Report features original data and research on delivering personalized customer experiences

Merkle, a leading technology-enabled, data-driven performance marketing agency has released Personalization’s Golden Rule: Know Thy Customer, a report in collaboration with Marketing Dive. The report features original research and insights from 195 respondents, including marketing executives, directors and managers, into what it takes to create great experiences through personalization, identity, and communication.

The report analyzes how departmental and technology silos can make it difficult to create a holistic view of the customer journey, showcasing that identity needs to be at the core of every marketing touchpoint. The findings reveal 66% of respondents agree that getting the digital experience right is critical for brands’ survival over the next 10 years. Identity can be used to recognize patterns of behavior that fuel those preferences at an individual level, which can then lead to more personal experiences, according to the report.

“As marketers, we constantly strive to be strategic partners, and that means putting the customer first. To do that, we have to deliver a personal experience, which requires the interpretation of many different sets of data,” said Evan Nicholson, senior director of Digital Experience Strategy Group at Merkle. “This report aims to help marketers understand and apply that data to provide the right experience across all touchpoints. Customer experience doesn’t end at the acquisition level so that data must be utilized across the entire journey.”

The report also indicates that recognizing intent is an area that marketers struggle with, finding 87% of respondents understand their customer’s intent, but that it is not enough for personalization efforts. Insights from the survey discuss how marketers need to consider their ability to recognize intent across the entire customer life cycle, not just within single channels. According to the research, 68% of respondents have no ability to personalize the customer experience, even if they understand their intent.

Additional findings from the report include:

• 91% of respondents strongly or somewhat agree that getting the digital experience right is critical to brands’ survival over the next 10 years.
• 11% of respondents feel they have excelled at delivering a digital experience their customers want.
• Only 5% of respondents feel extremely confident in their ability to identify visitors who didn’t log in to their site, which presents a challenge for understanding customer identity

To register and download the full report visit here.

Contact
Kite Hill, PR for Merkle
Moira Shannon
[email protected]