Personalisation for all?
By: Aurélie Bastian
Tags: User Experience, Personalisation, Targeting, Cro, Digital Marketing

When one mentions personalising customer experience through customised content, the initial assumption is that it requires complex implementation, additional expertise and costly technical solutions. It is actually far from the truth: personalisation is available to all — but there are different levels of personalisation from beginner to expert.

In order to initiate your personalisation project, start with the following 3 steps :

Tool selection: several providers in the market e.g. AB Tasty, Optimizely, Adobe Target… Mapping of available data: required in order to define your segments. The listing of content to be personalised : editorial or visual content, offers…

Check our Infographic before going further :

Level 1 — Beginner — Leverage the tools’ native features

The CRO (Conversion Rate Optimisation) tools usually offer native features, you can easily activate these when defining your targeting plan. Here are a few use cases:

Segments: Returning visitors vs new visitors

Returning and new visitors have different expectations when coming on your website; personalisation can help you meet their needs.

Personalisation example :

. First timers > a homepage focused on editorial content in order to preempt questions and infuse them with brand values.

. Second timers and more > a homepage more conversion oriented.

Segments: Traffic sources

Depending on the traffic source or campaign, you can personalise the wording and visual content to reassure the user.

Personalisation example:

. Users coming from your “mum” segment promotion e-mailing campaign will see family pictures and products on the website’s homepage.

Segments: Geolocation

According to the user’s geolocation you can personalise the experience.

Personalisation example:

. To promote the opening of a shop in Paris, you can display a banner to address the Parisian audience. As geolocation is based on IP, be careful of the precision degree you want to reach.

Level 2 — Intermediate — Use existing implementation

Most of the time marketers already own customised information, that can be very useful for your personalisation project.

Datalayer:

With a datalayer, you can get specific information about users. Some marketers use it to enrich their data and media tags. I recommend using the data to enhance your personalisation project.

Use case :

. The user holds a loyalty card > Offer him to buy products.

. The user doesn’t hold a card yet > Drive him to a subscription.

Existing content:

Your web pages are a great source of content, which can be leveraged to activate personalisation.

Use case :

. A promotion banner is displayed on the product page > creating a sense of urgency, by showing a countdown to the end of your special offer.

Level 3 — Expert — Use tools to go further

Several solutions on the market provide advanced tools to create segments or product recommendations.

DMP (Data Management Platform) :

Marketers use it in the field of acquisition campaigns, to create enhanced user segments. I recommend activating these segments to personalise user experience.

Focus on Product recommendations :

These solutions provide self learning tools which are able to analyse purchase history, in order to offer the most relevant products.

Website personalisation is a broad subject, however, keep in mind that it is accessible to all. You can succeed by focusing on key questions, defining the right segments, and going step by step.