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How to Plan an Epic Product Launch Week

How to Plan an Epic Product Launch Week
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Our inboxes are cluttered.

Ecommerce brands are trying their best to stand out and grab the attention of their audience. Some create hype, others fall flat.

[Ultimate Checklist Guide] Plan a Birthday, Promo, or Product Launch Week

In this ultimate checklist guide, we’ll unpack how Carved, a brand that design handmade wooden goods, planned and ran a successful birthday week with Magnet Monster as their email and SMS partners. You can easily apply it to a promotion or product launch week campaign strategy to help you boost sales and engagement.

Buckle up your seatbelt!

Extras you get with this article guide:

  • (FREEBIE) Magnet Monster: Holiday/Promo/Product Launch Week Checklist
  • Breakdown of Carved’s birthday week turned into an actionable checklist
  • Email design examples

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[FREEBIE ALERT!] 

We have created a Google Sheet to help you effectively plan a birthday, promotions or product launch week for your Ecommerce client, team or your own brand.

(Download the free Google Sheet here) —> lead magnet

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UNPACKING CARVED’S BIRTHDAY WEEK

Carved planned and ran a 5-part email sequence as part of their birthday week strategy. Each day had a different theme attached to it to ensure that email engagement is kept top of mind while sending cadence is high.

Here’s how well their birthday week emails performed throughout their Bday week:

Source: Klaviyo insights via Looker Studio

  • 200% Increase in Total Placed Order Value against the weekly average (highest for the year 2023)

  • Avg. Click Rate of 3.2% from emails (higher than their average of 2.1%)

  • Total Unsubscribes had a slight spike, but not nearly enough to cause damage to their sender reputation, especially not at the volume of emails that have been delivered during this period (see the graph below).

Source: Klaviyo total unsubscribe graph

Here’s a breakdown of tactics and elements that were included within Carved’s emails that you can use as a checklist for your own birthday or promotion week strategy. 

Tip #1: Setting the expectation on what can be expected

Communicate anticipated birthday week highlights: special offers, exclusive discounts, limited-edition products, and more. Set expectations, generate anticipation, and engage customers.

Carved’s examples:

Tip #2: Eye-catching subject line and preview text

Craft attention-grabbing subject lines and preview text for your birthday week emails and promotions. Personalise them, use action words, and emphasise value to boost open and click-through rates.

Carved’s examples:

You do NOT want to miss our birthday 🎂

🥳Birthday week starts NOW!🎉

Drop alert⚫Stealth Knife Blackout Edition

🏔️Meet our NEW MNTNS collection

Quiz time! Are you a Carved connoisseur? 

It’s drop o’clock! 50 Sk8 Cases available

TGIF: Grand Teton inlay cases are back! (only 50)

Birthday week is coming to an end…

Tip #3: Create hype and grab attention with scarcity

Create urgency and excitement with limited-time deals, exclusive birthday-only promotions, and unique experiences available only during the birthday week. Communicate limited availability to instil FOMO and drive immediate action.

Carved’s examples:

Tip #4: Making it sticker with giveaways

Generate excitement during your birthday week with giveaways. Offer free products, gift cards, or special experiences as prizes. Encourage participation through social media, email subscriptions, or purchases. Giveaways build loyalty, generate buzz, and amplify your campaign's impact.

Carved’s examples:

Tip #5: Highly attractive product drops (especially limited-editions)

Create a buzz by releasing exclusive and limited-edition products during your birthday week. This tactic generates excitement and a sense of urgency among your customers, encouraging them to make a purchase and potentially even share the news with others.

Carved’s examples:

Tip #6: Cross-sell/upsell for higher AOV

Encourage customers to explore additional products or upgrade their purchases by offering relevant cross-sell and upsell opportunities. By showcasing complementary or premium items, you can increase the average value of each order, resulting in higher revenue and customer satisfaction.

Carved’s examples:

Tip #7: Easy opt-out to reduce spam complaints and unsubscribes

Provide a clear and simple opt-out process for customers who no longer wish to receive birthday week communications. This approach helps maintain a positive brand image and minimises spam complaints and unsubscribes, allowing you to focus on engaging with interested and willing participants.

Carved’s examples:

Tip #8: Bring in a human-touch with more text-based emails

Instead of solely relying on design-heavy emails, incorporate personalised, text-based messages during your birthday week. This approach adds a human touch to your communication, making customers feel valued and fostering a stronger connection between your brand and its audience.

Carved’s examples:

Tip #9: Spark more engagement with a quiz

Create a birthday-themed quiz to spark engagement and interaction with your audience. The quiz can be related to your products, brand history, or customer preferences. This interactive tactic not only entertains customers but also provides valuable insights for customization and segmentation, leading to a more tailored and effective marketing approach.

Carved’s examples:

MORE TIPS FROM OUR TEAM OF EXPERTS

What's important is to make sure you're offering something different, unique, or limited edition-based—something that you don't normally do—and make it irresistible. This will help to hype up the entire event. Adding in limited quantities only provides a sense of exclusivity, which helps products sell faster.

Keina Mehta - Strategist

Tip 1: Create a dedicated landing page.

Tip 2: Visually "show" that there are X number of units still available/unallocated. Start with 10,000 (or any other number), but visually indicate that there are less than 100 units left. This drives up the psychological fear of missing out, making individuals feel like they are the only ones still undecided while 9000+ others consider it a good deal.

Tip 3: Add a countdown timer to the end of the offer.

Tip 4: Include a prominent SIGN UP form on the squeeze page. This will ensure that people have to participate to have a chance of purchasing the product if they join the queue quickly enough.

Tip 5: To demonstrate real commitment, request payment upfront to secure their product, even if it has not yet been manufactured. Additionally, emphasise that by committing now, they will have the opportunity to invite their friends to this exclusive landing page through invite-only access.

Tip 6: Add a countdown clock ticking towards the release date.

Tip 7: Track every single metric on the landing or squeeze page, including user behaviour, for daily micro adjustments.

Andrew Langhorn - Co-Founder and CFO

If you're planning a birthday week promo for your brand, let your subscribers know beforehand.

Tell them exactly what to expect and inform them that you'll be sending out more emails than usual.

This not only primes them for your upcoming campaigns but also gives them a chance to opt out if they're not interested.

The last thing you want is high unsubscribe rates and spam complaints on such a happy occasion!

Eric Wall - Copywriter

A post-launch/promo/birthday last-chance campaign would be great. This will make sure that we're leaving no crumbs behind and get as many people over the fence as possible.

We might even do this with SauceShop, as their subscribers were super receptive to the birthday campaigns.

Jed Escuzar - Project Manager

CLOSING THOUGHTS

  • Create hype to capture the attention of your target audience. You don’t want to cheapen your brand by creating ‘false’ or ‘forced’ hype.

  • When you are planning your daily themes, find a good mix of email copy focused on sales, educational, informative and engaging messaging.

  • Pinpoint your business goals before jumping feet first into planning a full week.

Every ecommerce brand could benefit from a birthday or promotion week once a year. Be meticulous in the planning stages to ensure that you utilize your email and SMS channels to their best advantage.

Enjoyed this article? Follow me on Twitter or LinkedIn and don't forget to join 5,000+ hungry D2C enthusiasts who lap up our CEO Adam Kitchen's weekly insider insights on eCommerce email marketing.

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