Personalization is more important than ever before in this newly regulated GDPR world. How important? According to an article in RetailTouch Points, 87% of consumer survey respondents are willing to share various details of activity and consent to behavior tracking or monitoring in exchange for personalized engagements or rewards.
The lynchpin for the exchange of data is that it has to be worthwhile. How, therefore, can organizations ensure that they are delivering the valuable experiences that make buyers happy to share their data? For websites, there are many different areas that can be personalized for individual customers. It’s not as hard as it might seem, and too few marketers are taking advantage of the opportunities available to them.
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According to a study by Accenture, only 25% of marketers are using the effective technique of targeting web traffic by customer segment to reach audiences with tailored messaging. Yet Targeting web traffic by customer segment is only done by 25% of marketers nearly 48% of buyers report having left a site after a poorly curated experience, and 91% of consumers are more likely to buy if brands recognize them and provide relevant offers and recommendations.
4 areas to personalize today:
Behavioral: This type of targeting presents messages and offers based on a wide range of past and current website activity. Think about what your buyers are telling you with past purchases, likes, or shares, and use that to build a better experience for them. For example, you can offer specific content to address cart abandonment or returns.
Behavioral targeting is one of the first areas to focus on when you being personalizing, as marketers typically have the data already and can easily begin segmenting with relevant content and offers to increase the customer experience.
Geotargeting: Targeting content and offers for visitors based on their location is called geotargeting. Location contains a lot of valuable context that allows marketers to offer an enhanced experience, if they know both where people are located currently at the moment they visit the site, and where they have been in the past.
Think about travelers from different parts of the world or regions of the country and how geotargeting could help customize their experience. A retailer could offer sunscreen or beach supplies if a customer from Minnesota is in Maui in December. Geotargeting offers an opportunity to demonstrate insights, a commitment to customer satisfaction, and a chance to show a sense of humor or company culture.
Technographic: This is specific targeting based on the technology stack of the buyer. Show different offers to website visitors based on their hardware, software, device or other settings. Wearables and voice-activation are also an important part of technographic personalization that can be leveraged to improve customer experience and increase conversion rates.
Weather: Deliver weather-based promotions and messaging based on current or expected weather conditions. Think about refining targeting to include local temperatures, heat index, rain (Pantene offers below), snow, or even wind chill.
Buyers on the go or traveling might really appreciate this data before they walk out to door in a new city or country.
Check out Monetate’s Target Practice Infographic for more website personalization ideas including products viewed, distance to warehouse, time and shipping zone or purchase frequency. The crux is that creating 1-to-1 experiences through personalization will do more than increase customer satisfaction: it drives more revenue, so that while your customers are enjoying an enhanced experience your bottom line is also seeing a healthy boost. Sounds like a win/win to us.