KURU Footwear Notches $2m+ with Full-Funnel Direct Mail

About KURU Footwear

The inventor of heel-first footwear, KURU believes that health begins with heel.

With patented KURUSOLE technology, dynamically protecting the natural shape of your heel and serving as the foundation for both pain prevention and relief, KURU has become the shoe of choice for humans with health hopes. Based in Salt Lake City, KURU launched in 2008 and has grown to offer an expanding lineup of pain relieving footwear, including plantar fasciitis shoes for women and men, that put your heels first.

TLDR:

KURU Footwear launched a high-ROI direct mail program in 2023 and, on the "heels" of that success, is scaling the channel in 2024.

• KURU came to PostPilot to leverage postcards as an additional way to engage with customers at all stages of the funnel. 
• The team is sending postcards for both acquisition and retention, integrating direct mail into their mix of paid, earned and owned channels.
• Across all campaigns, KURU has sent hundreds of thousands of postcards so far, which drove $2m+ in revenue at a 10x+ ROI. 

Background:

Before testing direct mail, KURU focused primarily on search, shopping and social channels, but the team sought a new way to acquire customers, warm prospects further, and drive further value from their existing customer base.

“We evaluated PostPilot against a number of DM companies, but I got the feeling right off the bat during initial conversations that working with your team was going to be a true collaborative partnership.” 

-Megan Kolbe, Dir. of Paid Media, KURU Footwear

The PostPilot Solution:

“We’ve seen consistent growth of direct mail since working with PostPilot, both from a budget standpoint in existing campaigns, as well as scaling into net-new campaign initiatives across acquisition, retention, and reactivation strategies.”

KURU uses direct mail to “stand out” from digital ads and emails that customers (and potential customers) are inundated with every day and add a “personalized touch” to their marketing.

Closing the Sale with MailMatch^TM

With MailMatch, brands can send mailers to potential customers’ homes with only their email address. KURU’s kept MailMatch switched on since July ‘23 to help drive sales from abandoned carts—and this is one of the postcard designs they’ve used:

The Acquisition Tactic: KURU automated this via PostPilot last year. We automatically fire off this postcard to customers who abandoned their carts 6 days prior and who have already gone through an email abandoned cart sequence. 

Abandoned cart reminders are a tried-and-true email tactic, and they crush with postcards, too. 

Keeping ‘Em Close with Postcards

Pushing Post-Purchase Postcards

KURU has aimed to reduce the time between first and second purchases, and “PostPilot has provided a cost-effective way to get back in front of folks who have potential to become lifelong fans.”

To shorten that time and drive repeat purchases, KURU’s has used direct mail as an extension of post-purchase email drip flows for different audiences. 

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The Retention Tactics: Last year, KURU sent the postcard above to customers 35 days post-purchase. Then, they sent a second, separate, postcard to customers who still had not purchased in 120 days. This was sent to customers who didn’t convert via any post-purchase email campaigns.

Results:

“I’ve been pleased with every single campaign we’ve put out. Before meetings with [our dedicated account manager] Kassidy, I check on the data to get a sense of performance, and honestly: there haven’t been any flops.”

KURU’s seen remarkable success with direct mail so far.

• $2m+ in revenue
• 10x+ ROAS

Let’s break that down.

For acquisition and retargeting of warm leads:

• $500K+ revenue
• 7.5x+ ROAS
• 2.5%+ CVR

And for retention:

• $600K+ revenue
• 11.5x ROAS
• 4.5% CVR

Their other efforts, including reactivation and holiday campaigns, drove the other $927k in revenue last year. 

We love to see it. 

Direct mail may have begun as another reliable tactic, but it’s become a fundamental pillar of KURU’s marketing strategy. We can’t wait to see the results as they "step up" their direct mail even more in ‘24 and beyond:

“I anticipate KURU leaning further into direct mail in 2024 and 2025. We’re excited as we further scale our winback drip series, A/B test card designs, evaluate holdout testing results, and add more MailMatch campaigns into our media mix this year.”