PacSun seamlessly migrated a complex email program, going live in just 38 days

How a leading lifestyle brand easily shifted intricate data and robust integrations from a legacy ESP to Cordial.

38 days

First send

25 days

Batch emails fully ramped

71 days

Priority automations migrated

Company

Founded in 1980, a leading lifestyle brand offering an exclusive collection of the most relevant brands and styles to a community of inspired youth.

PacSun
Key Channels Used
Email SMS
The challenge

PacSun, a leading lifestyle and apparel brand, was looking to find a new technology partner after facing instability with their previous messaging provider. With ongoing technical issues and messaging limitations, they knew a change was needed. However, with over 100 automations powering critical programs, the migration would be complex.

To migrate both their email and SMS programs, onboard successfully with a new provider, and beat the industry standard of a 90-day migration, PacSun required a strategic partnership that excelled in flexibility, agility, and speed. Strength and reliability—across any message type—are key to the success of migrating such a large retail brand’s program.

PacSun required a solution with the capability to quickly launch essential automations and messaging programs to avoid major business disruption ahead of retail’s peak season. It was clear that the right technology partner would be more than just software, but a true partnership grounded in speed, reliability, and dedication to successful outcomes.

The solution

To make the complex migration seem less daunting, Cordial collaborated with PacSun to “lift and shift” their dynamic content and message automations. Cordial’s implementation experts prioritized ramping batch programs first, enabling PacSun to send daily messages from Cordial as soon as possible.

To begin automation shifts, Cordial focused on building the most critical automations to launch, as defined in priority waves by the PacSun team. The Cordial team created segmentation dictionaries for easy audience building, new Sculpt blocks, and promotional content features. This alleviated creative production work for the PacSun team, reducing overall build and send time for their email programs and increasing time to value.

Simultaneously, intricate work began on foundational data integrations. One of the most critical integrations to address was PacSun’s customer loyalty welcome program. This behavioral data, such as rewards points earned by a customer, is extremely valuable to a large retailer. Cordial built the integration, using webhooks provided by PacSun’s loyalty partner, and saving the PacSun team thousands of dollars during the implementation process.

Throughout the migration, PacSun collaborated with Cordial to make strategic decisions. PacSun leveraged Cordial’s expertise and resources to tackle complex data transformations and integrations. For example, to solve for incomplete historical order data transferred during migration, Cordial used its built-in data transformation solution, Architect, to unblock segmentation based on purchase history. Architect’s powerful way of importing and normalizing data accelerates the migration timeline from months to weeks.

The agility of Cordial’s technology facilitated the rapid transition of PacSun’s email program, the seamless transition of PacSun’s customer data flows, and the ability to easily make ongoing enhancements post-launch.

The result

With a basic messaging infrastructure, clear prioritization of their 100+ programs, and reduced creative workload, Cordial fully migrated the first wave of PacSun’s automations, totaling 43 multi-touch automations in 10 weeks. Within that time, Cordial also built and launched 77 ramp emails and 85 individual email + SMS touches.

"Normally, you expect a migration timeline to be around six to twelve months. With Cordial, we were able to migrate our CRM platform within a bit more than sixty days, and right before holiday. Usually you have deliverability issues when migrating platforms, or a long ramp up time. During this process with Cordial, however, there were no major technical issues, which was something I've actually never seen. I was incredibly impressed."

Thomas Calhoun, VP of Ecommerce, PacSun

"Cordial is very different in terms of support. Not only is the platform great with a friendly UI, but Cordial is very responsive in specific requests and customizations needed from their clients. That's what made a really big difference for us."

Thomas Calhoun, VP of Ecommerce, PacSun

43

multi-channel automations migrated in 10 weeks

21

customer affinity automations launched in 10 weeks

In addition to the first wave of multi-channel automations, Cordial powered 21 customer affinity automations, once again using Cordial Architect. Architect’s data transformation scripts evaluate the shopping behavior and email activity of every contact and determine each customer’s category, brand, and product affinities. PacSun can then trigger complex orchestrations within Cordial, providing curated product recommendation campaigns that are customized to each individual customer.

Looking ahead

Knowing the proven dedication of both teams, PacSun and Cordial continue to work closely together, driving results and revenue from email and SMS programs. With the core infrastructure now migrated to Cordial’s robust platform, PacSun is poised to optimize engagement with revenue-driving campaign strategies.

"Everyone at Cordial has been amazing to work with and are always available to support us. We were able to complete implementation in a few months and during the busiest time of year; I expected a lot of delays but Cordial made it happen. The team is top notch and there to support you along the way."

Jesse Isola, Director of CRM & Loyalty at PacSun