15 Best Shopify Customer Retention Strategies

Customer acquisition has become more expensive, and customer churn rates are higher than ever – so once a customer is acquired, it’s important to keep them. We’ll discuss the 15 best customer retention strategies for Shopify users so you can gain a competitive edge.

Why Customer Retention is Crucial for Shopify Stores

Simply put, customer retention means keeping your existing customers happy, loyal, and coming back for more. It impacts everything from revenue to reputation. By encouraging repeat purchases, you build a loyal customer base, increase customer lifetime value, and generate consistent revenue growth, directly impacting your profitability. 

Plus, focusing on existing customers allows you to bypass the often costly and time-consuming process of finding and converting new leads. As Zac Fromson, COO of Tequila Sunrise says, “With new privacy updates and more people opting out of marketing tactics, the cost per reach has increased considerably in the last few years. That is why nurturing and keeping the folks you’ve acquired has become the top priority—customer retention will save you lots of money.” 

15 Proven Customer Retention Strategies for Shopify Stores

Ready to turn one-time buyers into loyal advocates? These 15 proven customer retention strategies will help you drive repeat business and turn shoppers into Superfans. 

1.  Implementing a Customer Loyalty Program

Customer loyalty programs reward repeat customers with perks like points, discounts, and exclusive access. This adds a sense of value, appreciation, and makes repeat business more enticing. Beyond driving sales, loyalty programs give brands an opportunity to capture zero-party data, which lets you create personalized experiences that drive further customer retention.

Shopify makes adding customer loyalty programs easy: You can use Shopify analytics to find your top customers, and then automate your loyalty program with apps like Okendo Loyalty. These allow you to easily create points programs, tiers, and offer incentives for actions like following you on social media.

2. Utilizing Personalized Marketing Campaigns

When marketing campaigns are personalized, they get customers more engaged. Personalized marketing starts with segmentation. Dividing your audience by interests and past purchases allows you to keep your emails relevant, reduces inbox clutter, and reduces “unsubscribes.”

You can further personalize by offering product recommendations based on browsing history, and set up automated trigger emails and SMS messages for specific occasions (like welcome emails, birthdays, or abandoned cart reminders). Email marketing platforms like Klaviyo, Attentive, Omnisend, Shopify Email, or Mailchimp seamlessly integrate with Shopify, and give you the tools you need to make email segments, create automated trigger emails, market your products, and build strong customer relationships. 

3. Offering Subscriptions for Repeat Purchases

Subscriptions simplify repeat purchases, especially for consumables like coffee, skincare, or supplements. It offers the convenience of automatic deliveries for the customer, while your brand benefits from predictable recurring revenue. You can make being part of your subscription program even more enticing with discounts and exclusive perks. 

Implementing a subscription model on Shopify is fairly straightforward. The Shopify app store offers many options that can handle everything from setting up recurring billing and managing subscriptions to offering flexible delivery schedules and personalized subscription options.

4. Collecting and Acting on Customer Feedback

If you want your customers coming back, it’s important to listen to what they have to say. Post-purchase surveys provide a direct line to understanding customer needs and pain points. This lets you gain valuable information about how to improve products, enhance the customer experience, and drive growth and retention. Shopify supported apps like Okendo Surveys streamline collecting and managing this feedback so you can pinpoint areas for improvement, and take action to improve your store. 

5. Enhancing the Customer Experience (CX)

The experience a customer has with your brand often determines whether they buy from you again. Creating a seamless customer experience (CX) means paying attention to every touchpoint in the customer journey, from initial browsing to post-purchase follow-up. Adding options like guest checkout and multiple payment options creates a user-friendly online store. These details can make a big difference in customer satisfaction, loyalty, and your bottom line. 

6. Simplifying Navigation and UX

Shoppers want an intuitive user experience (UX), so keep your navigation simple. Simplified menus, prominent search functions, easy product filtering, and a streamlined checkout make shopping effortless and more enjoyable, leading to increased conversions, customer satisfaction, and retention.

7. Optimizing Mobile Shopping

A clunky mobile experience can cost you customers. Optimize your mobile store by focusing on responsiveness and speed. Mobile responsiveness ensures your site adapts seamlessly to any screen, while fast load times prevent frustration and abandoned carts.  Optimizing images, minimizing code, and using browser caching will help your site load quickly on mobile devices.

For Shopify users, a mobile-first theme is a great start. Tools like Google’s Mobile-Friendly Test and PageSpeed Insights can find areas for improvement, such as optimizing images, minimizing code, and browser caching.

8. Providing Exceptional Customer Support

Few things can tank a customer’s feeling about your brand like a bad experience with customer service. To make yours exceptional, solve problems and answer questions quickly. This builds trust and shows you value your customers’ business. 

Tools like 24/7 live chat and chatbots ensure that help is always available, no matter the time, boosting customer satisfaction and preventing frustration. Shopify offers access to a variety of apps, like Shopify Inbox, that seamlessly integrate with your site and offer real-time assistance as well as AI capabilities, allowing customers to get immediate answers. 

9. Send Post-Purchase Follow-Ups

Staying in touch with customers with post-purchase follow-ups can help build lasting relationships and encourage repeat business. Automated email sequences continue the conversation, keeping you at the forefront of their mind. A simple “thank you” email goes a long way in building goodwill. Beyond that, post-purchase emails offer a valuable opportunity to suggest complementary products, request feedback, offer discounts, provide tips or resources for their product, or even remind them when it’s time to order again. 

10. Build a Referral Program

Word-of-mouth is powerful, and you can harness that power with a referral program. These not only bring in new customers but also deepen relationships with existing ones. Both the referrer and the new customer receive perks, creating a win-win situation that strengthens customer relationships, drives engagement, boosts loyalty, and leads to stronger customer retention. 

Shopify users can integrate a referral program through apps like Okendo Referrals. This lets you build and monitor your referral program, offer flexible rewards, automate workflows and tracking, and include custom terms and conditions.

11. Provide Exclusive Discounts for Returning Customers

Discounts are a great incentive to keep customers coming back. Exclusive discounts for repeat buyers or early access to sales make customers feel valued and provide a compelling reason to shop again. Shopify simplifies VIP discounts with automated segmentation and order application, saving you time and ensuring loyal customers are always rewarded.

12. Utilize SMS and Push Notifications

SMS and push notifications offer a direct and immediate line of communication between you and your audience. When timed right, they keep you at the top of your customers minds, drive engagement, and lead to repeat sales. Share exclusive offers, order updates, restock alerts, and valuable content like helpful tips and personalized recommendations. Remember: valuable content keeps customers engaged, while solely promotional messages risk opt-outs.

13. Improve Shipping and Returns Policies

Complicated return policies and unexpected shipping costs can be major deterrents, so prioritize both. Be upfront with your shipping costs, and consider offering free shipping for top customers or within VIP loyalty tiers. Simplify your return process by offering generous return windows, and providing clear shipping options. 

These improvements build customer confidence, making them more likely to complete their purchases and return for future business. Shopify users can take advantage of its built-in return management tools which streamlines the return process, generates return labels, and easily tracks returns. This simplifies things for your customers and you.

14. Leveraging Data to Predict Customer Behavior

When it comes to customer retention, data is king. By using analytics, you can identify high-value customers, understand customer segments, track website interactions, and analyze cart abandonment patterns. This data helps predict future purchases and measure the effectiveness of your retention strategies. 

Shopify offers built-in analytics that lets you analyze customer behavior and integrates with apps that provide deeper insights, track lifetime value, automate marketing campaigns, and improve segmentation. This lets you make data-driven decisions that help increase repeat purchases.

15. Integrating Social Proof to Build Trust

Social proof is a powerful tool for building trust and credibility. Reviews, testimonials, and user-generated content (UGC) provides potential customers with authentic validation of your products and brand. Okendo’s ecommerce trust research shows 95% of customers read reviews before purchasing, so showcasing this social proof on your store is essential. 

You can encourage customers to share their positive experiences by offering incentives like discounts, extra loyalty points, or entries into contests. You can also reward customers for tagging your store on social media platforms to generate UGC and expand your reach. Incentivizing review generation not only helps build trust with new shoppers, but also keeps your existing customers engaged and more likely to make future purchases.

Shopify makes it easy to add this valuable social proof to your store with apps like Okendo Reviews. It streamlines collecting, managing, and showcasing this feedback, while also allowing you to monitor sentiment, solve issues, and measure its impact. 

FAQs About Shopify Customer Retention Strategies

What are the best Shopify apps for customer retention?

The “best” Shopify app for customer retention depends heavily on your specific needs and budget. However, some consistently rank high in terms of features, user reviews, and overall effectiveness are:

• Okendo Reviews: Offers one of the best ways to collect and showcase social proof.
• Klaviyo for email marketing: Klaviyo excels at segmentation, personalized email flows, and automated campaigns based on customer behavior.
• Gorgias for customer service: A helpdesk platform designed specifically for integrating with Shopify to provide a centralized hub for managing customer inquiries across multiple channels.

How do I measure the success of my retention strategies?

To measure customer retention success, track these metrics over time: 

• Customer Lifetime Value (CLV) for long-term value
• Repeat Purchase Rate for customer loyalty 
• Churn Rate and Retention Rate to see how many customers you’re keeping 
• Average Order Value (AOV) for purchase size
• Customer Satisfaction (CSAT) and Net Promoter Score (NPS) for customer happiness and advocacy.

It’s helpful to segment data by customer groups, set benchmarks, and A/B test strategies. You can visualize your progress with a dashboard to make data-driven decisions and improve customer loyalty. 

What’s the most cost-effective retention strategy for small Shopify stores?

Showcasing reviews is one of the most cost-effective retention strategies. It builds trust with customers, and provides you with feedback for improvement without a high price tag. 

What is the KPI for customer retention?

Customer Retention Rate (CRR) is the primary KPI for retention, showing the percentage of customers kept over a period. It’s best used alongside other metrics like churn rate, repeat purchase rate, and customer lifetime value for a complete picture of retention performance.

Next Steps: Retain More Customers with Shopify

Prioritizing customer retention through strategies like loyalty programs, personalized experiences, and excellent customer service is essential for Shopify stores looking to achieve long-term success. Don’t just focus on individual tactics. You need to create a cohesive retention strategy to be successful. Remember, genuine relationships, offering value, and a consistently positive customer experience are key for turning shoppers into Superfans. 

Ready to prioritize customer retention? Explore Okendo’s suite of Shopify apps to discover how social proof, feedback, loyalty programs, and referral programs can build trust, boost conversions, and form lasting customer relationships.