Partner Article

Embrace the initimacy of online marketing for customers

It’s online marketing focus week on Bdaily. Here, Anthony Wilkey, strategic client director at Emailvision, examines the importance of keeping customers engaged.

As consumers we are a contrary bunch: we want to be understood and valued as unique individuals, yet we are passionate about preserving our privacy.

Online marketing channels can be intimate and the results are immediate. Customers can be easily engaged, yet there are damaging consequences if brands fail to acknowledge the individuals to whom they are talking to.

In a recent YouGov survey, conducted on behalf of Emailvision, 75 per cent of respondents said they felt bombarded with too many emails and 50 per cent had had their names spelt incorrectly, resulting in 40 per cent of respondents refusing to share any of their personal details with brands.

The start of any good online customer relationship requires listening, appreciating and acting on the preferences and interests with those we do business. In our experience, the following techniques are essential:

Focus on quality not quantity

For many marketers the volume, variety and velocity of information that is generated daily by consumer interaction with a brand can appear overwhelming. Focusing on quality is key.

Keeping the customer at the heart of it all

As customers rely more on technology and interaction with brands throughout the day on a number of devices, marketers need to tailor their digital marketing strategy accordingly.

Customers should be kept at the heart of marketing strategies and multichannel campaign development. It is important that every customer is treated as an individual – ruin this and risk high levels of resentment.

Engaging relevantly with audiences

It is essential for a brand to be able to react relevantly with its’ audience. For example, in order to address the increasingly prevalent issue of cart abandonment, a company could send out a followup email reminding visitors of their basket contents and encouraging them to complete the purchase, which could also include cross-sell and up-sell recommendations for related purchases.

Such content engages customers and helps to guide them toward new opportunities. Enabling customers to define their preferences, so that they can receive valuable recommendations, will also help further develop your relationship online and in-store.

Getting tactical

It is essential to set objectives for every campaign and ensure the right technology is in place to support and measure performance.

If the goal of a campaign is to encourage repeat purchases, do take into account a visitor’s preferences and how often they re-purchase items. If it is to encourage cross-sells, do provide intelligent recommendations around the “people who bought X also bought Y.” If it is to encourage immediate or impulse purchases it is important to ensure recommendations have low delivery costs; and if it is to move last-season or sale stock, retailers are best off making use of what is known in the trade as “worst-seller algorithms.”

There is no doubt that technology has transformed the relationship between brands and consumers.

Digital marketing has immense potential for building relationships, but has significant consequences when not executed properly.

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by SmartFocus .