Mobile commerce is becoming increasingly popular: in 2022, 52% of global consumers purchased goods or ordered services using mobile applications. Given this trend, companies are investing in developing their own apps to create an additional touchpoint with customers. At the same time, the cost of attracting a new user can reach $5.28. To ensure that your money is not wasted, it’s wise to use a mobile app customer retention strategy. Personalized and relevant communication with the user at the right time and in a convenient channel should be at its heart.

Let's discover how the Prom.ua marketplace developed a system of automated mobile push campaigns with personalized triggers based on this principle, growing sales by 10% over two years.

About the Project

Prom.ua is the largest Ukrainian marketplace, and its catalog contains more than 100 million products. Here you can find anything necessary from different categories, from children's toys to industrial equipment. The platform is one of the ten most visited resources in Ukraine; approximately 4.8 million people use it every day.

More than 60,000 companies from all over the country have already joined the Prom.ua service. Each entrepreneur can sell goods using different platforms:

• marketplace directory;
• business website created on the Prom.ua platform;
• “Prom Shopping” mobile application.

Today, the latest platform accounts for more than 50% of all orders. 96% of app users note that the mobile version of the marketplace is more convenient than the desktop one. Thus, the company’s indicators gradually began to correspond to the global trend, according to which mobile commerce is gaining momentum and decreasing the share of orders made from a desktop.

The Tasks

In 2020, the company assembled a new direct marketing team. A review of existing communications and the search for new solutions to increase the efficiency of direct channels have become priorities. The team’s mission was to “revolutionize retention on Prom.ua.”

The main goal was to retain more users by encouraging purchasing activity. This required improving interaction with customers and setting up personalized communications that would cover the full customer lifecycle.

Solution

The team analyzed the performance of all channels and decided to abandon mass promotional emails and web push notifications. Currently, the marketplace sends messages to the entire contact base only on important occasions.

Instead, Prom.ua specialists decided to focus on personalized communication. Mobile notifications received high priority: the app’s share in sales is constantly growing, and already at the start, mobile push brought 90% of orders from all direct channels. That is why this channel has become the foundation of the retention strategy.

To set up personalization, the company used the following Yespo features:

• tracking website and mobile application users’ behavior, which helped to analyze customer activities across the platforms;
• deep segmentation, allowing for targeting micro-segments based on information about the user’s behavior, purchases, and personal data;
• personal recommendations that increase audience engagement and sales thanks to offers selected by AI individually for each client.

The marketplace has developed more than 70 automated campaigns. Below, we will talk about the most interesting ones.

Onboarding

In the onboarding chain, Prom.ua introduces newcomers to its main advantages. The main task at this stage is to engage the user into the funnel and transfer them to the segment of regular and loyal customers.

The hyper-segmented scenario takes into account the client’s previous purchases and the functionality of the marketplace they use. For example, if a customer places an order without secure payment, they will receive a notification inviting them to try this option. This approach helps to retain users and improve interaction with them: this is how customers are convinced of the convenience and safety of Prom.ua.

Abandoned Funnel Stages

Triggers based on uncompleted user actions are a common practice in direct marketing, which the Yespo team regularly implements for our clients. The effectiveness of this tool is confirmed by the experience of ecommerce projects from different business niches.

Thus, messages about abandoned views became the most converting among the pharmaceutical company’s triggers on Viber. An auto parts supplier was able to increase orders by 1,872% using an abandoned cart trigger, advanced segmentation, and an omnichannel communication approach.

In order to promptly contact users who left the marketplace without a purchase, Prom.ua has set up automatic sending of several message types depending on the abandoned stages of the funnel:

• Abandoned cart – a reminder about an unfinished order, which encourages a user to complete a purchase.

• Abandoned view – a notification inviting a user to take another look at the product that they were interested in.

• Abandoned category – if a user views the results of a certain category but does not go to the product pages, they will receive recommendations for bestsellers or new products.
• Abandoned search – if the customer was shown products based on their search, they will receive a reminder with the search results. If nothing is found for their request, the algorithms will make recommendations based on previous purchases.

Favorite Product

A list of favorite products on the website is a quick way to the customer’s heart. There is no need to guess the buyer’s wishes – they will tell you everything themselves. All that remains is to send a timely offer.

Based on the wish list, several triggers were configured:

• Return to the application with a notification of the selected product. The newsletter is sent to a segment of users who have added a product to their wishlist within 24 hours but have not ordered anything in the last week.

• Recommendation of a similar product in stock. A notification is sent if the user has added an out-of-stock item to their favorites.

• Notification of goods arrival. As soon as a wishlist item that was previously out of stock becomes available again, the user is notified about it.

Price Drop

A price drop can bring the user significantly closer to the purchase decision, so the marketplace sends a notification about the reduction in price for:

• items added to the cart;
• previously viewed product;
• a product similar to the item from the abandoned view;
• favorite product;
• items similar to the favorite product.

New Items

If there is a new item in a category that the user has viewed in the last 24 hours, they will receive a corresponding push notification. To increase the relevance of the offer, contacts who placed an order during this time are excluded from the mailing list.

Discounts

Promotions and discounts selected for the client based on their action history significantly increase the likelihood of conversion. A trigger message with an individual recommendation of a promotional item is sent to all users who have viewed any items in the marketplace over the past month.

Reactivation

Personalized offers are also used to bring back “sleeping” customers. Reactivation messages are sent to customers who last viewed products 30, 60, and 90 days ago.

Cross-sell

Based on the client history data analysis, recommendations are generated and sent taking into account the client’s last purchase or purchases for a certain period.

Canceled Order Recommendations

If cancellation occurs due to the unavailability of an item, the buyer receives a notification with offers from other sellers who have this item.

Feedback Collection

Comments and ratings from other customers help the marketplace user choose a store or product. Thanks to reviews, companies gain a reputation among potential buyers and significantly increase the likelihood of a sale. Prom.ua has developed various campaigns to collect feedback:

• an offer to evaluate the seller’s work for those who have closed the transaction completely;
• a reminder of the importance of a review for those who have not yet left one;
• if the order was canceled, the customer is asked to share the reason;
• notification that the seller responded to the user’s comment;

if the review has not been moderated by the Prom.ua system, the user receives an offer to find out more details in their personal account.

To increase user engagement, mobile push notifications in these scenarios are combined with messages in email and Viber channels in different variations.

"We implemented each trigger quite quickly, and this is one of the reasons why we chose the Yespo platform for this task rather than using our own resources. If you ask any developer about such a task, they will answer: “Abandoned search? Yes, it’s easy to set up.” But when you show the full map of triggers that need to be implemented in a quarter, then after calculating the development hours, it turns out that it will take not 3, but 6, 9, or even 12 months.

In this case, it is easier to use ready-made solutions. Yespo has all the necessary features and can significantly reduce the time it takes to implement best practices on the market. That’s why we decided to follow this path and involve our own developers in other product development tasks.” — Anna Shchur, Head of Promo & Retention Prom.ua

The Results

The Prom.ua team approached its retention revolution in a balanced manner: it systematized and organized its communication strategy, worked on weaknesses, and focused on developing strengths. Using the Yespo functionality, this approach delivered significant results:

• Over 2 years, the share of orders in the direct channel has increased 5 times.
• Personalized triggers grew sales in the channel by 10%. The most effective ones are “Abandoned views” and messages related to wishlist items.
• The site received 30% of sales from triggers thanks to individual product recommendations generated by Yespo algorithms.

Future Plans

Having implemented best practices for eCommerce, the Prom.ua team chose two directions for further development:

• A/B tests and improvement of already launched triggers. Yespo functionality allows for analyzing the effectiveness of different options directly in the system.
• Launching new triggers.

Now, direct marketing specialists are focusing their efforts on introducing fresh ideas and custom developments. To implement new triggers, experts study user behavior. Why do they love the marketplace? What features do the majority of your audience use? Where are there fewer users but high conversion? How to satisfy the buyer's needs? The Prom.ua team is looking for answers to these questions and is in a state of continuous development, adhering to its own principle: “Constantly improving the purchasing experience is the main goal of our communication.”

The focus on personalizing communication with the client in a mobile application has already proven the effectiveness of this strategy. Do you also want to use the potential of mсommerce and AI to grow your business, or are you planning to implement your own ideas? Contact our specialists and get professional support in bringing your ambitions to life!

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