If you’ve done the work of encouraging anonymous users to sign up for a free trial and succeeded at getting new customers to join your loyalty program, and are now looking for ways to not only increase customer engagement but improve your customer monetization efforts as well, then you’ve come to the right place.

In 2021, Braze researchers identified 8 tips for making the most of your customer monetization campaigns, and our 2023 analysis reveals even more strategies your team can use to maximize customer lifetime value via more effective upsell campaigns, flash sales, subscription renewal drives, and more.

#1: Uplevel Your Upsell Campaigns with API-Triggered Automation to Increase Conversions by 7.5X

API-triggered campaigns that get sent right when a key action has taken place are not only more personalized and tailored to an individual’s behavior and interests than traditional time-based, scheduled delivery, they can also accelerate conversions. For upsell campaigns, brands that promote add-on offerings via triggered campaigns, such as offering a discounted car service after a customer successfully books a hotel reservation, show a positive uplift of +7.5X.

Other ways to enhance upsell campaigns and fuel conversions for these messages include:

• Adding dynamic content with Connected Content: +1.3X uplift in conversions

• Using custom filter triggers: +49% uplift in conversions

• Including deep links: +34% uplift in conversions

• Leveraging Intelligent Timing: +95% uplift in conversions

#2: Use Content Cards to Boost Conversions from Discounts and Sales Campaigns by up to 20.2X

Want to get more customers to engage with one of your company’s special offers? Leveraging the right channel could make the difference. Content Cards are one of the most impactful messaging channels for promotional monetization efforts, producing a positive uplift of 14.8X on conversions, with in-app messaging coming in a close second, boosting conversions by 12.6X, according to our analysis. Content Cards with both text and images offer an even greater advantage, increasing conversion rates by as much as 20.2X.

#3: Give These Tactics a Try to Get More Users to Upgrade Their Subscriptions

As your team creates and sends campaigns encouraging existing customers to become premium subscribers, here’s what you can do to convince even more users to make the move.

• Switch from time-based, scheduled delivery to action-based delivery or API-triggered delivery to improve conversion rates by as much as 1.6X and 2.4X, respectively.

• Add powerful messaging channels to the mix: Content Cards and in-app messaging yield the highest conversion rates for subscription upgrade campaigns, with a 5.8X uplift and 104% uplift, respectively. Banner Content Cards, in particular, have been found to generate the highest conversion rates, achieving a 30.7X uplift.

• Take advantage of Sage AI by Braze to send the right message to the right customers. Marketers that utilize Intelligent Selection for subscription upgrade campaigns can see a +4.6X increase in conversion rates.

#4: Drive Subscription Renewals by 8.9X with Slide-Up In-App Messages

In-app messages (IAMs) can increase conversion rates for subscription renewal campaigns by 3.6X. Additionally, among IAM formats, slide-up IAMs produce the highest conversion rates, with an 8.9X uplift.

#5: Add GIFs and Images to Your Monetization Campaigns

Including GIFs in your outreach could help lift conversions for your company’s cart abandonment campaigns and subscription renewal campaigns by 1.3X and 83%, respectively. Similarly, adding images to subscription renewal and partnership campaigns has been found to increase conversions by 93% and 41%, respectively, as well as influence general purchasing behaviors with a 31% increase in conversions.

#6: Instead of Sending One-Off Monetization Campaigns, Develop Recurring Messaging for Maximum Impact

Sending updates on an ongoing basis has been found to yield stronger results across a variety of monetization campaigns. Recurring campaigns propels gains in conversions among:

• Partnership campaigns by 13.7X

• General discount and sales campaigns by 2.7X

• Upsell campaigns by 2.4X

• Subscription renewals by 1.8X

• Flash sales by +85%

#7: Optimize Your Loyalty Campaigns for Maximum Conversions

Looking for ways to increase engagement among your high-value loyal customers? Try out these powerful strategies.

• Deploy loyalty campaigns after customers take an action, such as after viewing their membership status or checking their points balance. These triggered campaigns have shown a 3.7X higher conversion rate.

• Harness the most effective channels and templates for loyalty campaigns: Content Card and IAM loyalty campaigns can result in 3.7X and 3.1X higher conversion rates, respectively. Within Content Cards, Content Cards that contain an image and text can deliver a 7.7X uplit in conversions. Within IAMs, slide-up IAMs and full-screen IAMs have been shown to elevate conversion rates by 6.9X and 5.7X, respectively.

• Use Intelligent Selection to send the right message to the right users. Brands that utilize Intelligent Selection, backed by our machine learning algorithm, for loyalty campaigns have seen a 6.7X increase in campaign conversion rates.

Get more advice on how to improve customer monetization outcomes for your brand. The 2023 edition of the popular Braze Inspiration Guide is here and packed with expert and data-backed guidance for marketing, growth, and engagement teams on how to advance monetization campaigns across channels!