exclusive internet offers? What do you mean? You said you were going to give me a custom offer? But hey, I would love to take a look at these offers. Clicking on the link leads me to a landing page, tailored to people from the Netherlands. Didn’t you take into account the address I put in the last time I ordered? My address is in Belgium. Does that mean I’m not allowed to use this offer? This was probably a standard email to everyone who spoke Dutch. But make it as clear as possible!
7 We have now arrived at the standard footer of this message. For the third time now they show us offers and discounts. If we weren’t convinced the first and second time, a third time is unnecessary. But when you’re talking about benefits and loyalty, we maybe have to turn this around. Maybe there’s a reason I haven’t bought for a while. This would be the perfect time to ask about that… a button with “What are you missing?” or “Is there something we can help you with?” would be the perfect triggers. And maybe you shouldn’t wait until the footer to ask about that.
8 Some more standard content in a grey font. For the second time now, they ask me to change my contact data. And no, I still can’t remember my password. Who don’t you place these links at the bottom of the message. Because social buttons deserve some more visibility. The forward to a friend link can be highlighted by turning it into a fun button.
9 These same thing goes for the Facebook logo. That one deserves more attention, and should be bigger than the “follow us” line. Your contact knows what he’s supposed to do over there. And while you’re it, do include the Google + logo. But then it has to be on your website as well. And why not promote your own Ibis app? A lot of contacts read their email on their smartphones. What better tool would there be to target for your app?
10 Only mention information that is relevant. The copyright of the images you used aren’t really relevant for your contacts. On the contrary, it makes your email look unprofessional. You want to send a stylish email message, you want to entice your reader with your product, and you can’t do better than a stock image. Is there no one who can use a reliable digital camera?
