News
 Personalization:
Data to Use and Ways to Put Them in Action
Personalizing your marketing messages can be a great
way to connect with prospects. But to be truly
effective, personalization must go beyond a person’s
name. It must address an individual’s needs,
interests, and desires. Mavis Linneman, copy
editor/assistant editor of Target Marketing
Magazine, reveals the types of data that can help
personalize your marketing messages.
In addition to basic geographic and demographic
data, there are myriad other types of data you can
use to make your messages more relevant. Here, three
experts explain the types of data that can be used
to personalize marketing messages and a few ways to
use these data to your advantage.
Types of Data
1. Attitudinal or behavior-based data. Mark Graham,
senior vice president and chief knowledge officer at Yankelovich, a Chapel Hill, N.C.-based consumer
research company, suggests combining traditional
demographic and geographic data with social
consciousness measures. This type of data might
include a consumer’s beliefs about environmentalism,
health care, or exercise. “If this person is
socially conscious and recycles and considers
themselves an environmentalist, then by all means,
we need to communicate with [him] as if [he is] an
environmentalist,” he says.
Stephanie Laud, director of database marketing
solutions at Merkle, a Landham, Md.-based database
marketing agency, asserts that attitudinal data “can
also offer value by helping marketers understand
what drives customer behavior—which, in turn, can
also help determine targeting strategy.”
2. Transactional data. According to Laud, this is a
rich source of information for enhancing prospecting
data. “These transactional data—including purchase
behavior and general online activity—can make direct
mail and e-mail targeting even more relevant,” she
says. “It can also enable trigger-based targeting,
which would affect not only the timing and frequency
of contact, but also the message and even the
offer.”
3. Aggregated data. Laud explains, “If you are
selling a product targeted to individuals with
age-related health concerns, understanding
individual age and life stage is valuable,” she
says. “However, knowing the average age of people
within a particular county or ZIP Code(TM) could be
a more accessible solution, and one that can be
provided by aggregated data.”
4. Inquiry data. “Inquiry data—or the equivalent of
abandoned shopping carts—is also extremely valuable
for marketers sending ‘second chance’
opportunities,” says Debora Haskel, vice president
of marketing at IWCO Direct, a Chanhassen,
Minn.-based provider of direct mail production
services and solutions. For example, if a marketer
notices that a prospect abandoned her shopping cart
during the last stage of purchase, it could send a
follow-up e-mail to the shopper, offering assistance
with the purchase.
5. Life-event data. This type of data can be used to
tie a need—particularly an unarticulated need—to an
offer. For example, a marketer might send a new
parent an offer for a parenting magazine. According
to Haskel, “Recent market studies have shown a
triple-digit lift from matching offer to need, and
that 69 percent of consumers open mail due to timing
and need.”
Data in Action
Here are a few ways to use data for personalization
beyond the tried and true.
1. Tie in geography. For a postcard mailing to
prospective customers, Graham notes a high-end,
regional car dealership printed the image of the
specific car it was trying to market. The car’s
license plate matched the state the recipient lived
in, and the license plate number was the recipient’s
name.
Another way to tie in geography, adds Haskel, is to
use testimonials from customers who live in the same
region as the prospect.
2. Marry short-form online information to follow-up
communications. According to Graham, this is a trend
in e-mail marketing in which marketers are
collecting minimal information from
consumers—through as few as 10 questions—and then
using the information “to score these people
immediately based off a predefined segmentation
system ... it gives you enough information to have
the person segmented into a particular cluster,” he
explains. “Based on which cluster they’re in, they
get a message that’s sent right to ‘em.”
Graham uses car insurance as an example, saying that
if you just purchased car insurance, you might be
interested in tires or floor mats. “There’s a
correlation of products that get purchased at the
same time,” he says, and short-form information
could be used for subsequent offers.
3. Use familiar respond-by dates. Laud notes that in
financial services, “use of birth dates for
respond-by dates have been proven effective.”
4. Use dynamic linking of images and landing pages.
This can be done “based on customer and/or prospect
modeling,” says Haskel. Loyalty programs, in
particular, are using this to tie specific offers to
behaviors and attributes. Haskel explains, “A large
pet store might use breed-specific images for dog
owners whose profiles include not just number of
pets, but additional details about pets they own.”
A final note: While personalization is a great tool
to lift response, like everything else it should be
used in moderation, especially in direct mail.
“Too much personalization feels ‘Big Brother’ to
people, as though the marketer is following their
every move,” relays Laud. “Overpersonalization is
less of a concern with e-mail and follow-up
contact,” she states, because consumers expect that
you’re able to link to their contact information
once they’ve given you their e-mail addresses.
---Source:
Target Marketing Magazine August 15, 2007 issue (www.targetmarketingmag.com).
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