Customers are increasingly demanding personal and relevant online shopping experiences. It is therefore important to think about how you can create as relevant content as possible on your website based on the data you have available about the customer. You have different options depending on whether the customer is anonymous or known.
Anonymous personalisation
For visitors who have not registered any personal information, the content of the online shop can be optimized using anonymous data from analysis tools such as Google Analytics.
Individuals are then placed in different groups/segments and receive content accordingly. The content for the various groups/segments can be adapted to different categories such as: new vs. returning customers, popular products and categories, conversions, gender, age, location, device and traffic.
By using anonymous data in this way, you can improve your content, but it does not allow you to deliver personalized experiences to each customer.
It is also possible to optimize the content of the online shop by using cookies. This is a small text file that is downloaded and stored on the computer when the user opens a website. It can, for example, be used to remember the shopping cart, record where the user moves around the website and purchase history. This is not data that is linked to you as a person, but to the device used.
Personalisation and customer retention programs
It is only when the customer has created an account/user in the online store that you can offer personalized content based on information stored on the customer. Personalization is about offering personalized experiences by dynamically displaying/changing content, product recommendations and specific offers based on demographics, interests, behaviour, purchase history and other personal data. Examples of the use of personalization can be: display of complementary products, display of related products/categories, products/categories the customer has recently viewed/purchased, targeted discounts on recently viewed/purchased products and banners adapted to each individual customer.
Why focus on personalization
- Marketers see an average 20% increase in sales when a personalized experience is offered. (Monetity)
- 80% of consumers are more likely to buy when brands offer personalized experiences. (Epsilon)
- 77% of consumers have chosen, recommended or paid more for a brand that offers a personalized experience. (By the way)
- 90% of US consumers find personalized marketing content somewhat to very appealing. (Statistics)
- 92% of marketers say customers and prospects expect a personalized experience - up from 85% in 2019. (Evergage)
- 83% of customers would exchange data for a more personalized experience. (Accenture)
To get customers to register with personal information in the online store, a customer club can work well as an incentive. With a customer club, you can offer unique benefits that make it attractive for customers to sign up. Once the customer has filled out a form, you are sitting on key data that helps you improve your future visits. If we use this data to offer personalized content, customers will have a relevant shopping experience in the online store.
See how we work with customer clubs
In a clothing store, for example, the registration form can ask the customer for personal information such as name, gender and date of birth. This can be combined with other data such as purchase history (in physical store and online store) and behavior (click/view history) in the online store. The result is that the members who visit the clothing store receive content, product recommendations and specific offers based on this data.
Focus on the entire customer journey
All pages on your website should be customized to best hit the various phases of the customer journey. If we manage to use the data that we capture to provide content/products that we believe are relevant at the moment, we show customers that we understand them and their preferences. We must offer the content that is most likely to lead to a sale or that leads customers to the products they want to buy. In this way, we simplify the customer journey, help customers complete purchases and create good customer experiences.
Contact us if you need tips or help on how to best adapt the content of your websites!
Maja Aalberg
Maja works as a digital advisor and project manager in Frontkom. She has a bachelor's degree in PR- and marketing communications from BI Norwegian Business School and Master's degree in Communication and Information Technology from NTNU. Maja is an expert in creating growth through digital marketing and content.