Blueland, a sustainable cleaning product company with a focus on refillable plastic-free cleaning products, wanted to sustainably grow on new acquisition channels. As a first-mover, they were an early user of Shop Campaigns. Since then, they've continued to grow effectively with the program, making it one of their most profitable third-party acquisition channels.
Problem
Vice President of Growth and Digital Product Josh Knopman acknowledges that customer acquisition for digitally native brands has become more challenging. Despite a very strong growth period through COVID, they're keen to establish benchmarks on a mix of offline and digital channels that provide steady, cost-effective growth over time. Their strategy across channels is to educate eco-conscious and eco-curious consumers about the perils of greenwashing, then teach them how to easily identify high-quality sustainable cleaning products.
When evaluating new channels, the brand considers a range of KPIs, focusing on average order value (AOV) and customer lifetime value (LTV) that align with benchmarks.
Solution
The team was quick to adopt Shop Campaigns. They piloted it within 48 hours of its announcement in the Winter ’23 Edition.
We try to be early movers where we can, especially in cases where it's a high potential reward, low potential effort, or low actual effort. I specifically remember when Shop Campaigns was announced at the Winter Edition two years ago; we were piloting it within 48 hours of it being live.
By optimizing average order value (AOV) and customer acquisition costs, the company scaled the initiative to achieve significant growth. Within a matter of months, Shop Campaigns earned a permanent spot in their acquisition portfolio.
Results
The ability to target exclusively new customers set Shop Campaigns apart from other acquisition channels, simplifying the optimization process and requiring minimal time to manage. Based on the success of the channel, the Blueland team started allocating more of their total advertising budget to Shop to influence further growth.
- In 2024, driven by the success of Shop Campaigns, Blueland’s average order value on Shop was 4% higher than that of their website
- Shop Campaigns drives a 7.5% increase in LTV than compared to new non-subscribers acquired via Blueland's website
- Blueland’s sales on the Shop app increased 22x between 2022 and 2023. This is primarily driven by Shop Campaigns.
- Managing Shop Campaigns takes on average less than half an hour a week. That time is mainly for reporting and minor adjustments.
For AOV and LTV, it's quite competitive compared to our own website and far above any third-party sales channel that we've tested.
As a key addition to Blueland's acquisition portfolio, Shop Campaigns proved to be a highly effective channel for driving customer growth. With a focus on metrics like return on ad spend, average order value, and customer retention rates, the company experienced competitive performance as compared to third-party sales channels. Shop Campaigns’ simple setup and precise targeting for new customers coupled with the ability to maintain a high retention rate has solidified its position as a consistent, strategic focus area for Blueland's growth strategy.
With Shop Campaigns, just knowing that every single attributed sale is truly a net new customer was such a differentiating factor for us versus any other acquisition channel.