Now sellers have yet another opportunity to engage and retarget their existing customers. In early March, Amazon quietly rolled out the Manage Your Customer Engagement tool that sends engaging emails to a brand’s followers informing them about the new product launches and discount offers. It’s almost like running an email campaign, with the only difference being that you don’t have the email list with you. Keep on reading to learn about this latest tool and how it can enhance your shopping experience and drive brand growth.
What is Manage Your Customer Engagement tool
Manage Your Customer Engagement tool, or MYCE as we call it, allows brand registered sellers to initiate email campaigns and send engaging content to shoppers who opt to “follow” them. The follow+ button is featured in areas such as Amazon Seller Storefront & Amazon Live. It is quite similar to an email marketing campaign, with the only difference being that Amazon manages the campaigns; you are just responsible for creating content.
The tool supports new product announcements and special offers, but additional templates will be available in the future.
Take a look at the video for a detailed explanation:
Video credits: Amazon.
Quick questions:
Who is eligible?
Manage Your Customer Engagement is available to all brand registered sellers that have Amazon store. If your brand is not registered or you don’t have an Amazon storefront yet, please contact us.
Is Manage Your Customer Engagement tool available for all marketplaces?
No, this is a beta program exclusively for US sellers.
Is there a fee?
As it is included as a part of brand registry, there is no extra fee. One thing I’ve learned in all these years is that when Amazon offers something for free, it’s always a great idea to give it a try.
Where can I find the MYCE dashboard
It’s under the “Brand” tab of Seller Central. Or just click here. You might not be able to see the dashboard yet even if you have a full-fledged store and followers because Amazon has not made it available to everyone. Just wait for a few more months; till then, you can always make strategies to increase followers.
How can I measure the effectiveness of my campaigns?
Because this tool is still in beta mode, there is no sophisticated data available yet, but sellers are provided with Open Rate and Total Reach data for each campaign.
What are the benefits?
To quote Amazon, “The Manage Your Customer Engagement tool empowers your brand to build loyal relationships, increase retention, and drive engagement.”
How can I set up a campaign on the MYCE dashboard?
Image credit: Bobsled Marketing
The process is pretty straightforward. Brands can simply choose the ASINs they wish to target, select a campaign start and end date, and they will be able to send email alerts to all the customers who follow them.
Here’s everything you’ll need to start campaigns:
- A high-resolution logo. Logos must be in a horizontal layout (3:1 or narrower) and have a white, black or PNG background.
- A single product you want to feature. It’s a good idea to choose your newly launched ASINs who need a visibility boost.
- A supporting image. Preferably a lifestyle that shows product-in-use.
Next step would be to select the time frame (a five-day period between Monday to Friday) for which you want to run the campaigns. Once it is scheduled, Amazon will review the campaign to see if your content meets the requirements. It takes a minimum of 72 hours for your campaign to be reviewed. Once approved, Amazon will automatically send emails to everyone who’s following your brand. However, if your campaign is not approved, you should look at Amazon’s content requirements.
You can ask your Amazon seller consultants to build campaigns for you, or take help from our experts.
Important note: Brand should not use it as a medium to ask for reviews. For that type of communication, you can either use Amazon’s “Request a Review” button or look at our blog for white hat tricks to gain reviews.
How does a campaign look like?
Image credit: Amazon.
Now the question is, how to gain followers? The main source through which sellers can gain followers is via their storefront. Did you notice the little Follow+ button on the upper right corner? Yes, when a customer clicks there, you will have a brand new follower.
Other than the storefront, the follow button is also featured in Amazon Live videos. More on this in the next section.
How can brands gain more followers on Amazon?
Most probably, you don’t have access to Manage Your Customer Engagement tool at the moment. But it would be great if you begin the efforts to build a following. Sellers can increase their followers by two mediums, Amazon storefront and Amazon Live. Amazon Live gives sellers the ability to interact with their customers. You don’t need to be a vlogger to go live. You can set up a camera in your warehouse to show how your product is being made or show the assembly instructions, talk about the unique uses of the product or just host an interview with a satisfied customer.
Everyone knows what Amazon storefront is. But a few know how to use it well. First and foremost, it isn’t enough to just stash all the products of your catalog on one page and call it a store. You should have a multipage storefront that has all the products neatly categorized and organized. Imagery is another important part of the storefront. Never ever skimp on that. And the last thing, add a banner in your brand store that prompts the customers to click on the Follow+ button. Your detail page should also hint the customers to visit the brand store and follow your brand because that’s where most of the shopping activities occur. Include a banner in your Amazon Enhanced Brand Content or add a sentence in your bullet points.
Why did Amazon release this tool?
- The Manage Your Customer Engagement tool is yet another attempt by Amazon to make the shopping experience of their customers more “social”.
- Amazon wants to reengage shoppers and wants that they keep coming back to purchase more.
- This tool also helps shoppers weed out fake sellers that have caused rather costly problems for the company in the past.
- When customers receive emails from a brand, they feel even more appreciated and are more likely to become loyal and repeat customers.
- Prior to the launch of this tool, brands had limited interaction with the shoppers. The retail giant may have developed this feature to draw more sellers so it can remain the dominant player in the retail e-commerce space.
For name brands that already have a large number of followers, this will be an excellent marketing tool to integrate into your Amazon customer engagement strategy.
The matter is still in Amazon’s hand
Marketers think that with the launch of this tool, Amazon is “loosening its grip on customers and letting sellers reach out to them”. But that’s not actually the case. All of the campaigns will be created within the Manage Your Customer Engagement dashboard and Amazon will send email alerts on the seller’s behalf. Amazon has always prohibited sellers from communicating directly with customers unless they want to inform them about the order status. In such situations, brands can use Amazon’s internal messaging system to communicate with customers and resolve issues.
The retail giant is still keeping the customer’s private information such as email address and phone number private. But with this tool, Amazon allows sellers to interact and engage indirectly with the customers while also keeping things under control. Amazon even reviews the content that will be shared, ensuring they adhere to its policy.
The only limitation we could think of is
A customer can follow a brand only if they visit their storefront or attend the live. But Amazon shoppers spend most of their time browsing the product detail pages. They don’t usually end up on storefronts unless the brand is running Amazon Sponsored Ad campaigns or if they notice a tiny URL under the title.
So, even though Amazon is offering more ways to engage with the customers, it is still challenging for brands to gain followers. However, you can always use our tips to increase followers on the marketplace. Don’t be disappointed if you don’t see the sudden increase in numbers as you expected. Always remember: Consistency is the key.
So….is it worth it?
Yes, of course! First of all, it’s free, so there is no reason not to give it a try. Amazon is majorly a pay-to-play marketplace. Every day, brands invest hundreds of dollars just to get their product in the eyes of customers. And when this new customer allows you to engage with your customers and boost sales without even spending a dime, why shouldn’t you use it? Say you have 100 followers and out of those, if 5 decide to give your newly launched product a try, wouldn’t that be great, considering you haven’t spent even a dollar in the campaign?
Using this tool is yet another opportunity to interact directly with your shoppers, develop a stronger relationship and encourage repeat purchase. The campaigns provide an enhanced shopping experience which can help build brand awareness.
Best of all, you can announce your product launch, discounts and promotions to customers who are already interested in your brand and want to know more about your products.
Need some creative help?
Just like any other social media or email marketing campaign, content is the king. The content you send to the shoppers says a lot about the brand and can make or break your campaigns. Our team of Amazon graphic designers can help you create a storefront that gets you more followers and informative ad catchy email content that drives engagement. Remember, we are Amazon consultants too! So content created would be as per Amazon guidelines and is less likely to get rejected.