You’ve heard that it’s easier to sell to a previous buyer than get a new one. It makes sense—your current audience knows you, trusts you, and wants to support you. We were curious how common repeat buyers are among Gumroad’s top creators, so we dove into the data a little bit, and here’s what we found:
Then we looked at a few superstar creators in particular and found a few who were boosting the average. For illustrator and brush maestro Kyle T Webster, a whopping 41% of his buyers purchase more than once, and they account for 60% of his revenue!
These top creators understand the importance of their existing audience. They’re focused on nurturing a relationship with fans that will sustain their creative careers into the future. They’re playing the long game, and it’s paying off.
How can you keep your buyers coming back? Let’s take a look at some specific strategies:
Treat your buyers right
First and most important, treat your buyers with respect and care. Make sure they’re happy with their purchases. Stay in touch with them, but only with relevant, valuable content—don’t overdo it. Be personal, friendly, and responsive when they have questions. And reward them for supporting you with the occasional bonus or discount. Do everything you can to make sure they have a positive reaction when you come asking for the next sale.
Use email
Email is a great way to let buyers know about your other products. When you come out with something new, send a couple messages to your past buyers outlining what’s included, give them the purchase link, and maybe even offer a discount for being a loyal supporter.
When a new buyer purchases something, trigger a thank you email that suggests another product they might be interested in (bonus for giving them an offer code here as well).
Unlike many other platforms, Gumroad gives you access to all of your buyers’ contact information. You can export that list to your favorite platform, or take advantage of our built-in email features to automatically trigger these messages at the perfect time.
Enable recommendations
Gumroad Recommendations is an opt-in feature that allows related products from any Gumroad Creator to show up after a purchase is made. But here’s the cool thing: your own products are most likely to be recommended to your buyers, as long as you have more than one product and they haven’t bought it yet. So make sure to turn on recommendations in your settings.
Use retargeting
Use Facebook Custom Audiences or Twitter Tailored Audiences to target ads at previous buyers. These platforms allow you to generate an audience set by simply uploading email addresses. Then you can create a highly targeted ad for Product B to everyone who bought Product A, and vice versa.
Offer more than one product
Yes, this sounds obvious, but a lot of creators just put their book, album, or whatever up for sale and call it a day. Get creative and think about what else you can offer. Maybe it’s the byproduct of your work, like sketches for a comic book or sheet music for a song. Or maybe it’s creating different versions, like a short art tutorial on a specific technique vs. a longer, more in-depth one on several techniques. Or maybe it’s creating something related to your core product, like a recipe book to complement your workout programs. Give your audience the option to go deeper with your work, and the results will happily surprise you.
As you can see, getting repeat buyers is simply a mix of treating people respectfully and letting them know when you have a new product ready. We hope these tips have helped you think a bit more long-term about the value of each customer, and inspired you to keep them coming back!