Personalization is a critical pillar of retention marketing as it makes the customer feel valued. Absence of personalization signals to customers that you don’t value their business, giving them a reason to spend money elsewhere. More than retaining revenue, it also drives more revenue as eighty-six percent (86%) of customers say that personalization influences their purchases (Infosys, 2013). According to recent research from Motista, emotionally connected customers have a 306% higher lifetime value (LTV), stay with a brand for an average of 5.1 years vs. 3.4 years, and will recommend brands at a much higher rate (71% vs. 45%). 

But why should you care about personalization, and what does it have to do with loyalty? 

Personalization can be defined in a few different ways. From adding a customer’s name or initials to products to using a core statement that speaks to your core audience. Personalization helps your brand to connect your products and services to the right audience at the right time. While it may seem quite overwhelming at first, it really is quite simple. You can steer your customers in the right direction and predict their needs with artificial intelligence and machine learning.

From the minute someone lands on your website, the entire journey can be personalized and therefore relevant to each customer. No need to create personas anymore. Every journey will be unique. Let’s say when a potential customer is browsing your store aimlessly, a chatbot could make some unique suggestions to the visitor, highlighting some important articles, trying to guide the potential customer to make a purchase. Furthermore, if the visitor is logged in, or decides to create an account, all of the future interactions can be personalized based on their profile. 

While it may sound a bit complex, the journey is all worth it as the numbers speak for themselves. Personalized home page promotions influenced 85 percent of consumers to make a purchase. Additionally, personalized shopping cart recommendations were responsible for influencing 92% of online shoppers (Instapage, 2019). 

So let’s explore together the 3 important steps of how you can give your customers  a Personalized Experience:

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1. Create Dashboards.

Creating a personal home page allows the customer to see their past purchases, loyalty points, and potential rewards. You can take it a step further by personalizing all of the promotional banners on your homepage based on their purchase history. 

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2. Personalize all interactions.

Social media is a powerful tool for driving sales, especially in the eCommerce industry, as they target the younger generations. However, you must not disregard the push notifications that customers receive from your app or via email. In fact, email remains one of the most used forms of communication. Nevertheless, all interactions must remain personalized and relevant to each of your customers. Mass emails, discounts, or campaigns will only drive customers away. Your brand must consider at all times how relevant a particular promotion is for your customer. 

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3. Restructure Loyalty Program.

Lastly, it is important to restructure your loyalty program to incorporate rewards for better engagement. Rewarding your customers for uploading images on your product’s social media, for example, should now become part of your core strategy, which would allow for a more human experience & interaction with your brand. Offering a multitude of options for earning points allows the customers to interact with your brand on their terms. A great example is the North Face’s VIPPeak Program which allows customers to earn points for a curated experience, not just discounts on products.

Creating a relevant personal experience maintains customer loyalty

Overall, the experience accounts for 76% of what drives engagement, and out of that 12% is solely personal reverence. So creating a relevant and personal experience is key for maintaining customer loyalty (Motista, 2018).