Web Exclusive Case Study: Shoebuy.com Acquires New Customers Via Socia Media Referral Program

Problem: Shoebuy.com, an online retailer of footwear and related apparel, sought to increase the number of visitors, and subsuquent customers, to its website.
Solution: Hired an email and social media online marketing solutions provider.
Results: Shoebuy.com now hosts over 6.5 million visitors a month, ranking the site as one of the 10 most visited apparel shopping sites. Ten percent of these new visitors are converting to customers.

Working with StrongMail, a provider of online marketing solutions for email and social media, Shoebuy.com, one of the largest retailers of footwear and related apparel on the internet, has acquired thousands of new customers with StrongMail's Influencer social media referral marketing solution.

Using StrongMail Influencer to facilitate word-of-mouth marketing via an interactive referral program, Shoebuy.com has significantly increased website visits and new purchases.

Shoebuy.com's strong commitment to customer service has enabled it to amass a loyal and passionate customer base that's been instrumental in successfully growing its business. In order to capitalize on its happy customers, Shoebuy turned to StrongMail Influencer to power a social referral program that rewards its customers for sharing offers with their social networks.

Since integrating the StrongMail Influencer referral campaign into its website and marketing emails, Shoebuy's customers have shared offers with hundreds of thousands of potential customers within their social networks. More importantly, of the large number of new website visitors generated by the program, 10 percent of them convert into paying customers.

"Shoebuy's success leverages a vibrant company culture that is extremely focused on the customer experience, and StrongMail Influencer enables us to cash in on that investment with an innovative tool that makes it easy for our customers to share and easy for us to thank them for it," said James Keller, Chief Marketing Officer at Shoebuy.com, in a StrongMail press release. "With StrongMail Influencer, we've acquired thousands of new customers by tapping the passion of our most loyal brand advocates."

Using StrongMail Influencer, Shoebuy is able to optimize creative executions in real time to maximize viral reach. In-depth reporting also enables Shoebuy to identify its top influencers in terms of invitations sent and actions upon them. Shoebuy is then able to leverage that data in future marketing campaigns. StrongMail Influencer also handles the tracking of referral performance, including automatic reminders of progress towards referral goals to maximize participation.

"Shoebuy's success with StrongMail Influencer is another great example of what's possible when you have the right tools and strategy for motivating and rewarding your most valuable customers," said Ryan Deutsch, vice president of emerging media at StrongMail, in the company's press release. "Companies with passionate customers like Shoebuy cannot afford to ignore the value of social referral programs — especially when you have a tool like StrongMail Influencer that is capable of transforming loyal customers into brand advocates."