Personalization of Marketing Communication – not just for your Customer’s sake

[simple-author-box]

Personalization of marketing communication is not just a good practice for retailers, but also a way to help their businesses survive. The advent of the internet has rendered retailers the opportunity to offer their customers products specifically customized for them. This is in direct contrast with mass marketing where the objective is to broadcast product offerings to reach the largest number of people possible.

Personalization of marketing communications is to treat each person as a unique individual with distinctive needs and to provide them with customized solutions 1. To be able to personalize marketing communications, retailers need to learn about the customer’s individual needs and preferences in terms of the types of content that the customer is willing to receive and other person-specific characteristics.

The strategic use of data collected during the online buying process and social media sites may be a good starting point for retailers to know their customers better.

Data – the foundation for the personalization of marketing communication

The digitalization of the entire advertising industry is generating ever increasing amounts of data that must be collected, analysed and interpreted 2.  Lying hidden in all this data is information, potentially useful information that is rarely made explicit or taken advantage of. We must just find the data.

The data we need is right before our eyes. Says Woopra: “Social media interactions, email marketing, landing pages, surveys, customer relationship management (CRM) tools, and re-targeted ads are all customer touch points that can tell you about your customer’s needs and interests”.

Once the data are sorted and tabled, retailers can segment and target their customers and also position their products accordingly. However, here the process is done for each customer specifically according the individual’s unique needs, desires and behaviors (customization). So, once customization has been achieved, it makes personalization of marketing communication possible.

Personalized marketing communications used by online retailers

Online shopping has become an important channel for retailers. Unfortunately, it does not afford facile development of an interpersonal relationship or facilitate easy interactions between buyers and sellers 3.  Even worse, many retailers use the online channel to send generic marketing messages via email or text, to the annoyance of their customers. This, however, is not personalized marketing communication.

Retailers need to collect and analyse data about the buying behaviour of individual customers. The profile of the customer will provide guidelines for the retailer how to personalize his/her marketing communication message. Daniel Newman, CEO of Broadsuite Media Group suggests the following ways brands can use data to build personalized marketing tactics:

  • Capture complete data – are you collecting every piece of data that you possibly can? Brands today have more consumer information at their fingertips than ever before, and they can use that data to get to know their customers in depth.
  • Social data – social cues and signals are excellent ways to figure out more about customers than traditional sources like email, demographics, or purchase records.
  • Segmentation – you need to segment your audience into smaller groups for more accurate targeting.

What does a personalized marketing message looks like?

You’ve done all the hard work by sourcing and sorting your customer data. Now it is time to create a personalized marketing message for your customer. Below is an image from GIGYA, a customer identity management agency. The ad shows beauty products that are specifically recommended for a customer with a unique skin type and facial features.

Note that the narrative is in the second person – thus the ad is addressing the individual personally.

The advantages of personalized marketing communications

Retailers that personalize their marketing communication may enjoy the following advantages says Infor Marketing Management:

  1. Improved Return on Investment (ROI) – one study found that personalized website experiences resulted in an average 19% increase in sales. For email, personalization is even more powerful, generating transaction rates and revenue six times higher per email than non-personalized emails.
  2. Outflanking the competition – with personalization, retailers can increase the impact of each interaction to get consumers’ attention and time online – at the cost of the competitors.
  3. Customers expect it – most consumers said it’s important to receive relevant offers when shopping online. And, almost a third wants more personalization during their online shopping experiences, reports Infor Marketing Management.

Concluding

“Personalization is retail’s future; especially as more advanced technologies allow marketers to handle personalization more effectively”, suggests Infor Marketing Management. However, retailers have to invest in the right technology, including marketing automation, CRM, social media management and data analytics tools, as well as more advanced e-commerce platforms.

Bringing the person back into the marketing message may help soften the total onslaught of marketing atomization by means of the internet of things, big data and bots. Success in personalization of marketing communication may give you a competitive advantage…

Have a peek at this short video from Evergage re personalized marketing communication.

A Marketing Plan helps you to communicate the right content to the right audience.

Read also:

  1. Demise of Loyal Retail Customers in the Digital Age
  2. Chatbots in Retailing – a Fact or a Fad?
  3. Retail and the Internet of Things

Notes

1 Järvinen, J. and Karjaluoto, H. 2015. The use of Web analytics for digital marketing performance measurement, Industrial Marketing Management, 50:117-127.

2 Grether, M. 2016. Using Big Data for Online Advertising Without Wastage: Wishful Dream, Nightmare or Reality? GfK Marketing Intelligence Review, 8(2):38-43.

3 Lee, Y.J., and Dubinsky, A.J. 2017. Consumers’ desire to interact with a salesperson during e-shopping: development of a scale, International Journal of Retail & Distribution Management, 45(1):20-39.

Images and video

  1. Pixabay
  2. GIGYA,
  3. Evergage

64 thoughts on “Personalization of Marketing Communication – not just for your Customer’s sake”

  1. Heya just wanted to give you a quick heads up and let you know
    a few of the pictures aren’t loading correctly.

    I’m not sure why but I think its a linking issue. I’ve tried
    it in two different browsers and both show the same results.

  2. Furthermore, Search Engine Optimization business give to their customers
    high website traffic web site listing you can market on in your advertising campaign to obtain even more website traffic.

  3. First off I want to say fantastic blog! I had a quick question in which I’d like
    to ask if you do not mind. I was interested to know how you
    center yourself and clear your thoughts prior to
    writing. I have had a hard time clearing my mind
    in getting my ideas out. I truly do enjoy writing however it just seems like the first 10 to 15 minutes are usually lost simply just trying to
    figure out how to begin. Any suggestions or hints? Many thanks!

  4. I see you don’t monetize your website, don’t waste your traffic, you can earn extra bucks every month because you’ve got hi quality content.
    If you want to know how to make extra money, search for:
    best adsense alternative Wrastain’s tools

  5. Hey there just wanted to give you a quick heads up.
    The words in your content seem to be running
    off the screen in Internet explorer. I’m not sure if this is a
    format issue or something to do with internet browser compatibility but
    I figured I’d post to let you know. The layout look great though!
    Hope you get the issue resolved soon. Cheers

  6. This is some enjoyable stuff. It took me a while to locate this website but it was worth the time. I noticed this page was buried in google and not the number one spot. This web site has a ton of nice stuff and it does not deserve to be burried in the search engines like that. By the way Im going to save this website to my favorites.
    buy oakley http://oakley.unilorites.com

  7. After examine a number of of the blog posts on your web site now, and I actually like your manner of blogging. I bookmarked it to my bookmark web site listing and might be checking back soon. Pls take a look at my web page as effectively and let me know what you think.

  8. It was actually wonderful reading this info and I think you are absolutely right. Let me know in case you are thinking about wealth generators back office, that is my principal competence. I am hoping to hear from you soon, be careful!

  9. This is some helpful stuff. It took me a while to unearth this website but it was worth the time. I noticed this page was hidden in google and not the number one spot. This web page has a lot of high-quality material and it doesnt deserve to be burried in the search engines like that. By the way Im going to add this web publication to my list of favorites.
    cheap hermes sale http://www.handbagssale.online

  10. Thank you for the wise critique. Me & my neighbour have been making ready to perform a little research about that. We acquired a great e book on that matter from our native library and most books the place not as influensive as your information. I am very glad to see such info which I used to be searching for a protracted time.This made very glad! Anyway, in my language, there arent much good source like this.
    fjallraven uk http://www.fjallravensale.cc

  11. Spletno oglaševanje – Learn more about the professionals as well as downsides of each and every of such approaches. Current changes inside adsense program have got shaken upward several affiliate marketers. May this suggest an instantaneous collapse regarding ad-sense is incorporated in the cards? even better, can cost per acquisition or cost-per-action advertising and marketing necessarily mean your loss of life involving google adsense as well as contextual advertisings?.
    patagonia jacket sale mens http://www.discountpatagonia.cc

  12. Took me time to learn all of the comments, however I actually enjoyed the article. It proved to be very helpful to me and Im certain to all of the commenters right here! It is all the time nice when you cant only be informed, but in addition engaged! Im positive you had joy writing this article. Anyway, in my language, there will not be much good source like this.
    ecco shop online http://www.londoon.co.uk

  13. Dude, please tell me that youre heading to write a lot more. I notice you havent written an additional weblog for a while (Im just catching up myself). Your blog is just too important to become missed. Youve received so very much to say, this kind of knowledge about this topic it would be a shame to see this weblog disappear. The internet needs you, man!
    Millet on sale https://droos.org/millet/

  14. Approaching from the standpoint of a fellow member within this trade, I really enjoy your write-up. I’ve constantly been in in actual fact like with this trade all my life so I’ve developed a discussion board for marketplace specialists to come together and discuss all things in this business. You gave me some fantastic creative concepts for my own website online.
    Millet online https://spectrumtraveltours.com/millet/

  15. An impressive share, I just given this onto a colleague who was doing a little analysis on this. And he in fact bought me breakfast because I found it for him.. smile. So let me reword that: Thnx for the treat! But yeah Thnkx for spending the time to discuss this, I feel strongly about it and love reading more on this topic. If possible, as you become expertise, would you mind updating your blog with more details? It is highly helpful for me. Big thumb up for this blog post!
    hermes ties for sale http://www.ebayhandbags.online

  16. Pingback: Are Your Customers Receiving Your Marketing Messages? - eBizplan.net

  17. Pingback: Demise of Loyal Retail Customers in the Digital Age - eBizplan.net

Leave a Comment

Scroll to Top