Are You Maximizing Personalization to Drive Customer Loyalty?
As retailers reflect on last year’s hits and misses, boosting consumer trust and engagement remain top of mind.
With today’s market characterized by accelerating ad spend costs, increased competition and price transparency, retailers face an uphill battle for the coveted consumer spend. According to the shopping preferences of more than 1,000 U.S. shoppers, 69% are seeking more personalized offers and experiences that more accurately meet their needs. To reach their target demographics effectively, retailers should tailor their products and services to individual consumers instead of investing in a one-size-fits-all approach. Let’s explore a few ways of engaging consumers with a personalized approach to shopping.
More from Sourcing Journal
Create Custom Product and Price Promotions
Data has long been the cornerstone of a successful retail strategy. Data-driven insights into customer preferences and shopping habits inform approaches that help customers feel heard and understood. One approach retailers can take to address the price-conscious needs of today’s shoppers is delivering personalized discounts and product offers for items and services consumers have already expressed interest in.
According to CapitalOne Shopping research, 80 percent of Americans would be open to purchasing from a brand for the first time if they had a discount and consumers who use coupons spend 37 percent more than those who don’t. By leveraging point-of-sale (POS), CRMs and ERPs like NetSuite and Salesforce, website, and mobile app data, retailers can develop more sophisticated 360 views to inform personalized offers. Investing in an integration platform like iPaaS can ensure accurate, real-time data can efficiently deliver discounts like abandoned cart offers, automated price drop alerts, and personalized emails.
Reward Repeat Customers with Loyalty Programs
For most retailers, the value of repeat customers is well known with 67% of returning customer spending more than one-off customers. Major retailers from Starbucks to Sephora have invested billions into loyalty programs to ensure they continue to capture the attention of existing customers while focusing their efforts on reeling in new ones. And amid easy access to competitor products, reviews, shopping guides and more, retailers cannot afford to lose their most loyal customer base. These programs not only encourage existing customers to continue engaging, but also inspire them to spread the word to other potential shoppers.
One loyalty initiative retailers can invest in includes member programs for repeat purchases that result in an accumulation of points or status that can later be leveraged for additional rewards. Such programs also offer the added benefit of allowing retailers to easily capture personal details such as order history, birthdays, and personal preferences that enable retailers to seamlessly target customers with personalized email and text campaigns later on.
Invest in Top-Tier Customer Service and Support
In a time when disconnected applications and data sources can often complicate efforts to address customer questions and concerns, a concerning number of retailers have chosen to let customer service efforts fall by the wayside. Yet, 45% of consumers indicated they would turn away from online retailers that provide poor customer service, proving that retailers that fail to address concerns such as delayed or slow shipping, inefficient returns management, and unresponsive customer service will feel the pressure.
Often, a lack of transparency into consumer buying behaviors and order fulfillment can complicate customer service teams’ effort to proactively view and address concerns. Furthermore, manual order tracking can be time-consuming and costly, reinforcing the need for a comprehensive integration strategy that provides 360 visibility into the customer.
Leverage Customer Data for Targeted Email and Text Campaigns
Large social media and advertising initiatives have boundless merits, but with consumers inundated with marketing materials, retailers need to invest in an alternative approach to speak to consumers at the individual level.
Email and text campaigns can more easily deliver the personalized offers customers seek by capitalizing on order history and preferences. This approach can provide quick wins for retailers in the form of abandoned cart recovery, restocking updates and welcome specials. Additionally, busy seasons are often characterized by last-minute shoppers struggling to check off their remaining gifts; retailers can play a part in making sure they find a spot on the checklist by offering direct messages when consumers need it most.
Today’s era of retail is rife with competition, both online and in-person. Retailers are forced to grapple with not only lowered consumer spending, but also a more informed consumer armed with a deep knowledge of the market and other offerings. If retailers want to set themselves up for success, they can start listening to what consumers want most and invest in personalized offers that assure their customers they’re seen not just as a number, but as an individual with preferences and opinions.
Mark Simon is the vice president of strategy at Celigo. With more than two decades of experience in the tech industry, Mark has spent his time leading teams at a number of different companies, such as Explore Consulting and Evo, where he served as chief technology officer.
