March 18, 2015
Retailers struggle with personal e-mails
For all the benefits promised with the advancements being made in data analytics, none is more enticing to me than personalization. I’m not talking about a system that knows me so well it can predict what I’m going to buy next, but simply one that takes my purchasing history and personal preferences into account to provide me with recommendations and offers that don’t cause me to grimace or giggle.
I happily provide personal information with the hope, for example, that nearly five years after making my last purchase of disposable diapers, retailers will stop e-mailing me discount offers on Pampers and Hugs and perhaps tell me about a new coffee from Peet’s or, better yet, offer me a deal on the French Roast that I consume in mass quantities.
According to a study last December by The Relevancy Group, via eMarketer, segmentation and targeting top the e-mail marketing priority lists of marketers in 2015. That is hopeful news, because according to the same research, e-mail offers are a long way from being personalized.
Only 27 percent use transaction data and purchasing behavior in their e-mail marketing campaigns, say study results, even though this information is generally seen as the surest path to a return on investment.
In fact, there are only two metrics that rise above the one-third level. Demographic data is used by 41 percent and geographic data by 39 percent.
Part of the issue is that most retailers are a ways off from the omnichannel nirvana they and tech providers love to talk about. According to The Relevancy Group, just 28 percent use data from across selling channels to create a single view of their customers.
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Discussion Questions
What do you see as the cause or causes behind the lack of personalization in e-mail marketing? Will more personalized e-mails have a significant affect on retail revenues?
Poll
Personalization requires money to analyze data and few retailers are willing to spend what is needed. That said, consumers are turning away from email as an advertising vehicle. Retailers have trained them not to open emails because they don’t contain meaningful information.
This is such a major missed opportunity for retailers and the only reason I can think of is that we are all so distracted by collecting data that we are failing to actually make good use of it.
Email marketing that misses the mark is only contributing to a culture of people that automatically delete all emails from retailers. Personalized emails will help build a more loyal and direct relationship between shopper and retailer, as well as drive incremental sales by suggesting purchases that customers could actually use.
We’ve found in our studies that the digital marketing group struggles to find its place amid existing marketing groups (as I mentioned earlier this week when talking about FSIs).
The thing retailers seem to like about digital marketing is it’s not very expensive to just send it out. Just like re-targeting isn’t that expensive to just blast to everyone with a cookie on their computer. Finer cuts cost money, and so far the ROI hasn’t been well quantified.
The message seems to always be the same. We get enamored as an industry with an idea, and then struggle to find a way to actually implement it. In other words, I don’t think it’s a technology issue—it’s an operational and execution issue.
Money for systems, training for employees, time for software mastery and testing of segments and messages are needed to make email segmentation effective. The results of effective implementation are increased loyalty and increased sales. The results are great but require a significant investment.
There is a long list of reasons why personalized emails haven’t advanced, perhaps really too long to explore here.
While retailers have always drawn a causal link between increased personalization and increased sales, I’m not convinced that: a. that link has ever been as strong as proponents claim, and b. that the logic of personalization bridges into the digital age—at least in the form of emails.
As time goes on I think people will continue to add filters that directly and/or indirectly block sellers. Why do I think that? How many emails do you get in a week? And how much has the volume of those emails increased over the past five years?
Email management is a growing issue. Adding more cyber fuel to the digital fire isn’t going to help.
Totally agree with the case for personalization. If you’re targeting and personalizing your email campaigns based on clicks and opens alone, you do not have enough data—whereas doing this properly is shown to increase sales by 14 percent.
In my experience, the companies who don’t implement personalization have outsourced their marketing and don’t want to even make tiny changes like adding a single line of script.
The gathering of information, within the context of personalization requires massive amounts of data that is complete, timely and doesn’t threaten privacy concerns. These might be contradictions within themselves, which might explain why personalized email marketing is so difficult to succeed with when directing their impact on retail sales (and thus revenues).
We are all recipients of unsolicited email on a daily basis. What is interesting is how we come to the conclusion that it is simply junk mail. In the age of information we hold as valueless the information that comes to us for free without regard for the content and support information attesting to its relevance and value in our lives. This is one instance where blaming the messenger is the correct response. The tools used to communicate have nothing to do with what the message does to the consumer. The ability to effectively communicate via email is in fact the creation of a first impression and therefore of paramount importance. Putting together a concise and accurate announcement designed to provoke a positive response is all we need to do, every time.
If after reading your message the consumer disregards it prior to reading all of it or responds with indifference then it is fair to conclude that the messenger’s communication skill level is the problem. Watching and listening to people point at the equipment they use instead of how ill-prepared they are to communicate has never ceased to amaze, bewilder and amuse me.
If people only purchased from one company (either online or bricks and mortar) there would be a decent chance that that firm, over time, would get a good handle on a purchaser’s habits and preferences from the collected data. But we don’t buy from just one company or use just one credit card. We spread our business around for many good reasons.
I don’t think it’s ever going to be possible for a retailer to know me, my family, and our crazy life well enough to make useful and personalized “recommendations.” I wish they’d stop trying, and stop filling up my inbox with “offers” that are of no interest to me up until I am forced to block them or unsubscribe to their emails.
To be truly personal, you have to be accurate, both in the eyes of the consumer and within the back-office functions of the retail or CPG enterprise. You have to take the time to investigate the marketplace for the right tools, readily available today from several great vendors, and determine what capabilities are required to achieve your organization’s growth strategy goals. Getting these tools implemented will definitely have a positive effect upon the profitable growth potential of the company.
No matter how well analyzed the data is, personalization will always be tricky. Most of the shopping I do these days is for people other than myself. Rarely am I in the market to buy these items again.
I know, I know, some categories have a better chance than others.
Bottom line, getting the brand name in front of the consumers eyeballs will always have some value and if email is a cheap way to do this, it will continue.
Personalization, on the other hand, will truly see its day when retailers can track me from my pre-store shopping all the way to the store. Say I put some items in my cart or wish list online, then I enter a store and see a pop-up of those same items and/or similar items I might be interested in. Now, that is personalization!
For my 2 cents.
Every so often I’m asked in a(n online) survey something along the lines of: “Many companies gather personal data to make offers more compelling/relevant. Do you generally think this is a good thing?” And as I start to answer I think, relevancy is nice, but…I’m not keen on them having all the info needed to determine that (or at least I may not be). And that sums up the quandary: we want people to know what we want, but we don’t really want them to know much about us. I’m not sure that conflict can ever really be resolved.
Spam filters cull out many emails from retailers as there are so many emails with so little value to the consumer. Not sure more personalization will solve that but at the same time, if it makes the emails more relevant, perhaps it will help.
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Personalization requires money to analyze data and few retailers are willing to spend what is needed. That said, consumers are turning away from email as an advertising vehicle. Retailers have trained them not to open emails because they don’t contain meaningful information.
This is such a major missed opportunity for retailers and the only reason I can think of is that we are all so distracted by collecting data that we are failing to actually make good use of it.
Email marketing that misses the mark is only contributing to a culture of people that automatically delete all emails from retailers. Personalized emails will help build a more loyal and direct relationship between shopper and retailer, as well as drive incremental sales by suggesting purchases that customers could actually use.
We’ve found in our studies that the digital marketing group struggles to find its place amid existing marketing groups (as I mentioned earlier this week when talking about FSIs).
The thing retailers seem to like about digital marketing is it’s not very expensive to just send it out. Just like re-targeting isn’t that expensive to just blast to everyone with a cookie on their computer. Finer cuts cost money, and so far the ROI hasn’t been well quantified.
The message seems to always be the same. We get enamored as an industry with an idea, and then struggle to find a way to actually implement it. In other words, I don’t think it’s a technology issue—it’s an operational and execution issue.
Money for systems, training for employees, time for software mastery and testing of segments and messages are needed to make email segmentation effective. The results of effective implementation are increased loyalty and increased sales. The results are great but require a significant investment.
There is a long list of reasons why personalized emails haven’t advanced, perhaps really too long to explore here.
While retailers have always drawn a causal link between increased personalization and increased sales, I’m not convinced that: a. that link has ever been as strong as proponents claim, and b. that the logic of personalization bridges into the digital age—at least in the form of emails.
As time goes on I think people will continue to add filters that directly and/or indirectly block sellers. Why do I think that? How many emails do you get in a week? And how much has the volume of those emails increased over the past five years?
Email management is a growing issue. Adding more cyber fuel to the digital fire isn’t going to help.
Totally agree with the case for personalization. If you’re targeting and personalizing your email campaigns based on clicks and opens alone, you do not have enough data—whereas doing this properly is shown to increase sales by 14 percent.
In my experience, the companies who don’t implement personalization have outsourced their marketing and don’t want to even make tiny changes like adding a single line of script.
The gathering of information, within the context of personalization requires massive amounts of data that is complete, timely and doesn’t threaten privacy concerns. These might be contradictions within themselves, which might explain why personalized email marketing is so difficult to succeed with when directing their impact on retail sales (and thus revenues).
We are all recipients of unsolicited email on a daily basis. What is interesting is how we come to the conclusion that it is simply junk mail. In the age of information we hold as valueless the information that comes to us for free without regard for the content and support information attesting to its relevance and value in our lives. This is one instance where blaming the messenger is the correct response. The tools used to communicate have nothing to do with what the message does to the consumer. The ability to effectively communicate via email is in fact the creation of a first impression and therefore of paramount importance. Putting together a concise and accurate announcement designed to provoke a positive response is all we need to do, every time.
If after reading your message the consumer disregards it prior to reading all of it or responds with indifference then it is fair to conclude that the messenger’s communication skill level is the problem. Watching and listening to people point at the equipment they use instead of how ill-prepared they are to communicate has never ceased to amaze, bewilder and amuse me.
If people only purchased from one company (either online or bricks and mortar) there would be a decent chance that that firm, over time, would get a good handle on a purchaser’s habits and preferences from the collected data. But we don’t buy from just one company or use just one credit card. We spread our business around for many good reasons.
I don’t think it’s ever going to be possible for a retailer to know me, my family, and our crazy life well enough to make useful and personalized “recommendations.” I wish they’d stop trying, and stop filling up my inbox with “offers” that are of no interest to me up until I am forced to block them or unsubscribe to their emails.
To be truly personal, you have to be accurate, both in the eyes of the consumer and within the back-office functions of the retail or CPG enterprise. You have to take the time to investigate the marketplace for the right tools, readily available today from several great vendors, and determine what capabilities are required to achieve your organization’s growth strategy goals. Getting these tools implemented will definitely have a positive effect upon the profitable growth potential of the company.
No matter how well analyzed the data is, personalization will always be tricky. Most of the shopping I do these days is for people other than myself. Rarely am I in the market to buy these items again.
I know, I know, some categories have a better chance than others.
Bottom line, getting the brand name in front of the consumers eyeballs will always have some value and if email is a cheap way to do this, it will continue.
Personalization, on the other hand, will truly see its day when retailers can track me from my pre-store shopping all the way to the store. Say I put some items in my cart or wish list online, then I enter a store and see a pop-up of those same items and/or similar items I might be interested in. Now, that is personalization!
For my 2 cents.
Every so often I’m asked in a(n online) survey something along the lines of: “Many companies gather personal data to make offers more compelling/relevant. Do you generally think this is a good thing?” And as I start to answer I think, relevancy is nice, but…I’m not keen on them having all the info needed to determine that (or at least I may not be). And that sums up the quandary: we want people to know what we want, but we don’t really want them to know much about us. I’m not sure that conflict can ever really be resolved.
Spam filters cull out many emails from retailers as there are so many emails with so little value to the consumer. Not sure more personalization will solve that but at the same time, if it makes the emails more relevant, perhaps it will help.