As frontrunners of innovation, we love executing new ideas and taking risks. We knew our audience was tech-savvy and early adopters of new technology and would love trying a new offering such as YouPay. Our Marketing Manager, Brydie Brakels, saw value in YouPay that hadn’t yet been leveraged through YouPay’s initial merchants, shifting the system’s original intended use into a way for our headstrong and confident audience to get exactly what they wanted. Our YouPay integration commenced with Make Them Pay Day, a celebration of our audience and opportunity for them to have carts purchased to win big. Hourly giveaways of our popular Mystery Boxes and the inclusion of a free perfume (a cult favourite) in each YouPay order generated hype and encouraged trial use of the system. We pushed this messaging through an eye-catching campaign, encouraging our audience to ‘make them pay’ – be that their partner, a friend, or a stranger lusting after them on the internet – to get what they actually desired for Valentines’ Day. This campaign encapsulated YouPay’s offerings in a way that aligned with our branding and audience, and we saw an immediate acceptance of YouPay in our VIP Facebook group and social channels. The response to our campaign was incredible, and the system was immediately utilised by our audience.

We have always had frequent social engagement on our platforms, but YouPay has allowed us to utilise this engagement and drive social commerce. Since launch, our VIP group on Facebook has had weekly ‘YouPay it Forward’ threads, encouraging VIPs to treat one another. We are also inundated with UGC from customers unboxing their gifted YouPay orders and flaunting their products.

We have seen a great mix of both. Our current customers happily use YouPay while we see around 25-27% of carts made and purchased are new customers to Tragic Beautiful. Yes - they tend to place orders more often.

We definitely have. We have collaborated with YouPay to create exciting campaigns, offering free gifts, discounts, and even a $1000 shopping spree. These value-adding initiatives have seen our customers advocate for Tragic Beautiful within our own social channels as well as third-party YouPay groups and beyond. This brand advocacy via positive online word-of-mouth has allowed us to acquire new customers, who then become brand advocates themselves.

YouPay adds an exciting element to our ongoing social commerce strategy. As mentioned, our collaborative campaigns have allowed us to drive sales and encourage trial purchase from customers – without them even purchasing their own products! Social commerce was part of our strategy prior to YouPay, but YouPay let us transform our social channels into user-led sales channels by leveraging our strong customer relationships, further nurturing a positive brand perception, and facilitating the creation of tight-knit bonds with fellow community members.

This initiative has tremendously benefited Tragic Beautiful’s sales and brand perception: our YouPay launch on February 10, 2022 saw 112 carts paid for, resulting in a 147% increase for our sales based on February 9 figures. Returning customers were the primary purchasers, making up 75.17% of orders. We saw a 12% conversion rate increase after integration, with customers making others purchase their carts, decreasing cart abandonment. Our cart threads since integration have generated thousands of dollars in extra weekly sales. We have been able to mitigate our smaller marketing budget through social commerce, and “leaking” sales within YouPay groups provides us with an inundation of free sale advertising. We have also been able to organically market new products for free and stimulate demand for slow-moving products.

This showcases the importance of YouPay within our social media strategy, and the significance of running innovative, social-media based campaigns to encourage customers to share their carts in groups and on their other platforms.

Providing a safe space for our community is integral to us. We have an audience consisting of many peoples within marginalised communities such as LGBT+ folk and sex workers. We have always strived to create a space in which these people can comfortably be themselves, and our group is often commended as having a safer and friendlier group culture than other Australian alternative forums. YouPay has helped by facilitating this already tight-knit community to provide the gift of giving to one another, many happy tears have been shed from members of our group and the joy they have given to other Tragics.

YouPay has given us valuable insights into the products customers want but perhaps can’t afford or justify right now. These insights have allowed us to not only shape sale promotions but have also assisted with our product sourcing and creation, further aiding our customer-driven approach in a money-can’t-buy way.