Cozy Earth hones in on digital marketing to prep for Cyber 5 sales
Customer acquisition was simpler before — and even at the heart of — the pandemic for Cozy Earth, a direct-to-consumer bedding and loungewear brand.
“Back then, it was relatively easy for us to acquire customers and get really meaningful space on people’s phones, on Facebook, on Instagram, whatever it was,” said Weston Clark, director of customer retention. “And it was really: How much money can we spend? Because it was pretty cheap to acquire a customer from 2017 all the way up until 2021 when the iOS change happened.”
About 80% of Cozy Earth’s web traffic comes from mobile devices, Clark told Digital Commerce 360. As a result, the retailer continues to invest in its SMS and email marketing to boost its direct-to-consumer sales.
And it hasn’t been as easy post-pandemic.
“Acquisition costs have pretty much soared through the roof, and it’s become even more important for us to — one, retain our customers, but two, find different channels for us to acquire these customers,” Clark explained.
Cozy Earth was founded in 2010, but the brand primarily focused on selling at trade shows for about six or seven years before it began selling online, Clark said. The retailer is also working on growing its wholesale business, he added.
Improving email marketing
Cozy Earth uses software provider Attentive for its SMS and email marketing. Before switching to Attentive, many of Cozy Earth’s marketing emails would go straight to consumers’ spam folders for about six to eight months. The previous email marketing provider “had no idea that that was happening, and in turn, we didn’t either,” Clark recalled.
Although the retailer’s average order value hasn’t changed since making the switch, its click-through and conversion rates have increased.
“We’re seeing more conversions because we’re seeing more clicks because we’re not hitting spam folders,” he said.
Keri McGhee, chief marketing officer at Attentive, told Digital Commerce 360 that just like consumers, Attentive’s clients want value for every dollar they spend. She said the trend when it comes to spending on technology and marketing is consolidation.
Attentive has added generative and predictive artificial intelligence tools to its suite, which McGhee said “allows brands to send the right message, at the right time, to the most engaged subscribers.”
From there, the brands can maximize where the consumer is in their shopping journey to drive the highest return on investment. Attentive data showed that shoppers, on average, are clicking less than three times per session.
“So you have three clicks to convert somebody and give them the most personalized experience,” she said.
About 1,000 of Attentive’s clients use both its email and SMS marketing tools. And consumers spend six times more when those clients use both sets of marketing tools, McGhee said.
Holiday sales: Cozy Earth preps for Cyber 5
“It’s really important for us to have successful email and SMS channels over the holidays because that’s where we drive all of our profit,” Clark said.
Cozy Earth promotes Black Friday sales on its homepage ahead of Thanksgiving and the Cyber 5.
During the Cyber 5 period in 2023, Cozy Earth grew its sales 25% year over year. The fourth quarter is the retailer’s busiest time of year, Clark said. The Cyber 5 is the five-day period from Thanksgiving through Cyber Monday.
To prepare for it, Cozy Earth:
- Ensures it purchases the right amount of inventory.
- Communicates with its fulfillment center — Cozy Earth uses a third-party logistics provider (3PL) — to understand how much the retailer can ship.
- Communicates shipping deadlines to its customers “in a way that’s honest and conservative at the same time,” Clark said.
“But we also don’t want to give them an extra 2-3 days,” Clark said. “Let’s say our shipping deadline’s on Dec. 15. We don’t want to tell them the 12th, sales will slow down after that shipping deadline. So those are the three most important things is communicating those dates to the customers and then actually fulfilling the orders, making sure they’re there on time.”
During the 2023 Cyber 5 period, 45% of Attentive clients used its AI tools, McGhee said. In that period, they generated a total of about $1.8 billion in online sales.
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