About The Sill

The Sill is a direct-to-consumer plant brand specializing in curated houseplants, outdoor plants, and plant care essentials. Known for their innovative approach to making plant parenthood accessible, they offer products across multiple price points and expertise levels while maintaining a commitment to plant education and guidance.

The Challenge

Despite having a loyal and engaged customer base, The Sill faced three core challenges in scaling their operations:

AOV Growth: 

• Traditional Email and SMS marketing had reached a natural plateau in average order value growth.

• Mass marketing approaches failed to encourage discovery of complementary products at the right time.

• Generic product recommendations couldn't account for crucial context like customer location, plant experience, and past purchases.

Customer Education:

• The Sill’s plant offerings are continuously growing to include new varieties and categories of plants, which requires building consumer confidence through personalized guidance and recommendations.

• Customer expertise varied dramatically – experienced plant parents found basic care tips redundant, while novices felt overwhelmed.

• Seasonal changes in plant availability and factors like urban vs rural living further complicated providing relevant guidance.

Scale Requirements:

• With hundreds of thousands of customers and an ever-evolving selection of plants, providing personalized expert guidance became impossible to maintain manually.

• Standard automation tools lacked the sophistication to handle both nuanced plant care expertise and seasonal / location based upsell variation.

• Generic automated messaging risked undermining The Sill's premium, expert-led brand voice.

The Solution

LTV.ai implemented an AI driven approach that treated each customer as an individual in "segments of 1":

• Intelligent Product Discovery: Using customer variables like previous purchases, LTV, and location, LTV.ai delivered personalized product recommendations that resonated with each individual customer. By understanding purchase timing and regional factors, LTV.ai could recommend specific products in a natural, contextual way. 

• Education-First Marketing: LTV.ai's AI adapted its communication style to each customer's expertise level, from first-time plant parents to seasoned collectors. By incorporating seasonal changes and location-specific guidance, messaging remained relevant and valuable to each recipient.

• Personalization at Scale: By speaking to each customer as an individual rather than using catch-all messaging, LTV.ai significantly increased conversion rates without relying on discounting. This approach maintained The Sill's premium positioning while delivering highly personalized recommendations at scale.

The Results

LTV.ai's "customer first" approach delivered significant improvements across key metrics, measured against a control group:

Revenue Impact

• 28% increase in AOV

• $0.04 improvement in revenue per send

• 78% higher conversion rate per website visitor

Customer Experience

• 1.10% click-through rate

• 44% reduction in unsubscribe rates

• Significantly improved product discovery and education

Operational Success

The initiative transformed The Sill's operational capabilities on three key fronts: 

• First, they successfully scaled personalization across their entire customer base without compromising quality of recommendations or brand voice.

• Second, they maintained their premium positioning while significantly increasing engagement metrics across the board.

• Finally and most importantly, they established a repeatable framework for driving AOV growth through personalization rather than discounting, creating a sustainable model for future expansion.