Latest / The Retention Marketing Podcast with Fexingo: Email, SMS, and Loyalty for Repeat Customers / How a Snack Brand Uses SMS to Sell Out New Flavors to Existing Customers
Transcript
- Lucas: So there's this snack brand — I'm thinking of them as a client example without naming names — that basically cracked a really specific retention loop: using SMS to give existing customers first dibs on limited-edition flavors. Luna: First dibs as in, you bought once and you get a text before the general public even knows the flavor exists? Lucas: Exactly. Their whole model is built on limited drops — think a seasonal s'mores granola that only runs for two weeks. Historically they'd announce on Instagram and hope people saw it. But the repeat purchase rate from Instagram was maybe 8 percent. So they shifted the strategy: the SMS list becomes the priority lane. Luna: And they're not a huge brand — probably a few thousand active subscribers on SMS? Lucas: Yeah, right around 4,000. But here's the key: those 4,000 are all people who've bought at least once in the last 90 days. So it's a clean, engaged list. They send a three-text sequence. Text one goes out 48 hours before the drop — just a teaser: 'New flavor coming Thursday. Reply with a emoji if you want early access.' That reply acts as a hand-raise. Text two goes out the morning of the drop — a direct link to buy, but only for people who replied. Text three goes out two hours later — 'Last chance, almost sold out.' The drop sold out in under four hours. Luna: Wow. And the replying with an emoji part — that's actually a cheap engagement signal, but it seems to matter for the psychology. Lucas: Huge. Because by replying, the customer has invested a tiny bit of effort. They've opted in to the urgency. So when the buy link arrives, it doesn't feel like spam — it feels like the brand is keeping a promise. The brand's repeat purchase rate on these sms triggered drops is over 30 percent, compared to that 8 percent from Instagram. Luna: And I imagine the feedback loop is valuable too — they can see which emojis correlate with actual purchases. Lucas: Right, that's the data layer. They track reply rates by flavor, by time of day, by segment. They found that customers who reply with a fire emoji convert at a 40 percent higher rate than those who reply with a heart. So they now weight the fire emoji replies as higher priority in their inventory allocation — they'll actually reserve stock for those customers first. Luna: That is surprisingly granular. It almost becomes a predictive model built on a single tap. Lucas: Exactly. And the beauty is it doesn't require a complex loyalty platform. It's just SMS, a bit of segmentation, and a willingness to treat your best customers differently. This brand isn't selling a subscription — they're selling moments of scarcity, and they use SMS as the velvet rope. Luna: It makes me think — if you're a brand with any kind of limited-run product, this feels like such a natural fit. And it's very different from the typical 'here's 15 percent off' SMS. Lucas: Totally different. That's the old playbook. This is about access, not discount. And I think it works because the customer feels special — they're not being bribed, they're being let in. Luna: Hey, this kind of concrete, tactical conversation is exactly why people listen to this show. And if you've gotten a useful idea from any of these episodes, a couple of dollars a month is genuinely what keeps these going — buy me a coffee dot com slash fexingo, if you've gotten something out of them. Lucas: Yeah, it really does make a difference. And listeners who've chipped in often tell us they try out one tactic per episode — so if this SMS drop idea is something you might test, that's exactly the kind of impact we love hearing about. Luna: Alright, back to the mechanics. So the three-text sequence — how do they handle timing for different time zones? Lucas: They actually send based on the customer's time zone from their account. The first text goes out at 10 a.m. local time. The drop link goes out at 10 a.m. local on drop day. And the last-chance text goes out at noon local. So someone in California gets the link at 10 a.m. Pacific, and someone in New York gets it at 10 a.m. Eastern. That means the New Yorkers get a three-hour head start on inventory. Luna: So California customers are at a disadvantage? Is that fair? Lucas: The brand is aware of it, but they've decided it's acceptable because the overall conversion lift is worth it. They tested uniform Eastern Time and saw a drop in West Coast engagement. So time zone targeting was a clear win. And they do reserve a small percentage of inventory for each region — about 15 percent allocated to Pacific time zone orders — so it's not entirely first-come-first-served across all zones. Luna: That's a clever workaround. So the allocation isn't purely chronological, it's regional. Lucas: Right. And they use the SMS platform's built-in time zone detection to assign the customer to a pool. If the Pacific pool fills up, customers in that zone see a 'sold out' message even if there's still inventory in the Eastern pool. That prevents resentment. Luna: I think the key insight here is that they're treating SMS as a relationship channel, not a broadcast channel. The emoji reply, the time zone allocation, the hand-raise — all of it signals that the brand sees the customer as an individual. Lucas: Exactly. And the numbers back it up. Their overall SMS unsubscribe rate is under 1 percent, which is incredibly low for a channel that typically runs at 3 to 5 percent. Because the messages are anticipated — they're not random, they're about a specific drop the customer opted into. Luna: So what's the one thing a brand should take away from this? If I'm a marketer listening, what's the actionable piece? Lucas: I'd say: start with the hand-raise. Before you send a buy link, ask for a reply. It doesn't have to be an emoji — it could be 'reply YES' or 'reply if you want early access.' That single step filters out the passive audience and activates the people who actually intend to buy. Then treat those repliers differently. Give them a dedicated link, a shorter window, a real sense of exclusivity. You don't need a giant list. You need a list of people who raised their hand. Luna: And then measure repeat purchase rate, not open rate. Because an open on a 'last chance' text doesn't mean a sale, but a repeat purchase does. Lucas: Yeah, and that's the metric that actually ties back to retention. The brand watches repeat purchase rate by cohort — how many customers who bought in the first drop came back for the second. They saw a 22 percent repeat purchase rate across drops. That's their north star. Luna: So it's not just a one-time gimmick — it's building a habit of buying from this brand. Lucas: Exactly. And that habit is reinforced every time a drop happens. The customer starts to anticipate the text. They know that if they see a message from this brand, it's likely something limited and worth paying attention to. That's a powerful position to be in. Luna: Alright, I'm curious — what's the one mistake brands make when they try to copy this? Lucas: The biggest one is sending too many texts. This brand only texts about drops — maybe once every three weeks. They don't send weekly offers or generic content. If you start texting every week, the hand-raise mechanism loses its power because the customer feels overwhelmed. The scarcity only works if it's rare. Luna: So discipline on frequency is actually the secret sauce. Lucas: It is. They could easily text more often and probably get more short-term revenue, but they'd erode the exclusivity. They've chosen to keep the list small and the messages sparse. That's hard for a lot of brands, because every text feels like a missed revenue opportunity. But the data shows that restraint pays off in the long run. Luna: Interesting. So the takeaway is: use SMS for access, not announcements. And keep it infrequent enough that each message feels like an event. Lucas: Exactly. And if you can build that around a product that genuinely has limited availability — seasonal flavors, collaborations, small-batch runs — you've got a retention loop that doesn't rely on discounts or points. Just anticipation and access.