August 7, 2023 • 36 mins
Ever wondered how to make the most of customer reviews in your e-commerce strategy? Joined by our insightful guest, Charlotte Talesnick from Yotpo, we unpack the magic of review analytics and their transformative impact on e-commerce.
In today's digital era, customer feedback is more than words - it's a compass guiding businesses towards improvement. As we continue our chat with Charlotte, we discuss the power of customer insights and how they can help refine products and services. Hear about Yotpo's AI-driven sentiment algorithm, a great tool to identify key customer sentiments and ACAI's successful adoption of this tool. As we navigate the e-commerce landscape, we also examine the rising trends, giving a nod to SMS marketing and customer retention strategies. Tune in to this episode for a deep dive into the world of e-commerce.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:02):
Hi, welcome to the Big Commerce Podcast.
Hello and welcome to a brandnew episode of the Big Commerce
Podcast.
I'm your host, luigi, and thisweek I'm joined by Charlotte
Bell from Yoppo.
Yoppo is an e-commercemarketing platform that offers
an array of different products,such as loyalty referrals,
reviews, sms marketing, emailmarketing and user-generated
(00:24):
content.
In the conversation today, wecovered how merchants can
harness reviews, why they shouldbe part of their e-commerce
strategy and how they can alsoleverage things like loyalty
referrals and SMS to betterengage in high-convert customers
.
I hope you enjoy the episode.
Hey, charlotte, welcome to thepodcast.
Speaker 2 (00:46):
Thank you, I'm super excited to be on.
Speaker 1 (00:49):
It's super excited to have you on.
I know we were meant to recordthis a couple of months ago, but
that got moved.
I'm looking forward to talkingto you about reviews today.
For those who don't know, youwant to introduce yourself and
Yoppo.
Speaker 2 (01:03):
Perfect.
My name is Charlotte Bell and Iam a partner manager at Yoppo.
I have been in partnerships atYoppo for just about four years
actually, and to give you somebackground on Yoppo for those
that don't know it, I know somemight not know how to pronounce
it, some might not know what itstands for, but Yoppo's
(01:26):
e-commerce retention marketingplatform helps brands win and
retain customers for life withreviews, sms marketing, loyalty
and referrals, subscriptions andvisual, user-generated content.
The company was founded in 2011after the CEO, tomer, had a bad
experience buying a cameraonline and was burned by
(01:46):
trusting fake reviews.
We started as a reviewsplatform and now we have a full
suite of connected products.
Speaker 1 (01:53):
Thank you very much.
What does Yoppo stand for?
I know the answer to this one,but I wish you didn't ask me.
Come on.
Speaker 2 (02:00):
For opinion, the people's opinion.
Speaker 1 (02:02):
There we go.
Just because sometimes it'swithin an A, I mean I get it
with Call of Shock.
It's kind of what does it standfor?
And it doesn't stand foranything.
It's quite unique, butobviously Yoppo.
Speaker 2 (02:13):
Yeah, I should have asked you the question right
back.
Speaker 1 (02:16):
I'm sure I've said this before in the podcast, but
I'll get Verena to organize asession about the branding and
the name of Call of Shock,because it's a really boring
story, but it might help givesomeone some inspiration.
Of course, obviously, we'veworked together for a few years
and the platform's grown as well.
I think you've acquired acouple of different things that
(02:38):
connect into your system tobecome a marketing platform, but
fundamentally, you started off,like you said, with reviews, so
let's just focus on that.
How can Yoppo help businessesin terms of review management?
Because, also, e-commerceplatforms have reviews that are
out of the box and there areother systems.
(02:59):
So, as a merchant, you getquite a bit of choice as to how
you should manage reviews, and Ithink it's.
I still feel that when I speakto merchants it's something
that's under estimated and maybethey don't really fully
understand.
I get the question such as doescommerce handle reviews all the
way through to which platformshould we go with?
(03:21):
Can we integrate with differentsystems?
So I guess, starting at thebeginning, how can Yoppo help
businesses when they come intothis part of their marketing
discussion?
Speaker 2 (03:32):
Yeah, definitely.
So we have the smartest reviewsolution on the market Our
AI-driven smart prompts.
We have smart filters.
They both help brands tocollect high-quality reviews
that drive conversion anddisplay them where they will
have the most impact.
So we have integrations withGoogle, shopify, walmart,
facebook, instagram and more,and this is so that brands can
(03:54):
expand their reach beyond theirsites and showcase their best
reviews really wherever theirshoppers are.
Speaker 1 (04:02):
And I think that's one of the challenges that
merchants come up against.
It's kind of like you know, mycustomers can leave reviews
wherever, and so you know how doI choose the right platform,
how do I consolidate them.
Speaker 2 (04:13):
And how do you get them to show everywhere?
Speaker 1 (04:16):
Exactly, Exactly, Because also, I mean, I don't
know if it's true, but differentplatforms, I guess, are for
different people.
So if you're looking at kind of, you know a lot of people use
Google for predominantly, Iguess, service reviews rather
than kind of products.
But you're a bit more kind ofholistic in that approach and
that you can.
You basically can help themconsolidate all that and help
(04:37):
merchants to push out productreviews to their customers that
can then be used on differentplatforms.
Speaker 2 (04:43):
Exactly.
Speaker 1 (04:45):
So it forms part of kind of their marketing circle
as well, not just kind ofkeeping it within one platform.
Speaker 2 (04:50):
Exactly, and we have a ton of integrations, whether
with different e-commerceplatforms or with different
social media platforms.
You'll see, we're Googlepartners, so we really have the
ability to display those reviewson all different in all
different places so that theycan be seen the most.
Speaker 1 (05:09):
How, if you're looking at it from a merchant's
perspective, first of all, howimportant is having kind of
reviews campaign as part of youre-commerce strategy?
Speaker 2 (05:20):
It's extremely important.
I'm sure everybody listening isan online shopper.
Everyone's gone through theprocess themselves, everyone's
had their own customer journey,and the vast majority of
shoppers 90% in particular won'tbuy a product that doesn't have
reviews.
They're not just important forconversion, though.
(05:42):
High quality reviews also helpbrands ensure what we like to
call a valuable first purchase,meaning that the customer is
able to find and buy the perfectproduct for them, increasing
the likelihood that they'llreturn.
Of course, we always want themto come back, and this is just
looking, then, at reviews.
I'm sure we'll dive in a littlebit after to loyalty and
(06:03):
referrals, but YachtPot doesalso offer loyalty and referrals
, where we do incentivize thosecustomers to keep coming back.
Speaker 1 (06:14):
I've got to say I've used reviews as a way of helping
me make a decision around theproduct to buy, because most
recently it was with a runningarmband my phone holder broke.
I had to buy a new one, so I waswondering whether to buy a
holder or a sleeve to put myphone in and I basically went on
reviews, as in what one's gotthe highest number of reviews or
(06:37):
maybe the highest score, basedon the reason of amount of
reviews.
And that helped me make thedecision, because I can read so
many blog posts, I can read somany articles on different
online magazines about holders.
But at the end of the day, ifyou get the proof from people
that have bought that to say itfits, it doesn't fit, it doesn't
hold its shape, it isn'twaterproof or whatever, it can
(06:57):
help make that decision.
So from a customer perspective,it helped me make a choice that
I felt other people had alreadymade for me and maybe I
benefited from their experience.
But I guess from the flip sidealso, because we see this with
kind of NPS scores, it gives themerchant the opportunity to
understand what their customerslike or don't like about a
(07:19):
particular product or serviceExactly, exactly.
Speaker 2 (07:23):
That, too.
Another interesting part of itis so you of course didn't want
to buy another phone holder,right, that was potentially
going to break.
So you were going to readthrough the reviews and make
sure.
Okay, this one could last melonger, this one won't break.
We also have the ability tohave a question and answer
(07:44):
community section on the productpage.
So not only can you read andwrite reviews, but you can also
read and write questions.
So if you had a question andyou wanted to say what's better
this phone holder or the sleeve,the one that latches on to my
arm or it latches on to my belt,you could ask that question and
(08:08):
not only could the brandthemselves go back and answer,
but the actual community and anyother customer that has made
that purchase could go back andanswer too.
So you can get real timeanswers from not only the brand
but from other customers whobought that product.
Speaker 1 (08:24):
I find with some merchants they're a bit hesitant
to kind of embrace the reviewsbecause they or if they do, it's
kind of on their terms theydon't really want to hear the
truth.
So it's kind of like can we editthem, Can we manage them?
Can we hide the ones that arenegative?
And the problem with that isyou're not getting the well.
(08:46):
First of all, you're notholding yourself accountable.
So if your service is reallypoor, you're basically masking
it, saying we're just not goingto tell people that we're that
poor rather than doing somethingabout it.
But secondly, you're notgetting kind of actual feedback
from your customers or you'renot embracing it and potentially
also you're not, you're notbeing honest with as part of
(09:09):
your brand.
I mean, one of the valuesshould be kind of honest and
transparency and you're reallynot.
So how important is it foractually, we can go to that
later, but kind of from a let'sgo back to kind of managing
reviews then how, what are thebest ways to kind of have those
on your website?
Where do you see merchantswinning when they're displaying
(09:31):
or promoting reviews on theire-commerce websites?
Speaker 2 (09:34):
Yeah, definitely.
So it's important to displayboth your good and your bad
reviews.
Of course, like we just said, alot of brands are going to want
to just display their goodreviews.
But that's just not realisticto get all five star reviews
unless your product is trulyunbelievable and maybe you've
(09:54):
gotten bad reviews in the pastand you've made those
corrections and now you have allfive star reviews.
But that's likely not the case.
So if shoppers see all five starreviews on a product, that's
likely a red flag, and badreviews help customers make more
informed decisions.
So, for example, if I want tobuy a dress and somebody left a
review that said it runs small,I'll go a size up and I'll
(10:17):
likely be more satisfied with mypurchase and more likely to
leave a positive review and thenprobably purchase again.
So you'd want that reviewdisplayed because otherwise I'd
be unhappy if I didn't see thatit ran small.
I ordered my normal size.
It was too small.
I returned it.
I was like I don't know if I'meven going to exchange it then
for the bigger size.
(10:37):
So also, if it makes sense thenfor your brand to collect
photos, collect videos that'sanother great part of our user
generated content.
Exactly, exactly, and this helpsto overcome the biggest problem
e-commerce brands have, whichis that shoppers can't
(10:58):
experience the product in reallife before buying.
So if you see real people usingyour product in real
environments, it helps to boostconversion, because then
shoppers can really visualize itin their lives too.
Speaker 1 (11:13):
I guess you're making it a bit more emotive and
putting the potential buyer inthat frame of mind to say, okay,
this is what the actual productis going to look like, rather
than kind of a photoshoppedlifestyle image or something
that's kind of quite set up.
This is the bare bones.
We hear about UGC, usergenerated content, mostly around
social, but, as you say, thequestion and answers feature as
(11:37):
well, where you can get yourcommunity to put that content in
there and you've basically gotreal life fans, hopefully
promoting your product andshowing you the photos of the
product and use or in theenvironment.
But conversely, you can alsoget ones that show that it maybe
broke apart or it doesn't holdits eyes or whatever, and I
(11:59):
think that's one of thechallenges that merchants come
up against is that I don'treally have the bandwidth to
deal with that.
I have to stay on top andfirefight anything that you know
.
You get one disgruntledcustomer that's just going to,
you know, expend all theirenergy on trying to kind of take
you down and say I don't wantto deal with that.
So actually, how do I preventthat problem?
Well, I just hide, you know,the ability for them to be able
to write reviews or upload usergenerated content.
(12:23):
But I think also, like you say,it's A, it can help somebody
make a decision.
So if a medium or if a small isgoing to be maybe too small,
then maybe you move up to medium.
But also it shows the brand isgenuine, like you're not masking
(12:44):
anything, you're transparentand you're honest, and I think
that's especially in a day wherebad news can travel so fast.
I mean, if we go back to 30years, if you're a company that
sold really bad shirts, it wouldtake months or years for that
kind of reputation to now takeminutes on, you know, and so
(13:04):
really I think it's got to bepart of that strategy for a
merchant to stay on top of howtheir brand is perceived and
their reputation, and obviouslythere's tools out there.
But I think, as the commercebuyer kind of matures to
understand the commerce a lotmore, the commerce customer, you
acknowledge that not everyone'sgoing to have a 10 out of 10
experience, and I guessfundamentally just touching on
(13:29):
maybe negative reviews, so whatshould merchants do if they do
get kind of some not sofavorable feedback that's
published online?
Speaker 2 (13:38):
Yeah.
So if you do get not greatfeedback, we do have the option
also for brands to respondprivately to a customer that
left a bad review, and thatgives you the opportunity to
speak directly to that customerand understand what went wrong,
how can you help them and howreally we can turn around that
(13:59):
experience.
So that's really.
Another great aspect of ourplatform is the ability to
respond back to reviews, whetherpublicly or privately.
You have both options, andmaybe then you want to offer
them a discount code for theirnext product and offer something
that they will like based onwhat their review is.
(14:21):
Maybe that product just wasn'tfor them.
And then I'd say there's alsogoing to be ways that businesses
can use these reviews whetherthey're good or bad, but to then
improve their products orservices.
Speaker 1 (14:37):
I think that feedback is really good, because one
thing that a lot of merchantsdon't do is kind of market
research, and so this, I guess,is the second best thing,
because you're getting theirfeedback from the users and
they're telling you what worksor doesn't work.
Because, also, if you'retesting your product in a fairly
contained environment and notkind of in the real world,
(14:58):
you're not getting the real-lifefeedback that you might need to
develop that.
So using systems like reviews,like you say, is a good way,
because it's somebody that'sactually used that and said it
doesn't hold its size, itdoesn't fit.
The threading starts to comeoff after three runs, which is
what happened to my thing, andso that kind of feedback, I
(15:19):
guess, is invaluable.
And if you put yourself in asituation and say, ok, how would
I otherwise get that feedbackfrom a user or from however many
users you've got?
I guess there's also costsattached to that.
So really, what's the bestoption?
Do you kind of invest insomething like Yoppo, where you
get feedback from customers thathave used it, or do you go out
to a market research company andstart doing all that research
(15:41):
campaigns and investing money inthere?
So I think that's a really goodpoint.
You say as well using thefeedback to improve your product
or service or understand from acustomer what works and what
doesn't.
Speaker 2 (15:54):
Yeah, definitely.
And Yoppo has a smart sentimentalgorithm that analyzes a
brand's reviews andautomatically identifies
positive and negative reviewersentiment.
So, for example, a beautyretailer could quickly learn
that their bestselling eyeshadowhas a trend of negative
sentiment around the topic ofscent.
(16:14):
People love their eyeshadow butthey hate the smell.
So then that brand knows thatthey need to improve that aspect
of the product.
So keep that color, keep thatconsistency of the eyeshadow,
but work on the smell.
It gives you that opportunityto figure out what you need to
do to improve that product andmaybe to get then that five star
(16:36):
review.
Speaker 1 (16:38):
So that's really interesting because if you
compare kind of to other systemsthat are just purely a platform
to say fundamentally, rate ourproduct from one to five, and
then it just gives you therating.
You're actually kind of sayinglook, here are some trends
around what people like and whatthey don't like, so you can
continue to improve that productand start pushing up that
(17:01):
rating.
You've obviously got well many,many customers globally.
Are there any kind of successstories or case studies where a
merchant or a brand has kind ofharnessed the reviews and really
seen a significant change inthe way that their business
(17:22):
operates or grows?
Speaker 2 (17:25):
Definitely.
We have a really great casestudy and we actually have a
section on our website too, withall case studies, if anybody
wanted to read through more butone in particular is from a
sustainable and inclusiveoutdoor apparel brand for women.
The company brand is ACAI andthey have a premium price point
where they relied heavily onorganic growth via word of mouth
(17:48):
marketing from customers.
They knew that customerfeedback was key to their
success and they needed anefficient way to transform
feedback into actionableinsights.
So what they did was they hadan inclusive community that had
a strong foundation, but theyneeded a way to harness the
enthusiasm of their customers.
So they explored various reviewproviders.
(18:10):
They ultimately chose YachtPo,and we allowed them to implement
reviews and visual UGCalongside SMS.
So once they set up reviews,their review collection
accelerated and they weresimultaneously able to use
YachtPo's Insight tool to reallyhelp refine and direct their
product decisions based onvaluable customer insights.
So, for example, the mid-lengthtrek shorts, which is a super
(18:34):
popular item, were originallymade in a shorter length.
The Insight tool helps thebrand transform customer
feedback into actionableinsights, which gave them the
information that they needed toadjust the length of their
shorts to better suit the needsof their shoppers.
So after they do so, theshoppers are happier.
They adjusted the length oftheir shorts and they're happier
with the length, and if youwere to applications to any area
(18:56):
of major places, they couldimprove that they didn't know.
Speaker 1 (19:00):
So basically they went out with the intention of
kind of collecting or lookingfor a solution that helped them
collect reviews, and actuallythey didn't just get the
feedback engine, they actuallygot kind of the information they
needed to continually improvethat product.
Speaker 2 (19:16):
Exactly, and that's just one of many case studies
and examples.
We have a ton more, whetherit's in the fashion and apparel,
brand, realm, health and beauty.
You know you can really filterall of our case studies by
different industries as well, sothere will be a case study
really per industry.
Speaker 1 (19:37):
OK, we'll link to the case studies in the show notes
so that listeners can have aread of how your other merchants
have benefited through reviews.
But reviews is just one part ofthe suite of products that
Yoppo offers.
So what else have you got whenyou're asking with tools to help
merchants?
Speaker 2 (19:58):
Yeah, so Yoppo also offers visual marketing.
We offer loyalty and referrals,we offer SMS marketing, we
offer a subscription tool.
We really have a ton ofdifferent products.
We also offer email marketing.
So all of these products.
Really, what's amazing is theywork together under one roof, so
(20:21):
under one unified data layer,and they speak to each other.
So, for example, as we've beentalking about with reviews,
maybe you want to give loyaltypoints to somebody for leaving a
review and maybe you want togrant loyalty points for
somebody that signs up for yourSMS subscriber club and then,
(20:43):
through that SMS, we can ask forreview, we can promote
different products, offer adiscount code, pull in that five
star rating, so you really havea ton of opportunities to use
this cross product synergy.
Speaker 1 (20:57):
I guess that the benefit to the merchant there is
that you, like you said you'vegot that single data source.
So you haven't got to connectdifferent systems that maybe
collect different metrics andmake them talk to each other.
You're basically saying we'vegot one unified profile for this
customer and then, depending onwhich part of the Yoppo suite
you use, they're all pullingfrom that same data and they can
(21:19):
all talk to each other.
Exactly so unlike within thebigger e-commerce space, where
we're seeing the composablepiece, you're actually going the
opposite and making it moremonolithic and saying we can
really become a true marketingplatform for your brand because
we've got all these differenttools that can talk to each
(21:40):
other, that can pull for thesame data source, that can go
hand in hand as well.
Like you said, if somebodysigns up for loyalty they can
get or, sorry, for leisurereview, they get some loyalty
points, and I guess that canalso be pulled through to things
like email marketing and SMS.
And SMS is a really interestingpiece because it's like we seem
(22:03):
to have gone back to 2004,where everyone's doing text
messaging marketing.
But, actually, that's reallycoming to the forefront now as
that email space becomes reallysaturated, I guess.
Speaker 2 (22:17):
Definitely, sms marketing is huge and that's
actually people that arechoosing to communicate via SMS
are choosing that because that'stheir preferred way of
communication.
So for me, for example I havemy phone on me at all times I
choose SMS because then let'ssay that I am quickly shopping
(22:40):
for something I said, oh, I knowthat I have actually this
discount code in my text.
Let me just look at my text.
I'm choosing to use my phone asmy preferred way of
communication, so I'm signing upfor SMS.
If you don't prefer to do that,then totally fine, you won't
sign up for SMS.
But many I mean I'm sure yousee it and when you walk on the
(23:02):
street these days, everyone'sbumping into each other because
everyone's just looking out attheir phone at least in New.
York City they are, but.
Speaker 1 (23:10):
I don't know what to say.
Speaker 2 (23:12):
Yeah, everyone's on their phones these days.
Speaker 1 (23:16):
The other great thing about from a brand perspective
if your customers are willing togive you their mobile numbers,
their cell phone numbers, italso shows an element of trust
because they're quite intimateThings are mobile phones and so
if we're actually kind of givingyou our phone number so you can
market to us, it's showing thatwe trust you and we kind of
(23:38):
want to engage with you more asa brand.
Number one.
Number two I think the kind ofinteraction rates, engagement
rates on phone are much higherand also I think most SMS
messages are open within threeminutes of receipt, which is
nothing like for email marketing.
So I think from thatperspective, if you're looking
for some really good engagement,then SMS is the way to go.
Speaker 2 (24:03):
It's true.
It's true, I mean, once you geta text message, everybody jumps
and quickly opens their phone.
You hear that ding all the timeand, as annoying as it is, we
all do it and we all click onthe phone and whether it's a
vibrate, it's a ding.
Whatever it is, we open up thattext message right away.
Speaker 1 (24:27):
And probably action it, rather than just kind of
market spam or just look at theinbox and you've got 50 unread
emails and just do nothing aboutit.
I mean I don't think I've gotmore than three or four unread
texts at a time.
Speaker 2 (24:41):
And if I open up a text and it shows me a product
that has, you can really inputeven the star rating in there.
So it could say this lipstickis five stars and maybe I'm out
to dinner and I'm like actuallyI don't really like the lipstick
that I have in my bag.
And they just gave me adiscount code on this five star
lipstick.
Let me just order it quickly.
Speaker 1 (25:02):
Here's the link to order.
So could you mind giving us anexample of how SMS, how Merchant
might kind of utilize SMS toboost those conversions or to
kind of get that customer to buy?
Yeah?
Speaker 2 (25:15):
I mean, as you said, if you're signing up for SMS,
that means that you're trustingand you're giving that personal
phone number and so if you'rechoosing that, then you're
choosing to communicate on apersonal level and so, in
amazing way, not only to boostconversion, but it would be.
(25:37):
I mean, there's a ton ofdifferent ways.
Whether you want to, as I said,insert those reviews right
within that text message, youwant to ask for a review within
that text message, maybe youwant to refer a friend, and when
you refer a friend you getloyalty points and then you can
use those loyalty points to geta discount on that lipstick that
(25:59):
I just got a discount code for.
That was five stars.
You have a ton of differentways in which we can use, as we
said, all of our productstogether.
So SMS, in particular, is anamazing way to pull it all
together, because I can insertall of those different aspects
right in a text message, rightat the most personal way of
(26:21):
communication, right on.
You know, somebody's usuallyholding that phone right in
their pocket, right on theirbody, and so, whether it's
asking for a review in there,inserting reviews, providing a
discount code, maybe somebody is10 points away from reaching
their next VIP tier, and on thatnext VIP tier you're about to
(26:43):
get free shipping on every orderthat you purchase.
So here's a product that willget you those 10 points.
So there's a ton of differentways in which we can use SMS
really to increase purchases atthat super personal level, and
we can tailor it to yourpersonal interests.
(27:06):
We know, then.
We know what you like.
We know a lot about you.
Speaker 1 (27:13):
So I was about to say that it's not just kind of
again like other email marketingplatforms or marketing
platforms.
It is tailoring the messagingand those campaigns to the user.
And because you've got thatsingle kind of customer data
profile, you're able to thensegment your emails and say I
know that you buy this type ofproduct or this type of brand,
(27:35):
that, like you said, your Xnumber of points away maybe from
the next tier, and so you canuse all those different
attributes to really target thatuser, to get the highest
conversion, highest engagementfor your marketing efforts.
Speaker 2 (27:50):
Yeah, and we do have a huge library of automations
and flows.
Whether a brand wants to choosefrom those that we offer
because of course you're goingto want that card abandonment
flow when somebody you knowabandons their product in their
cart and we want to then sendout a text message and offer a
discount on that product, wehave that welcome flow.
(28:11):
We have a huge library for youto choose from.
But then of course you can alsobe creative and make your own
automation simple as but we giveyou a great starting point and
we give you all all the basicsthat you might need.
But you can also really becreative there with with your
SMS.
Speaker 1 (28:31):
I think that's really important because a lot of
merchants sometimes find itbecomes a battle to kind of keep
on top of these things.
So the fact that you kind of saylook, you know the platforms
there, you know you can eitherkind of self serve with some off
the shelf ideas and flows or,if you need that you know kind
of customization and you need toget down into the trenches and
(28:52):
start mapping everything out andreally telling it.
Then you can do that as well.
So there is because sometimesyou kind of speak to some
platforms and it's it's eitheryou know kind of self serve or
they do the onboarding for you,not necessarily kind of reviews,
but just in general, andsometimes that can be a bit of
putting for a merchant, ofputting for a merchant because
then I don't have the bandwidth.
Today I could do with thatproduct, I could do with that,
(29:12):
that technology, that service,but I'm not going to be able to
commit to or I don't understandenough.
I've got to bring in moreresources.
So the fact that kind of yourpose got this flexibility to be
able to support the merchantssay look, you know you can, you
can kind of come in on self onboard, you know off the shelf,
and then when you get tounderstand how the system works,
when you start seeing thosebenefits, you can start tweaking
(29:35):
and tailoring those things toreally start accelerating your
your conversions.
Speaker 2 (29:41):
Exactly, and you can have those automation set up too
, so you won't have to manuallydo it all.
Speaker 1 (29:48):
Brilliant Are you?
Are you kind of seeing anytrends in with any commerce
within the market or anythingthat's kind of you see is coming
around the corner that maybeour merchants can take some
inspiration from?
Speaker 2 (30:01):
Definitely the biggest change that we're seeing
is brands focusing more oncustomer retention, so realizing
that you need to move theneedle on retention and actually
doing it.
Are two different things,though, so, in fact, we recently
surveyed e-commerce brands and52% of them said that they were
more focused on retention thanthey were a year ago, but over
(30:21):
40% haven't made any changes totheir strategy in order to
improve it.
So why haven't they?
34% said their biggestchallenge is the lack of a clear
strategy, so our takeaway fromthat data is that brands know
how important retention is, butit's unclear on how to really
get it started, and without asolid strategy, you're left with
(30:43):
a hopefully they liked usenough to come back approach,
which clearly isn't working.
70% of those surveyed said theirretention rate has either
stayed the same or gotten worseover the past year.
So with rising acquisitioncosts, I think we're going to
see more brands beef up theirretention strategies with
subscriptions and loyaltyprograms and deeper
personalization and really justleveraging data to better
(31:05):
understand their customers sothat they can build those
winning experiences that keepthem coming back, and all things
that brands can do with YachtPo, by the way.
Speaker 1 (31:16):
That's a really important piece you said there
around, kind of the data,because I think again not to
kind of harp on about it but thefact that you've got a single
source of truth for thatcustomer profile.
Because we're in on data withdata right at the moment these
days, it's just at the momenteveryone's kind of panicking
about GA4.
I think 90% of the world isprobably asking itself why, when
(31:39):
Universal Analytics was fine,it's just, it's just it's about
the data and obviously it's gotso many benefits.
But the problem is that thereis an element of kind of
paralysis by analysis, becauseit's just there's so much data
out there and the fact thatyou're not making merchants say,
well, you know, putting datafrom this system for
subscriptions, pulling data fromthis system for loyalty and
referrals, this one for reviewsand this one for email marketing
(32:00):
, but you actually got thatunified profile with the
analytics, I think helps makelife easier for the merchants
and, like you say, you know andeveryone knows it's far cheaper
to sell to an existing customerthan acquire a new one and
marketing costs are going up andall these things.
And I think you know you've donethe hard work.
(32:20):
If a customer is buying fromyou like that.
Well, you've kind of done somehard work.
The hard work is end to keepthem and keep them coming back.
But the point being that you'vegot the ability to do that with
an out of the box solution thatthat makes it easier to retain
as customers without having tonecessarily create an in-depth
customer retention strategy, canreally only only lead to a high
(32:43):
, you know, like a positive ROI,because you're not having to
self serve and self create thesesystems.
Like it's just, these systemsare out of the box, they're
there to help you and, like yousay, you know if 40% of
merchants haven't got thatstrategy in place, well, you
know, go visit your phone andyour lease halfway there Exactly
.
Speaker 2 (33:03):
I couldn't have said it better myself.
Speaker 1 (33:08):
So I like to finish off with a question that or
rather, let me reword thatVerena likes to finish off the
podcast by asking people whatbook they've read or what
podcast they're listening to.
So I'm hoping you've read abook in the last few months, but
then, if you have, would youmind telling us what that was?
Speaker 2 (33:29):
Yeah, I actually did just read a book.
This is a book that I read juston my last vacation, which
actually was my honeymoon a weekago, and I read the Personal
Librarian.
It's actually about JP Morgan'sPersonal Librarian and it was
an amazing book, highlyrecommend.
It was a perfect length,perfect amount of history with a
(33:57):
story and, for me personally,being based in New York, the
library is still here, so I thenwent to visit it after I
finished the book.
Speaker 1 (34:07):
Well, we'll have to find that and link to it in the
show notes.
If people want to learn moreabout Yachtpo and kind of get in
touch, what should they do?
Speaker 2 (34:16):
Feel free, honestly, to reach out directly to me.
You can add me on LinkedIn atCharlotte Bell.
You can also email me directly.
My email is Cbell at Yachtpocom.
Very easy, so that's C-B-E-L-Lat Yachtpocom and I'm happy to
answer any questions and workwith anybody that's interested.
Speaker 1 (34:37):
Brilliant.
And just to kind of go overagain, which e-commerce
platforms do you integrate with?
Speaker 2 (34:45):
We integrate with most e-commerce platforms, so we
actually we can link out a pageto our integrations from here
and we integrate with everythingfrom Shopify, big commerce,
woocommerce.
We have a ton of differentintegrations that I can share
with everybody.
Speaker 1 (35:06):
So you cover most of the platforms.
Speaker 2 (35:07):
Exactly, and if there's not an integration, then
we do have the ability tocreate that integration.
Speaker 1 (35:16):
And obviously you've got APIs as well.
Speaker 2 (35:18):
Exactly, you can use our APIs.
Speaker 1 (35:21):
Brilliant.
Charlotte, thank you very muchfor your time.
It's been really interestinglearning about how well kind of
what Yachtpo offers, but alsohow your merchants can kind of
benefit from using reviews andloyalty and SMS marketing and
the like.
So I've really enjoyed ourconversation.
Speaker 2 (35:38):
Me too.
I hope all of us have as well.
Speaker 1 (35:40):
This was great, and I look forward to catching up
with you soon.
Speaker 2 (35:44):
Me too, Thanks Luigi.
Speaker 1 (35:46):
No worries, thank you very much.
Bye, bye-bye.
Thank you for listening to theBigCommerce podcast.
If you've enjoyed today'sepisode, please leave us a
review on your favorite podcastplatform and if you want to
follow us on social media, youcan find us on Instagram, at the
bigcommerce podcast, and alsoon LinkedIn.
Alternatively, you can catch upon all older episodes on our
(36:09):
website.
If you've got ideas for anyepisodes, please reach out to us
.
Until next time, thank you forlistening.
Hi, welcome to the Big Commerce Podcast.
Hello and welcome to a brandnew episode of the Big Commerce
Podcast.
I'm your host, luigi, and thisweek I'm joined by Charlotte
Bell from Yoppo.
Yoppo is an e-commercemarketing platform that offers
an array of different products,such as loyalty referrals,
reviews, sms marketing, emailmarketing and user-generated
(00:24):
content.
In the conversation today, wecovered how merchants can
harness reviews, why they shouldbe part of their e-commerce
strategy and how they can alsoleverage things like loyalty
referrals and SMS to betterengage in high-convert customers
.
I hope you enjoy the episode.
Hey, charlotte, welcome to thepodcast.
Speaker 2 (00:46):
Thank you, I'm super excited to be on.
Speaker 1 (00:49):
It's super excited to have you on.
I know we were meant to recordthis a couple of months ago, but
that got moved.
I'm looking forward to talkingto you about reviews today.
For those who don't know, youwant to introduce yourself and
Yoppo.
Speaker 2 (01:03):
Perfect.
My name is Charlotte Bell and Iam a partner manager at Yoppo.
I have been in partnerships atYoppo for just about four years
actually, and to give you somebackground on Yoppo for those
that don't know it, I know somemight not know how to pronounce
it, some might not know what itstands for, but Yoppo's
(01:26):
e-commerce retention marketingplatform helps brands win and
retain customers for life withreviews, sms marketing, loyalty
and referrals, subscriptions andvisual, user-generated content.
The company was founded in 2011after the CEO, tomer, had a bad
experience buying a cameraonline and was burned by
(01:46):
trusting fake reviews.
We started as a reviewsplatform and now we have a full
suite of connected products.
Speaker 1 (01:53):
Thank you very much.
What does Yoppo stand for?
I know the answer to this one,but I wish you didn't ask me.
Come on.
Speaker 2 (02:00):
For opinion, the people's opinion.
Speaker 1 (02:02):
There we go.
Just because sometimes it'swithin an A, I mean I get it
with Call of Shock.
It's kind of what does it standfor?
And it doesn't stand foranything.
It's quite unique, butobviously Yoppo.
Speaker 2 (02:13):
Yeah, I should have asked you the question right
back.
Speaker 1 (02:16):
I'm sure I've said this before in the podcast, but
I'll get Verena to organize asession about the branding and
the name of Call of Shock,because it's a really boring
story, but it might help givesomeone some inspiration.
Of course, obviously, we'veworked together for a few years
and the platform's grown as well.
I think you've acquired acouple of different things that
(02:38):
connect into your system tobecome a marketing platform, but
fundamentally, you started off,like you said, with reviews, so
let's just focus on that.
How can Yoppo help businessesin terms of review management?
Because, also, e-commerceplatforms have reviews that are
out of the box and there areother systems.
(02:59):
So, as a merchant, you getquite a bit of choice as to how
you should manage reviews, and Ithink it's.
I still feel that when I speakto merchants it's something
that's under estimated and maybethey don't really fully
understand.
I get the question such as doescommerce handle reviews all the
way through to which platformshould we go with?
(03:21):
Can we integrate with differentsystems?
So I guess, starting at thebeginning, how can Yoppo help
businesses when they come intothis part of their marketing
discussion?
Speaker 2 (03:32):
Yeah, definitely.
So we have the smartest reviewsolution on the market Our
AI-driven smart prompts.
We have smart filters.
They both help brands tocollect high-quality reviews
that drive conversion anddisplay them where they will
have the most impact.
So we have integrations withGoogle, shopify, walmart,
facebook, instagram and more,and this is so that brands can
(03:54):
expand their reach beyond theirsites and showcase their best
reviews really wherever theirshoppers are.
Speaker 1 (04:02):
And I think that's one of the challenges that
merchants come up against.
It's kind of like you know, mycustomers can leave reviews
wherever, and so you know how doI choose the right platform,
how do I consolidate them.
Speaker 2 (04:13):
And how do you get them to show everywhere?
Speaker 1 (04:16):
Exactly, Exactly, Because also, I mean, I don't
know if it's true, but differentplatforms, I guess, are for
different people.
So if you're looking at kind of, you know a lot of people use
Google for predominantly, Iguess, service reviews rather
than kind of products.
But you're a bit more kind ofholistic in that approach and
that you can.
You basically can help themconsolidate all that and help
(04:37):
merchants to push out productreviews to their customers that
can then be used on differentplatforms.
Speaker 2 (04:43):
Exactly.
Speaker 1 (04:45):
So it forms part of kind of their marketing circle
as well, not just kind ofkeeping it within one platform.
Speaker 2 (04:50):
Exactly, and we have a ton of integrations, whether
with different e-commerceplatforms or with different
social media platforms.
You'll see, we're Googlepartners, so we really have the
ability to display those reviewson all different in all
different places so that theycan be seen the most.
Speaker 1 (05:09):
How, if you're looking at it from a merchant's
perspective, first of all, howimportant is having kind of
reviews campaign as part of youre-commerce strategy?
Speaker 2 (05:20):
It's extremely important.
I'm sure everybody listening isan online shopper.
Everyone's gone through theprocess themselves, everyone's
had their own customer journey,and the vast majority of
shoppers 90% in particular won'tbuy a product that doesn't have
reviews.
They're not just important forconversion, though.
(05:42):
High quality reviews also helpbrands ensure what we like to
call a valuable first purchase,meaning that the customer is
able to find and buy the perfectproduct for them, increasing
the likelihood that they'llreturn.
Of course, we always want themto come back, and this is just
looking, then, at reviews.
I'm sure we'll dive in a littlebit after to loyalty and
(06:03):
referrals, but YachtPot doesalso offer loyalty and referrals
, where we do incentivize thosecustomers to keep coming back.
Speaker 1 (06:14):
I've got to say I've used reviews as a way of helping
me make a decision around theproduct to buy, because most
recently it was with a runningarmband my phone holder broke.
I had to buy a new one, so I waswondering whether to buy a
holder or a sleeve to put myphone in and I basically went on
reviews, as in what one's gotthe highest number of reviews or
(06:37):
maybe the highest score, basedon the reason of amount of
reviews.
And that helped me make thedecision, because I can read so
many blog posts, I can read somany articles on different
online magazines about holders.
But at the end of the day, ifyou get the proof from people
that have bought that to say itfits, it doesn't fit, it doesn't
hold its shape, it isn'twaterproof or whatever, it can
(06:57):
help make that decision.
So from a customer perspective,it helped me make a choice that
I felt other people had alreadymade for me and maybe I
benefited from their experience.
But I guess from the flip sidealso, because we see this with
kind of NPS scores, it gives themerchant the opportunity to
understand what their customerslike or don't like about a
(07:19):
particular product or serviceExactly, exactly.
Speaker 2 (07:23):
That, too.
Another interesting part of itis so you of course didn't want
to buy another phone holder,right, that was potentially
going to break.
So you were going to readthrough the reviews and make
sure.
Okay, this one could last melonger, this one won't break.
We also have the ability tohave a question and answer
(07:44):
community section on the productpage.
So not only can you read andwrite reviews, but you can also
read and write questions.
So if you had a question andyou wanted to say what's better
this phone holder or the sleeve,the one that latches on to my
arm or it latches on to my belt,you could ask that question and
(08:08):
not only could the brandthemselves go back and answer,
but the actual community and anyother customer that has made
that purchase could go back andanswer too.
So you can get real timeanswers from not only the brand
but from other customers whobought that product.
Speaker 1 (08:24):
I find with some merchants they're a bit hesitant
to kind of embrace the reviewsbecause they or if they do, it's
kind of on their terms theydon't really want to hear the
truth.
So it's kind of like can we editthem, Can we manage them?
Can we hide the ones that arenegative?
And the problem with that isyou're not getting the well.
(08:46):
First of all, you're notholding yourself accountable.
So if your service is reallypoor, you're basically masking
it, saying we're just not goingto tell people that we're that
poor rather than doing somethingabout it.
But secondly, you're notgetting kind of actual feedback
from your customers or you'renot embracing it and potentially
also you're not, you're notbeing honest with as part of
(09:09):
your brand.
I mean, one of the valuesshould be kind of honest and
transparency and you're reallynot.
So how important is it foractually, we can go to that
later, but kind of from a let'sgo back to kind of managing
reviews then how, what are thebest ways to kind of have those
on your website?
Where do you see merchantswinning when they're displaying
(09:31):
or promoting reviews on theire-commerce websites?
Speaker 2 (09:34):
Yeah, definitely.
So it's important to displayboth your good and your bad
reviews.
Of course, like we just said, alot of brands are going to want
to just display their goodreviews.
But that's just not realisticto get all five star reviews
unless your product is trulyunbelievable and maybe you've
(09:54):
gotten bad reviews in the pastand you've made those
corrections and now you have allfive star reviews.
But that's likely not the case.
So if shoppers see all five starreviews on a product, that's
likely a red flag, and badreviews help customers make more
informed decisions.
So, for example, if I want tobuy a dress and somebody left a
review that said it runs small,I'll go a size up and I'll
(10:17):
likely be more satisfied with mypurchase and more likely to
leave a positive review and thenprobably purchase again.
So you'd want that reviewdisplayed because otherwise I'd
be unhappy if I didn't see thatit ran small.
I ordered my normal size.
It was too small.
I returned it.
I was like I don't know if I'meven going to exchange it then
for the bigger size.
(10:37):
So also, if it makes sense thenfor your brand to collect
photos, collect videos that'sanother great part of our user
generated content.
Exactly, exactly, and this helpsto overcome the biggest problem
e-commerce brands have, whichis that shoppers can't
(10:58):
experience the product in reallife before buying.
So if you see real people usingyour product in real
environments, it helps to boostconversion, because then
shoppers can really visualize itin their lives too.
Speaker 1 (11:13):
I guess you're making it a bit more emotive and
putting the potential buyer inthat frame of mind to say, okay,
this is what the actual productis going to look like, rather
than kind of a photoshoppedlifestyle image or something
that's kind of quite set up.
This is the bare bones.
We hear about UGC, usergenerated content, mostly around
social, but, as you say, thequestion and answers feature as
(11:37):
well, where you can get yourcommunity to put that content in
there and you've basically gotreal life fans, hopefully
promoting your product andshowing you the photos of the
product and use or in theenvironment.
But conversely, you can alsoget ones that show that it maybe
broke apart or it doesn't holdits eyes or whatever, and I
(11:59):
think that's one of thechallenges that merchants come
up against is that I don'treally have the bandwidth to
deal with that.
I have to stay on top andfirefight anything that you know
.
You get one disgruntledcustomer that's just going to,
you know, expend all theirenergy on trying to kind of take
you down and say I don't wantto deal with that.
So actually, how do I preventthat problem?
Well, I just hide, you know,the ability for them to be able
to write reviews or upload usergenerated content.
(12:23):
But I think also, like you say,it's A, it can help somebody
make a decision.
So if a medium or if a small isgoing to be maybe too small,
then maybe you move up to medium.
But also it shows the brand isgenuine, like you're not masking
(12:44):
anything, you're transparentand you're honest, and I think
that's especially in a day wherebad news can travel so fast.
I mean, if we go back to 30years, if you're a company that
sold really bad shirts, it wouldtake months or years for that
kind of reputation to now takeminutes on, you know, and so
(13:04):
really I think it's got to bepart of that strategy for a
merchant to stay on top of howtheir brand is perceived and
their reputation, and obviouslythere's tools out there.
But I think, as the commercebuyer kind of matures to
understand the commerce a lotmore, the commerce customer, you
acknowledge that not everyone'sgoing to have a 10 out of 10
experience, and I guessfundamentally just touching on
(13:29):
maybe negative reviews, so whatshould merchants do if they do
get kind of some not sofavorable feedback that's
published online?
Speaker 2 (13:38):
Yeah.
So if you do get not greatfeedback, we do have the option
also for brands to respondprivately to a customer that
left a bad review, and thatgives you the opportunity to
speak directly to that customerand understand what went wrong,
how can you help them and howreally we can turn around that
(13:59):
experience.
So that's really.
Another great aspect of ourplatform is the ability to
respond back to reviews, whetherpublicly or privately.
You have both options, andmaybe then you want to offer
them a discount code for theirnext product and offer something
that they will like based onwhat their review is.
(14:21):
Maybe that product just wasn'tfor them.
And then I'd say there's alsogoing to be ways that businesses
can use these reviews whetherthey're good or bad, but to then
improve their products orservices.
Speaker 1 (14:37):
I think that feedback is really good, because one
thing that a lot of merchantsdon't do is kind of market
research, and so this, I guess,is the second best thing,
because you're getting theirfeedback from the users and
they're telling you what worksor doesn't work.
Because, also, if you'retesting your product in a fairly
contained environment and notkind of in the real world,
(14:58):
you're not getting the real-lifefeedback that you might need to
develop that.
So using systems like reviews,like you say, is a good way,
because it's somebody that'sactually used that and said it
doesn't hold its size, itdoesn't fit.
The threading starts to comeoff after three runs, which is
what happened to my thing, andso that kind of feedback, I
(15:19):
guess, is invaluable.
And if you put yourself in asituation and say, ok, how would
I otherwise get that feedbackfrom a user or from however many
users you've got?
I guess there's also costsattached to that.
So really, what's the bestoption?
Do you kind of invest insomething like Yoppo, where you
get feedback from customers thathave used it, or do you go out
to a market research company andstart doing all that research
(15:41):
campaigns and investing money inthere?
So I think that's a really goodpoint.
You say as well using thefeedback to improve your product
or service or understand from acustomer what works and what
doesn't.
Speaker 2 (15:54):
Yeah, definitely.
And Yoppo has a smart sentimentalgorithm that analyzes a
brand's reviews andautomatically identifies
positive and negative reviewersentiment.
So, for example, a beautyretailer could quickly learn
that their bestselling eyeshadowhas a trend of negative
sentiment around the topic ofscent.
(16:14):
People love their eyeshadow butthey hate the smell.
So then that brand knows thatthey need to improve that aspect
of the product.
So keep that color, keep thatconsistency of the eyeshadow,
but work on the smell.
It gives you that opportunityto figure out what you need to
do to improve that product andmaybe to get then that five star
(16:36):
review.
Speaker 1 (16:38):
So that's really interesting because if you
compare kind of to other systemsthat are just purely a platform
to say fundamentally, rate ourproduct from one to five, and
then it just gives you therating.
You're actually kind of sayinglook, here are some trends
around what people like and whatthey don't like, so you can
continue to improve that productand start pushing up that
(17:01):
rating.
You've obviously got well many,many customers globally.
Are there any kind of successstories or case studies where a
merchant or a brand has kind ofharnessed the reviews and really
seen a significant change inthe way that their business
(17:22):
operates or grows?
Speaker 2 (17:25):
Definitely.
We have a really great casestudy and we actually have a
section on our website too, withall case studies, if anybody
wanted to read through more butone in particular is from a
sustainable and inclusiveoutdoor apparel brand for women.
The company brand is ACAI andthey have a premium price point
where they relied heavily onorganic growth via word of mouth
(17:48):
marketing from customers.
They knew that customerfeedback was key to their
success and they needed anefficient way to transform
feedback into actionableinsights.
So what they did was they hadan inclusive community that had
a strong foundation, but theyneeded a way to harness the
enthusiasm of their customers.
So they explored various reviewproviders.
(18:10):
They ultimately chose YachtPo,and we allowed them to implement
reviews and visual UGCalongside SMS.
So once they set up reviews,their review collection
accelerated and they weresimultaneously able to use
YachtPo's Insight tool to reallyhelp refine and direct their
product decisions based onvaluable customer insights.
So, for example, the mid-lengthtrek shorts, which is a super
(18:34):
popular item, were originallymade in a shorter length.
The Insight tool helps thebrand transform customer
feedback into actionableinsights, which gave them the
information that they needed toadjust the length of their
shorts to better suit the needsof their shoppers.
So after they do so, theshoppers are happier.
They adjusted the length oftheir shorts and they're happier
with the length, and if youwere to applications to any area
(18:56):
of major places, they couldimprove that they didn't know.
Speaker 1 (19:00):
So basically they went out with the intention of
kind of collecting or lookingfor a solution that helped them
collect reviews, and actuallythey didn't just get the
feedback engine, they actuallygot kind of the information they
needed to continually improvethat product.
Speaker 2 (19:16):
Exactly, and that's just one of many case studies
and examples.
We have a ton more, whetherit's in the fashion and apparel,
brand, realm, health and beauty.
You know you can really filterall of our case studies by
different industries as well, sothere will be a case study
really per industry.
Speaker 1 (19:37):
OK, we'll link to the case studies in the show notes
so that listeners can have aread of how your other merchants
have benefited through reviews.
But reviews is just one part ofthe suite of products that
Yoppo offers.
So what else have you got whenyou're asking with tools to help
merchants?
Speaker 2 (19:58):
Yeah, so Yoppo also offers visual marketing.
We offer loyalty and referrals,we offer SMS marketing, we
offer a subscription tool.
We really have a ton ofdifferent products.
We also offer email marketing.
So all of these products.
Really, what's amazing is theywork together under one roof, so
(20:21):
under one unified data layer,and they speak to each other.
So, for example, as we've beentalking about with reviews,
maybe you want to give loyaltypoints to somebody for leaving a
review and maybe you want togrant loyalty points for
somebody that signs up for yourSMS subscriber club and then,
(20:43):
through that SMS, we can ask forreview, we can promote
different products, offer adiscount code, pull in that five
star rating, so you really havea ton of opportunities to use
this cross product synergy.
Speaker 1 (20:57):
I guess that the benefit to the merchant there is
that you, like you said you'vegot that single data source.
So you haven't got to connectdifferent systems that maybe
collect different metrics andmake them talk to each other.
You're basically saying we'vegot one unified profile for this
customer and then, depending onwhich part of the Yoppo suite
you use, they're all pullingfrom that same data and they can
(21:19):
all talk to each other.
Exactly so unlike within thebigger e-commerce space, where
we're seeing the composablepiece, you're actually going the
opposite and making it moremonolithic and saying we can
really become a true marketingplatform for your brand because
we've got all these differenttools that can talk to each
(21:40):
other, that can pull for thesame data source, that can go
hand in hand as well.
Like you said, if somebodysigns up for loyalty they can
get or, sorry, for leisurereview, they get some loyalty
points, and I guess that canalso be pulled through to things
like email marketing and SMS.
And SMS is a really interestingpiece because it's like we seem
(22:03):
to have gone back to 2004,where everyone's doing text
messaging marketing.
But, actually, that's reallycoming to the forefront now as
that email space becomes reallysaturated, I guess.
Speaker 2 (22:17):
Definitely, sms marketing is huge and that's
actually people that arechoosing to communicate via SMS
are choosing that because that'stheir preferred way of
communication.
So for me, for example I havemy phone on me at all times I
choose SMS because then let'ssay that I am quickly shopping
(22:40):
for something I said, oh, I knowthat I have actually this
discount code in my text.
Let me just look at my text.
I'm choosing to use my phone asmy preferred way of
communication, so I'm signing upfor SMS.
If you don't prefer to do that,then totally fine, you won't
sign up for SMS.
But many I mean I'm sure yousee it and when you walk on the
(23:02):
street these days, everyone'sbumping into each other because
everyone's just looking out attheir phone at least in New.
York City they are, but.
Speaker 1 (23:10):
I don't know what to say.
Speaker 2 (23:12):
Yeah, everyone's on their phones these days.
Speaker 1 (23:16):
The other great thing about from a brand perspective
if your customers are willing togive you their mobile numbers,
their cell phone numbers, italso shows an element of trust
because they're quite intimateThings are mobile phones and so
if we're actually kind of givingyou our phone number so you can
market to us, it's showing thatwe trust you and we kind of
(23:38):
want to engage with you more asa brand.
Number one.
Number two I think the kind ofinteraction rates, engagement
rates on phone are much higherand also I think most SMS
messages are open within threeminutes of receipt, which is
nothing like for email marketing.
So I think from thatperspective, if you're looking
for some really good engagement,then SMS is the way to go.
Speaker 2 (24:03):
It's true.
It's true, I mean, once you geta text message, everybody jumps
and quickly opens their phone.
You hear that ding all the timeand, as annoying as it is, we
all do it and we all click onthe phone and whether it's a
vibrate, it's a ding.
Whatever it is, we open up thattext message right away.
Speaker 1 (24:27):
And probably action it, rather than just kind of
market spam or just look at theinbox and you've got 50 unread
emails and just do nothing aboutit.
I mean I don't think I've gotmore than three or four unread
texts at a time.
Speaker 2 (24:41):
And if I open up a text and it shows me a product
that has, you can really inputeven the star rating in there.
So it could say this lipstickis five stars and maybe I'm out
to dinner and I'm like actuallyI don't really like the lipstick
that I have in my bag.
And they just gave me adiscount code on this five star
lipstick.
Let me just order it quickly.
Speaker 1 (25:02):
Here's the link to order.
So could you mind giving us anexample of how SMS, how Merchant
might kind of utilize SMS toboost those conversions or to
kind of get that customer to buy?
Yeah?
Speaker 2 (25:15):
I mean, as you said, if you're signing up for SMS,
that means that you're trustingand you're giving that personal
phone number and so if you'rechoosing that, then you're
choosing to communicate on apersonal level and so, in
amazing way, not only to boostconversion, but it would be.
(25:37):
I mean, there's a ton ofdifferent ways.
Whether you want to, as I said,insert those reviews right
within that text message, youwant to ask for a review within
that text message, maybe youwant to refer a friend, and when
you refer a friend you getloyalty points and then you can
use those loyalty points to geta discount on that lipstick that
(25:59):
I just got a discount code for.
That was five stars.
You have a ton of differentways in which we can use, as we
said, all of our productstogether.
So SMS, in particular, is anamazing way to pull it all
together, because I can insertall of those different aspects
right in a text message, rightat the most personal way of
(26:21):
communication, right on.
You know, somebody's usuallyholding that phone right in
their pocket, right on theirbody, and so, whether it's
asking for a review in there,inserting reviews, providing a
discount code, maybe somebody is10 points away from reaching
their next VIP tier, and on thatnext VIP tier you're about to
(26:43):
get free shipping on every orderthat you purchase.
So here's a product that willget you those 10 points.
So there's a ton of differentways in which we can use SMS
really to increase purchases atthat super personal level, and
we can tailor it to yourpersonal interests.
(27:06):
We know, then.
We know what you like.
We know a lot about you.
Speaker 1 (27:13):
So I was about to say that it's not just kind of
again like other email marketingplatforms or marketing
platforms.
It is tailoring the messagingand those campaigns to the user.
And because you've got thatsingle kind of customer data
profile, you're able to thensegment your emails and say I
know that you buy this type ofproduct or this type of brand,
(27:35):
that, like you said, your Xnumber of points away maybe from
the next tier, and so you canuse all those different
attributes to really target thatuser, to get the highest
conversion, highest engagementfor your marketing efforts.
Speaker 2 (27:50):
Yeah, and we do have a huge library of automations
and flows.
Whether a brand wants to choosefrom those that we offer
because of course you're goingto want that card abandonment
flow when somebody you knowabandons their product in their
cart and we want to then sendout a text message and offer a
discount on that product, wehave that welcome flow.
(28:11):
We have a huge library for youto choose from.
But then of course you can alsobe creative and make your own
automation simple as but we giveyou a great starting point and
we give you all all the basicsthat you might need.
But you can also really becreative there with with your
SMS.
Speaker 1 (28:31):
I think that's really important because a lot of
merchants sometimes find itbecomes a battle to kind of keep
on top of these things.
So the fact that you kind of saylook, you know the platforms
there, you know you can eitherkind of self serve with some off
the shelf ideas and flows or,if you need that you know kind
of customization and you need toget down into the trenches and
(28:52):
start mapping everything out andreally telling it.
Then you can do that as well.
So there is because sometimesyou kind of speak to some
platforms and it's it's eitheryou know kind of self serve or
they do the onboarding for you,not necessarily kind of reviews,
but just in general, andsometimes that can be a bit of
putting for a merchant, ofputting for a merchant because
then I don't have the bandwidth.
Today I could do with thatproduct, I could do with that,
(29:12):
that technology, that service,but I'm not going to be able to
commit to or I don't understandenough.
I've got to bring in moreresources.
So the fact that kind of yourpose got this flexibility to be
able to support the merchantssay look, you know you can, you
can kind of come in on self onboard, you know off the shelf,
and then when you get tounderstand how the system works,
when you start seeing thosebenefits, you can start tweaking
(29:35):
and tailoring those things toreally start accelerating your
your conversions.
Speaker 2 (29:41):
Exactly, and you can have those automation set up too
, so you won't have to manuallydo it all.
Speaker 1 (29:48):
Brilliant Are you?
Are you kind of seeing anytrends in with any commerce
within the market or anythingthat's kind of you see is coming
around the corner that maybeour merchants can take some
inspiration from?
Speaker 2 (30:01):
Definitely the biggest change that we're seeing
is brands focusing more oncustomer retention, so realizing
that you need to move theneedle on retention and actually
doing it.
Are two different things,though, so, in fact, we recently
surveyed e-commerce brands and52% of them said that they were
more focused on retention thanthey were a year ago, but over
(30:21):
40% haven't made any changes totheir strategy in order to
improve it.
So why haven't they?
34% said their biggestchallenge is the lack of a clear
strategy, so our takeaway fromthat data is that brands know
how important retention is, butit's unclear on how to really
get it started, and without asolid strategy, you're left with
(30:43):
a hopefully they liked usenough to come back approach,
which clearly isn't working.
70% of those surveyed said theirretention rate has either
stayed the same or gotten worseover the past year.
So with rising acquisitioncosts, I think we're going to
see more brands beef up theirretention strategies with
subscriptions and loyaltyprograms and deeper
personalization and really justleveraging data to better
(31:05):
understand their customers sothat they can build those
winning experiences that keepthem coming back, and all things
that brands can do with YachtPo, by the way.
Speaker 1 (31:16):
That's a really important piece you said there
around, kind of the data,because I think again not to
kind of harp on about it but thefact that you've got a single
source of truth for thatcustomer profile.
Because we're in on data withdata right at the moment these
days, it's just at the momenteveryone's kind of panicking
about GA4.
I think 90% of the world isprobably asking itself why, when
(31:39):
Universal Analytics was fine,it's just, it's just it's about
the data and obviously it's gotso many benefits.
But the problem is that thereis an element of kind of
paralysis by analysis, becauseit's just there's so much data
out there and the fact thatyou're not making merchants say,
well, you know, putting datafrom this system for
subscriptions, pulling data fromthis system for loyalty and
referrals, this one for reviewsand this one for email marketing
(32:00):
, but you actually got thatunified profile with the
analytics, I think helps makelife easier for the merchants
and, like you say, you know andeveryone knows it's far cheaper
to sell to an existing customerthan acquire a new one and
marketing costs are going up andall these things.
And I think you know you've donethe hard work.
(32:20):
If a customer is buying fromyou like that.
Well, you've kind of done somehard work.
The hard work is end to keepthem and keep them coming back.
But the point being that you'vegot the ability to do that with
an out of the box solution thatthat makes it easier to retain
as customers without having tonecessarily create an in-depth
customer retention strategy, canreally only only lead to a high
(32:43):
, you know, like a positive ROI,because you're not having to
self serve and self create thesesystems.
Like it's just, these systemsare out of the box, they're
there to help you and, like yousay, you know if 40% of
merchants haven't got thatstrategy in place, well, you
know, go visit your phone andyour lease halfway there Exactly
.
Speaker 2 (33:03):
I couldn't have said it better myself.
Speaker 1 (33:08):
So I like to finish off with a question that or
rather, let me reword thatVerena likes to finish off the
podcast by asking people whatbook they've read or what
podcast they're listening to.
So I'm hoping you've read abook in the last few months, but
then, if you have, would youmind telling us what that was?
Speaker 2 (33:29):
Yeah, I actually did just read a book.
This is a book that I read juston my last vacation, which
actually was my honeymoon a weekago, and I read the Personal
Librarian.
It's actually about JP Morgan'sPersonal Librarian and it was
an amazing book, highlyrecommend.
It was a perfect length,perfect amount of history with a
(33:57):
story and, for me personally,being based in New York, the
library is still here, so I thenwent to visit it after I
finished the book.
Speaker 1 (34:07):
Well, we'll have to find that and link to it in the
show notes.
If people want to learn moreabout Yachtpo and kind of get in
touch, what should they do?
Speaker 2 (34:16):
Feel free, honestly, to reach out directly to me.
You can add me on LinkedIn atCharlotte Bell.
You can also email me directly.
My email is Cbell at Yachtpocom.
Very easy, so that's C-B-E-L-Lat Yachtpocom and I'm happy to
answer any questions and workwith anybody that's interested.
Speaker 1 (34:37):
Brilliant.
And just to kind of go overagain, which e-commerce
platforms do you integrate with?
Speaker 2 (34:45):
We integrate with most e-commerce platforms, so we
actually we can link out a pageto our integrations from here
and we integrate with everythingfrom Shopify, big commerce,
woocommerce.
We have a ton of differentintegrations that I can share
with everybody.
Speaker 1 (35:06):
So you cover most of the platforms.
Speaker 2 (35:07):
Exactly, and if there's not an integration, then
we do have the ability tocreate that integration.
Speaker 1 (35:16):
And obviously you've got APIs as well.
Speaker 2 (35:18):
Exactly, you can use our APIs.
Speaker 1 (35:21):
Brilliant.
Charlotte, thank you very muchfor your time.
It's been really interestinglearning about how well kind of
what Yachtpo offers, but alsohow your merchants can kind of
benefit from using reviews andloyalty and SMS marketing and
the like.
So I've really enjoyed ourconversation.
Speaker 2 (35:38):
Me too.
I hope all of us have as well.
Speaker 1 (35:40):
This was great, and I look forward to catching up
with you soon.
Speaker 2 (35:44):
Me too, Thanks Luigi.
Speaker 1 (35:46):
No worries, thank you very much.
Bye, bye-bye.
Thank you for listening to theBigCommerce podcast.
If you've enjoyed today'sepisode, please leave us a
review on your favorite podcastplatform and if you want to
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Alternatively, you can catch upon all older episodes on our
(36:09):
website.
If you've got ideas for anyepisodes, please reach out to us
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Until next time, thank you forlistening.
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