How to generate quick revenue with a reactivation campaign
There is a tactic I have used twice now at Lead Cookie to generate significant sales increases.
It's a simple concept, and it's one that any established business can use.
It's the reactivation campaign.
In short, you reach out to every prospect you have ever spoken to before with a new offer.
In this article, I dive into what a reactivation campaign is in more detail, and share how we did this successfully twice at Lead Cookie.
What is a reactivation campaign?
A reactivation campaign is just what it sounds like. It is a "reactivation" of past customers or prospects who are no longer active.
These are people who once showed interest in your business, but did not buy, or churned off at some point in the past.
For an established business, this can be a lot. At Lead Cookie we have over 2,000 inactive leads in our CRM.
Why run a reactivation campaign?
Reactivation campaigns are low hanging fruit. These are people who already are aware of you, so the engagement potential is significantly higher. They are much more likely to open your emails or entertain your messages than a cold lead.
They also likely have a need that you can help them with. That is why they reached out to you at some point in the past.
When to run a reactivation campaign
One key thing to note is that this is not a tactic to just use anytime. The two times we have used this at Lead Cookie have been when we have evolved or iterated our product.
The first time I ran this was when rolled out a "Lead Cookie Lite" version of our core product that was at a lower price point. This converted very well.
The most recent time we ran this is when we rolled out our Sales System offering which includes LinkedIn, email, and phone.
Both campaigns were tied to major product updates which helped lead to significant conversion.
How to run a reactivation campaign
Step 1) Build your list
The first step is to build your list of prospects. If you have been keeping good records with your CRM. This should be easy.
At Lead Cookie, we simply sorted our CRM data by all statuses that were not currently active in the sales process. We began there and exported a giant list of over 2,000 contacts.
Step 2) Clean your list
Once you export your list, it's time to go through by hand and clean it up. Have anyone who is involved in sales at your organization give this list a read through and eliminate anyone who you should NOT contact.
Both my head of sales, and myself went through the whole list and cut out names of people who we knew we did not want to pitch again, or who were not our ideal fit.
Step 3) Load your list into an email marketing software
We set up our campaign in Mailshake.com which is a tool for sending mass emails. We then load our list into Mailshake and set up a very simple, short and sweet email sequence.
The script we used before Corona hit was as follows: (Note we are currently adjusting this during COVID-19)
Hi {{first_name}},
We spoke in the past about having Lead Cookie help ramp up sales for your business but we didn’t go forward at the time.
Recently we put together some new offers that encompass outreach across Email, LinkedIn, and phone. Would you be interested in learning more?
Step 4) Send campaign slow and steady
Here is an interesting thing about reactivation campaigns... the response rate is going to be insane. We get over a 10% response rate to our outreach campaigns. And from those a very high conversion to call.
BUT you must also recognize that this list is finite. And this is a tactic you can only do every now and then.
So while it may be tempting to send to your entire list in one week, I would encourage you not to do so for a two reasons.
First, sending to everyone at once will lead to overwhelm and panic.
Second, by sending slow and steady, you will be able to make any tweaks to the message over the first few weeks to improve it.
Reactivation campaigns are amazing when the timing is right
As I mentioned, we get over a 10% response rate whenever we run these outreach campaigns and see a significant increase in sales as a result.
But you must recognize that for this to work, you need a reason to outreach. And one of the best reasons is a product or service update which enables you to help more people in a way you couldn't before.
So get after it. Go launch your first reactivation campaign!