Coogee Bikes: The welcome series that answers every buyer’s question

That was the challenge Coogee Bikes and their agency Ecommerce Boost took on. Jean Pascal Charles (JP), Founder and CEO of the agency, runs Coogee Bikes’ lifecycle strategy, automation, copy, and campaigns in Omnisend. The answer to those four questions shapes the whole program, and it’s why a single automation, the welcome series, now drives 58% of Coogee Bikes’ Omnisend-attributed revenue.

Answers before discounts

Freddie says those four questions all come back to one thing. “The biggest concern is trust. People want to know we’ll still be there after they buy,” he says.

JP builds the answers into the emails themselves. “Road legality, realistic range and local support are purchase considerations, so they belong in the flows, not buried in an FAQ,” he says.

So the emails lead with answers. “The nurture needs to match the buying cycle,” JP says. “Someone comparing e-bikes needs answers on legality, range, delivery and support before another discount.” Each email deals with one question Coogee Bikes hears from customers and points the reader to a clear next step.

Every message has one job

JP sets up Coogee Bikes’ automations by where the buyer is in their decision. The welcome series builds confidence in the brand, the browse, cart and checkout abandonment automations deal with whatever is holding up the purchase, and post-purchase emails cover ownership and support. Omnisend pulls browsing and cart data straight from Shopify, so a customer’s own behavior decides when they move from educational emails to a purchase reminder.

Getting the rules right matters as much as the emails themselves. JP uses Omnisend’s segmentation and exit conditions to control who receives each automation. “Timing, exclusions and exit rules matter,” he says. “We don’t want someone receiving overlapping reminders or sales messages after they’ve bought.”

Because each automated email answers something the reader is already wondering about, people engage with it. Coogee Bikes’ automations get about three times as many clicks as its campaigns, though both go to the same list and feature the same products. Customers keep opening emails after they’ve bought, too. The post-purchase follow-up has a 45.9% open rate, one of the highest of any automation in the account.

SMS sits in the same Omnisend journeys as email. Email carries the product information, comparisons and reassurance, while SMS is kept for moments closer to purchase, when a short message is well timed. “We judge it on the additional revenue it contributes alongside email, with unsubscribe rates and message costs part of that assessment,” JP says. So far, SMS campaigns have a 19.4% click rate.

The welcome series does the selling

For most ecommerce brands, abandonment flows out-earn the welcome series. At Coogee Bikes, it’s the other way round. Someone who signs up is often weeks away from buying, so the welcome series carries the whole job of education and reassurance.

Welcome series alone drive 58% of Coogee Bikes’ Omnisend-attributed revenue. About one in six people who open a welcome email click through, and 2.7% of welcome emails sent end in an order. For a product at this price, that’s a strong rate.

The abandonment flows add another 36% between them. Altogether, automations account for 94% of the revenue Omnisend drives for the brand.

“Email and SMS have become significant revenue channels for Coogee Bikes,” JP says. “We’re seeing consistent attributed sales across the period, rather than results concentrated in a single campaign.”

Start with what customers ask

For any brand selling a considered purchase, JP’s advice comes back to where Coogee Bikes began: listen to the questions. The things people need to know before they buy are the most useful copy a brand has. “Each message should resolve a specific concern and give the customer a clear next step,” he says.

Then keep learning from the results. Freddie credits JP with always being “across the numbers and what we should be testing next,” and usually bringing ideas before anyone asks.

The right platform makes that practical without a big team. “Omnisend combines ecommerce automation with ease of execution,” JP says. “The Shopify integration, segmentation, email and SMS work together, so we can build sophisticated customer journeys without a heavy technical setup or a large team. We can launch quickly, refine the follow-up and track its contribution to sales. That balance of capability and speed is what makes it a strong fit.”

As for what’s next, Freddie keeps it simple: “Keep growing, keep improving the range, and become a brand Australians trust for e-bikes.” For a brand whose customers’ biggest question is whether it’ll still be there after they buy, trust is the right goal, and every email is built to earn it.