📆Q1 Report: spending trends & mindset

New here? This is Inbox Hacking, a Free Newsletter for Awesome email marketers eager to increase Awesomeness. Email marketing insights, tools, & tactics sent twice per week. Someone forwarded you our Newsletter? Please join over 14,411 Email Marketers and sign up for your Free subscription. Today → bite-sized insights from Q1 online spending trends, a Sweet 16 Email Marketing Tournament, & much more.

Tuesday’s edition of Inbox Hacking has arrived alive and well. You too (if you’re able to read this 🤞🏼). Here’s what’s on tap this morning.

A look at shopping behavior via nuggets I smashed together from a Q1 2023 Jungle Scout Report. Doesn’t matter if your email marketing is promoting e-commerce or services or magic elixirs. Knowing what’s going on in shoppers’ heads, including generational trends, will help guide you on your email campaigns. At the end of the feature story is a Sweet 16 Bracket for Email Marketing.

3 Key Findings in Report

Download the full report if you have plenty of free time🙃.

Boomers are 78% more likely than Gen Zers to buy items on sale

*Hint, that’s why your grandpa can buy a Cadillac with a stack of $100 bills. Plus he’s had 61 years to save.

Most surprising online shopping destination in the top 10? Etsy.com

*A lowly 8% of traffic compared to top dog Amazon’s 68% but just 5 points behind Target.com which was the #2 most popular offline shopping spot.

The top 2 money-saving strategies: 1) Buy on sale. 2) Use coupons / discount codes

*Of the 11 money-saving strategies – all but one involved still spending money! That one tactic was “doing without,” and Boomers outpaced other generations choosing that one (see Cadillac note above💰).

Targeted Email Marketing from Findings

Look folks, all you’re gonna hear is gloom and doom about the economy until houses start selling like crack cocaine again. Or when crack starts selling like meth once more. (Crack dealers need an SVB-type bailout)

So ride the wave and lean into what is on people’s minds.

If you’ve segmented your email list with some Baby Boomers grouped together, awesome. There may be no better time to send them 20% more sale offers than younger segments.

Next. Perhaps Etsy.com – the little woodworking site that could – has promise.

Get creative and build your list there
Partner with Etsy sellers to cross-sell from your website
Sell a few items there to test conversions over to your site

If it’s been a while since you had a meaningful coupon, why not email a generous discount code this week? Your VIP segment would appreciate it and maybe forward it to a friend→ ask them to… grovel if you must. (Pleeeease forward Inbox Hacking to an email marketer down on their luck, maybe one with gambling debt. They need improved email deliverability more than anyone I bet.)

Also, if you are offering lots of coupons that go unused— is the design not grabbing enough attention?

Where are People Searching for Stuff?

Amazon topped the list for where people start their shopping search but you know that already. The fresh Q1 data showed Walmart.com as the only online spot with a significant rise in searches (+6%).

Note. The chart shows a total of 9% (6% & 3%) of searches up for grabs. As they start somewhere else besides the most popular sites. Where? IDK, I’m busy with this newsletter. But leaning into referrals and ramping up positive reviews would not be a bad idea so you don’t lose sleep over searches.

Pre-Owned Economy

Hard to sell pre-owned consulting, marketing, or courses. But you can:

Revamp or revise courses
Contact old clients (not Boomers necessarily – past clients😁)

As for used items, here’s what’s hot online (in order):

Books
Clothing
Electronics

Not so hot, starting with last place:

Musical instruments
Bikes
Watches & Sporting goods (tied)

This Jungle Scout report covered all types of humans in various locations with different levels of jingle in their paychecks. Check the full report out.

Ode to March Madness. Sweet 16 Tournament of Email Marketing

*Semi-Finals & Championship in Thursday’s edition of Inbox Hacking.

Keep reading for new stats, knowledge base, & a hack you can use today.

Knowledge Base

🔌Knowledge is power but first, relax with a cat attack.

Mixing email and SMS marketing – giant report (1,000 retailers).

👀Turn browsers into buyers w/ 11 abandoned browse email examples.

Writing emails devouring all your time? 10 tips on efficient writing (#5⭐).

📊Publishers: Audiences have trust issues – chart. Major opportunity to build trust where little remains.

7 great tips to get subscribers to share your emails.

Self Help

Writing emails is tough.

Heck, writing notes to yourself can give you writer’s block, plus reveal how pitiful your spelling abilitys😉 are.

So my selfless help to you… on writing.

Butt in chair – don’t be easy on yourself
“Nobody wants to read your 💩” – change that
Spill a pile of words, clean ‘em up later
If you’ve got nothing to say on a topic – choose another topic

*Shout-out to Inbox Hacking Subscribers →

Brian at ABCllc (Benefits)

William at MediaRadar (Ad Intelligence)

Facts and Stats

Consumers who subscribe to both email and SMS have a 30% higher customer lifetime value versus one channel (Media Post)
Revenue per send→ transactional emails ($2.13) rivaled abandoned cart emails ($2.16) ~ Listrak
Bought pre-owned items in past year: Gen Z 42% / Millennials 39% / Gen X 31% / Boomers 19%

Bonus: 100% of Email Marketers can afford eggs and other luxury items.

From Our Sponsor

Email Marketing Struggles:

How much of your list is dead? Won’t open. Never clicks. Wouldn’t buy to save a life?

Imagine resuscitating those “dead” email subscribers and bringing them back into the purchase funnel.

Inbox Mailers will re-engage your dead list (even the most inactive subscriber will not be able to ignore these triggers).

This unique engagement trigger system has doubled and even tripled open rates for Inbox Mailers clients.

>>>Book My Free Demo

Marketing Musings

26% of podcasts never produce episode #2. One and done.

Nearly two-thirds don’t reach episode #4.

How hard is it to stand out with a podcast then? Just commit.

But Robert Rose says the mistake brands and solopreneurs make is chasing new eardrums.

He advises using a podcast to get closer to the audience you already have.

📌I like it. Good addition to a newsletter and…

How could you possibly get closer than inside a subscriber’s ears?

Get Hacking

Harry’s razor company is pretty cool… if you’re into personal appearance.💈

And millions in profits.

Some of that success came from email forwards. Did early users forward Harry’s email sign-up links because they felt sorry for an upstart blade broker?

Nope, they did it for the freebies. This is your hack for today. Give – to get – more of your marketing emails forwarded.

This can likely be automated simply in your ESP (example w/ Active Campaign) or use an outside service that tracks referrals.

Interesting tidbits from rando newsletters:

“The first spam message may’ve been sent by a DEC marketer, Gary Thuerk, in 1978 to drum up interest in the DECSYSTEM-20 computer.”
“Internet punching bag Ticketmaster recently posted a job listing for a director of social, highlighting bravery as a required trait.” ~The Hustle
“Lush stopped operating its Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, and Snapchat accounts, saying it wouldn’t return “until the platforms take action to provide a safer environment for users.” At the time, Lush said it would still maintain accounts on Pinterest, LinkedIn, YouTube, and Twitter.” (Twitter’s the web’s Thunderdome and still deemed safer than FB, IG, TT, & SC→ Holy hell!)

📝Please take survey below. Benefits Utah’s Woolly Mammoth preserve.