{"id":35032,"date":"2022-07-15T10:02:00","date_gmt":"2022-07-15T10:02:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.bloomreach.com\/?post_type=library&p=35032"},"modified":"2024-09-17T10:15:01","modified_gmt":"2024-09-17T10:15:01","slug":"recession-ready-your-marketing","status":"publish","type":"library","link":"https:\/\/www.bloomreach.com\/en\/library\/guides\/recession-ready-your-marketing","title":{"rendered":"Recession-ready Your Marketing by Doubling Down on Email"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Introduction<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

In the modern ecommerce world, personalization is everything. It\u2019s what engages customers, inspires them, and keeps them coming back. As the global economy moves closer to a recession, it\u2019s important to apply those personalization tactics to your tried-and-true customer communication strategy \u2014 email marketing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As ecommerce personalization<\/a> becomes more ingrained into the daily fabric of our lives in digital commerce<\/a> and collecting customer data becomes more challenging because of privacy laws, cookie restrictions, and other factors, it\u2019s important to understand that all personalization efforts must now start with one thing: first-party data.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What is First-party Data?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

First-party data<\/a> is the fuel you need to drive successful email personalization initiatives and strategies in ecommerce.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Specifically, first-party data is customer information that your company collects directly via its own channels and sources with the customer\u2019s consent. These channels include email, mobile apps, websites, social media, SMS, and more. Since you are collecting this data yourself, it obviously makes the data unique, as no other company is able to collect these specific data points. Advancements in modern marketing technology make it possible to centrally access this information and use it in marketing automation campaigns.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

You can comfortably rely on this data for one massive reason \u2014 you\u2019ve sourced it yourself. You know you\u2019ve collected it compliantly and can now use it to strategize and scale winning customer journeys with your brand.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Personalization lacks one true definition \u2014 it means something different to every brand. While we may define personalization as the practice of using commerce data<\/a> responsibly to get to know, guide, and impress your customers with experiences that are so relevant and contextual they feel like magic<\/a>, it\u2019s completely reasonable that your company defines the concept differently.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s possible to personalize your email communications using first-party data without having to invest time and resources into creating dozens of different email templates or other time-consuming tasks. Doubling down on first-party data efforts in relation to email can help you increase customer lifetime value<\/a> as economic pressures mount globally.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Email Campaigns Personalized by First-party Data<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Building your email personalization around first-party data guarantees that your personalization efforts are all-encompassing. It ensures that your company is using its collected customer data to meaningfully transform the customer experience and drive brand loyalty.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

First-party data-based personalization is about much more than just adding customer data into the body of an email to improve the content. It\u2019s also about finding the best possible time<\/a> to send an email and anticipating user behavior to recommend products with AI-driven insights, which can greatly boost open and conversion rates.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Over the years, marketers turned away from email and to channels such as ads, social media, and others because they offered the ability to hyper-target and personalize, and this in turn improved engagement. Email marketing was always thought of as the \u201cbatch-and-blast\u201d mass marketing campaign underdog of the marketing family.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Just because recession-like conditions are on the horizon, that doesn\u2019t mean that your company\u2019s marketing and revenue-generating efforts have to suffer. Investing more of your budget into email can result in your company getting significantly more in return. Consider these statistics from Constant Contact<\/a>:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For every $1 you spend on email marketing, you can expect an average return of $36<\/p>\n\n\n\n

61% of consumers enjoy receiving promotional emails weekly, and 38% would like emails to come even more frequently<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Email is used by over 4 billion people \u2014 over half of the world\u2019s population<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The best way of getting more out of your email marketing program from a time and money-savings perspective is with an all-in-one data platform that will allow your company to use collected customer data to personalize email campaigns.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

An all-in-one data platform removes data silos and unifies your customer data from any source into a single customer view<\/a> will allow you to launch personalized email marketing campaigns in real time with no assistance needed from any internal or external stakeholders. It will allow you to deliver a remarkable customer experience via email and always target the right audience segments. What specifically does an all-encompassing data platform facilitate?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Marketing to Real-time Customer Behavior<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Many marketers once considered email to be a channel where real-time communication mattered less. That has become completely untrue in today\u2019s market. The lack of real-time insights and the ability to use those insights to personalize marketing communications for customers can make all the difference in an economic downturn.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For example, let\u2019s say a customer clicks on an email campaign, lands on a website, interacts with a few products, adds a couple of those products to a cart, but then leaves without making a purchase. Everything about that customer has now changed, and those changes should be reflected in that customer\u2019s profile. That last click could potentially change when the customer is most likely to interact with an email next (thus affecting the optimal send time).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The segments that customers belong to must be updated automatically and immediately to be optimally effective. Was that customer set to receive a reactivation campaign? If so, that\u2019s no longer applicable. AI\/ML-based product recommendations must be updated immediately so that the abandoned cart email that was going to go out will now feature the right products.<\/p>\n\n\n\n