How the use of personalisation in digital marketing enhances customer engagement

In today’s fiercely competitive market, standing out is more challenging than ever. No matter the sector, brands must differentiate themselves and forge deep connections with their audiences to gain a competitive edge. The use of personalisation in digital marketing has emerged as an essential strategy for boosting customer engagement and retention. By providing products, services, experiences or content that truly align with each customer’s preferences, brands can significantly increase their relevance and impact.

Sprout Social has conducted an extensive study on the connection 1,000 people have with brands. When asked to reflect on their relationship with brands, two-thirds of consumers equate feeling connected with trust. Furthermore, 53% of people say they feel connected when that brand’s values align with theirs. And more than half (51%) say their relationship with a brand starts when they feel the brand understands them and their desires. 

These insights underscore that the use of personalisation in digital marketing isn’t just a trend. It’s a necessity in the modern marketing landscape. Today’s consumers expect brands to understand and respond to their unique needs and interests. This level of adaptability is crucial for building a solid and recognisable brand and, ultimately, for boosting customer engagement.

Let’s examine how!

1. What is personalisation in digital marketing?

Let’s start by defining a common understanding of personalised marketing to make sure we’re all on the same page. 

The definition of personalisation in digital marketing

Another commonly used word is individual marketing, referring to the same idea as personalised marketing. By adapting and tailoring your marketing efforts to your customers, you make them feel as if the message was made just for them. Result? You address their needs, and make them feel special. 

Some examples of personalisation in digital marketing

Some common examples of personalised marketing could be the following, as you’ve undoubtedly come across them:

• Targeted emails: tailoring email content to individual preferences and behaviours to increase open rates and click-through rates.
• Product recommendations: using customer data and browsing history to suggest relevant products or services, enhance the shopping experience and drive sales.
• Social media marketing: customising social media content and ads based on user interests and interactions to boost engagement, brand visibility and conversion.
• Location-based marketing: delivering personalised offers and messages based on a customer’s geographic location to drive foot traffic and relevance.

Many other examples of personalisation in digital marketing can also be mentioned, such as account-based marketing, which targets specific businesses or individuals with tailored messages, and “FOMO” marketing, which leverages the fear of missing out through time-sensitive offers and exclusive deals. These strategies further illustrate how personalisation can enhance customer engagement and achieve marketing and branding objectives.

2. The importance of personalisation in digital marketing

Let’s dive into the juicy stuff. Now that you have a better idea of personalisation in digital marketing, you should start understanding why it can be activated to boost customer engagement and serve your brand identity.

Enhancing customer experience

The use of personalisation in digital marketing significantly improves the customer experience by making interactions more relevant and tailored to individual preferences. Customers’ satisfaction increases when they feel a brand understands their needs and interests. This positive experience strengthens their connection to the brand, fostering a more meaningful relationship.

Building brand loyalty

Personalisation plays a crucial role in building and maintaining brand loyalty. By consistently delivering content and offers that resonate with individual customers, brands can create a sense of loyalty and trust. When customers see that a brand they like is considering their preferences and engages with them on a personal level, they’ll have a higher likelihood of remaining loyal, repeating purchases and becoming ambassadors. 

Boosting engagement and conversion rates

Adapting marketing efforts to individual interests and behaviours boosts engagement and improves conversion rates. Because personalised content and offers are compelling and relevant, they therefore push customers to take action. It could be clicking through an email, exploring the product recommendations or responding to a social media ad. Personalisation increases interaction and conversion.

Differentiating the brand

The market is crowded, and you want people to remember you. Personalised marketing helps brands stand out. They can do so by offering unique and tailored experiences that set them apart from competitors. By leveraging customer data, brands can establish and reinforce their distinctive identity. 

Anticipating customers needs

One of the most powerful aspects of personalisation in digital marketing is its ability to anticipate customer needs. By analysing customer profiles and interests, brands can predict what products or services a customer might need next. This proactive approach not only boosts sales but also deepens the customer relationship. When customers feel that a brand can anticipate their needs, they are more likely to trust and stay loyal to that brand.

3. How to implement personalisation in digital marketing

It should be pretty clear to you now how vital personalised marketing is to your brand and how you can use it to serve your branding objectives. But something is missing, right? Where will you start? What will you base yourself on to personalise your efforts and reach your audience? Well, for that, you need data. And to have data, you first need to collect it. Spoiler alert: the Qualifio platform can help. We’ve done it before 😉

Collect and analyse data for personalised marketing

The foundation of effective personalisation lies in proper first- and zero-party data collection.

• First-party data: this data is directly collected by brands from their audience, customers and prospects. It includes information gathered through interactions such as website visits, form submissions, or contest participations. First-party data is precious because it is obtained from your channels and reflects real interactions with your brand.
• Zero-party data: this is data that consumers intentionally and proactively share with a brand. It includes preferences, feedback and optional information that users willingly provide to improve their experience with a brand.

This data is transparent, consented and compliant with GDPR. But you’re not simply going to ask for it, right? Instead, you can collect it thanks to interactive marketing and gamification. By using interactive formats and offering a value exchange, your audience will willingly provide you with their data, which you can then use for marketing purposes. Qualifio offers a catalogue of 50+ interactive formats for you to choose from as well as interactive reward programs. With these, you can create your stunning campaigns and use gamification to collect data from your audience. 

Create tailored content

Once you have collected and analysed your data, the next step is to create tailored content that resonates with your audience. Here’s how you can do it effectively:

• Targeted emailing: craft messages that address their specific needs and interests, increasing engagement and conversion rates.

• Dynamic content: use dynamic content tools (like dynamic variables) to display personalised messages, offers, and visuals that align with the interests of different audience segments.

• Interactive campaigns: design interactive campaigns that adapt based on user responses, providing a personalised experience for each participant. Klorane, a French brand renowned for its botanical-based hair, face, and body care products, used Qualifio to create a facial skincare campaign offering a personalised skin diagnostic tool. This tool helps users find the right skincare routine tailored to their specific needs. By answering a series of questions about skin type, concerns, and goals, the diagnostic suggests a routine built from Klorane’s botanical-based products, including their BIO-certified ranges.

This campaign perfectly illustrates how personalised marketing can tailor content to adapt to its audience. 

Test and optimise

Regularly monitor the performance of your personalised campaigns using your analytics tools, tracking key metrics to understand what’s working and what’s not. Collect feedback from your audience to gain insights into their experiences and identify areas for improvement. 

Use these insights to refine and optimise your personalisation strategies, continuously improve your campaigns to enhance their effectiveness and better meet your branding objectives.

Personalised marketing: one of the 3 pillars of Groupe SEB’s marketing strategy

Groupe SEB, the global leader in small household appliances, fully integrated personalised marketing in their strategy, and they’ve used the Qualifio platform to implement it! 

By using Qualifio’s reward programs and interactive formats, Moulinex, a famous brand part of Group SEB, collect valuable first- and zero-party data, enabling the creation of tailored content that resonates with consumers. The “Bons plats, bon karma” reward program exemplifies this strategy, encouraging users to share personal information in exchange for a more personalised experience. This specific data collection subsequently allows Moulinex to set up automatic email or SMS triggers and target their prospects and consumers more precisely with personalised content. These automatic triggers include, for example, sending birthday emails with a discount, as well as SMS campaigns based on postal codes to promote Moulinex stores, particularly Tefal stores in France, targeting individuals geographically close by.

As a result, the shopping cards of program members were two times bigger than the average. On top of this, the “Bons plats, bon karma” program gathered over 16,000 members, surpassing the initial target of 15,000. All of this in 3 months. 

LolaLiza: a personalised customer journey based on data

LolaLiza, the fashion brand known for their dynamic digital strategy, have mastered the art of personalised marketing by combining continuous communication with interactive experiences. By leveraging data collected through their Qualifio campaigns, the brand tailors content to individual preferences, ensuring each customer feels uniquely engaged. 

A few years ago, the CRM team decided to opt for the Qualifio platform in order to achieve five different objectives:

1. Recruit new users
2. Reach a younger audience
3. Collect valuable first- and zero-party data
4. Increase their notoriety and visibility
5. Personalise their content

All the data collected via Qualifio campaigns is later on automatically sent to LolaLiza’s CRM. Users are then classified into two segments: new users and existing users. Depending on the segment, suites of emails are sent with personalised offers adapted to the user’s profile, boosting sales, customer engagement and brand visibility.

You see? Personalisation in digital marketing isn’t just a tactic, it’s the secret to standing out in today’s competitive landscape!

Conclusion

You’ve got it! Leveraging personalised marketing is essential for achieving branding objectives, as it enhances customer experience, builds brand loyalty, boosts engagement, and helps differentiate brands. 

By collecting and analysing first- and zero-party data, brands can create tailored content that resonates with their audience, fostering deeper connections and trust. Groupe SEB’s success with the “Bons plats, bon karma” program illustrates the power of personalisation in engaging consumers and driving brand growth. LolaLiza is also a great testimony to the benefits of personalisation in digital marketing. 

As demonstrated, integrating interactive and personalised marketing strategies not only meets customer expectations but also strengthens brand identity and loyalty. For brands aiming to stand out and thrive, embracing personalisation is no longer optional. It’s a necessity for boosting customer engagement.