Case Study by ITForce: Fashion Ecommerce Generated 48% of Total Email Sales through Order Confirmation

With digital platforms multiplying at a great speed, email remains the main channel of communication for businesses that sell online. Marketing strategies and email types may differ depending on the product but an order confirmation is a must-have for any ecommerce.

• Confirmation lets customers know they’ve placed their order successfully and need to expect a soon delivery or shipment.
• It proves that you’re a legitimate business that doesn’t defraud clients after getting their credit card info.
• It contributes to retention and helps build trusting relationships.
• It can generate repeat sales, and more.

Moreover, if you use a professional ESP with proper event management, confirmation emails can be easily integrated in your email automation strategies.

Company

Ukrainian brand of women's sports outfit.

Competitive advantage:

• Owned production that controls all stages of clothing creation, from selection of fabric to final packaging;
• Unique color patterns;
• Low prices for products of similar quality compared to competitors.

Previously, the company didn’t use email marketing although it had a big contact base of 14,350 contacts.

Task

The company’s task was to automate order triggers and start sending confirmation emails on a regular basis. Since most of their orders were placed outside working hours, it was important to notify customers they’ve performed a successful operation.

An order confirmation is an automated email sent to the customer 1 to 20 minutes after they place an order on the site. It serves to confirm the order processing and gives all the necessary order information, including the total cost, order ID, shipment method, etc.

Proper data transfer and order management were assigned as the successful performance indicators.

Deadline

We had 7 days to get the sending account ready, create an email template and set the trigger.

Solution

To set the trigger and automate confirmation emails, we followed a step-by-step plan:

1. Registration with an ESP. We selected our platform for its functionality, security and convenient easy-to-use interface.

2. Domain verification and order data transfer. The client’s developers verified their domain within 2 days. For domain verification, they selected the Full type of configuration to ensure the highest email deliverability.

3. Template design. A template was created in the our editor using corporate style: fonts, logo, colors. We’ll be using it for all further campaigns, editing certain blocks.

4. Confirmation email. We created the email with minimum text, focusing on order details only.

5. Personalization. We added dynamic variables to the ready email template. They would be substituted by personal data (links, product photos, price) at the moment of launch.

6. Workflow. We created and launched the worldflow that would trigger email sending on the event.

7. Testing. In the our system, you can send all emails from the workflow to one email address. This allows to test data transfer, layout display and correct data substitution.

Confirmation Email

We created a confirmation email with the following features:

• Minimalistic design with a focus on visuals;
• Fonts and buttons in the corporate style;
• View in browser link;
• Site menu;
• Order details (ID, item image, link, name and quantity, size, price, shipment info, payment, total price);
• Contacts and social media accounts;
• Unsubscribe link;
• Reason for the email being sent.

Results

The main reason to implement the order trigger was to establish good communication with customers. Primarily, we didn’t intend to use it for upselling. However, the order confirmation proved to be effective in driving traffic to the site and generating repeat sales.

On the click map, you can see that the customers mostly clicked the block with the purchased item because it’s the most sized block of the email. Catalog in the menu was the second most clicked element.

Campaign results:

• Total sent: 4,140;
• Opened: 2,055 (49.6%);
• Clicked: 323 (7.8%)
• Repeat purchases: 15 (4.6%);
• Conversion rate: 0.7%.

Based on it, every 276th customer who made an order over the first month of the trigger implementation also made a repeat purchase.

Alongside setting the order confirmation, we launched several promo campaigns. Based on the statistics, the confirmation email generated as many orders as 4 promo campaigns.

From February 8 to March 8, we sent 45,876 promo emails and 4,140 confirmation emails. In total, emails generated 32 sales, including 15 made through the order confirmation. Taking into account the share in the general sending volume, confirmation emails demonstrated a very high performance rate.

In the future, we plan to expand the order series and add a feedback request and an email with a small discount for the next order.

Conclusion

A confirmation order is an important element of email marketing strategies for ecommerce. It shows that you care about your customers and want to build long-lasting relationships. It’s also an important part of customer retention, alongside RFM triggers and abandoned cart emails.

Order automation is easy to implement: you create the email and set the trigger and workflow only once. The system will automatically send emails to all customers who have made the order, adding their data and order details through dynamic variables.

What’s more, you can enrich your order confirmation emails with personalized product recommendations for higher engagement. Help your customers continue their journey and find the necessary products fast and you’ll enjoy their attention and loyalty.