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Jul 22, 2021
According to a report by Smarter HQ on privacy & personalization, 72% of consumers only engage with personalized messaging and 80% of shoppers are more likely to check out their carts from a company that offers personalized experiences.
Without a doubt, people love personalized content.
It’s what gets their attention, pushes them to convert, and convinces them to remain loyal to a brand in today’s highly competitive market.
And, now that there’s hyper-personalization, which uses AI and machine learning to deliver the most significant and contextual experience, we believe its benefits can even be greater.
However, hyper-personalization can come off as invasive when you’re serving highly individualized content to your website visitors and they don’t know that you’re accessing their information.
Research shows that consumers are offended when they discover that a brand has their data without knowing how they were able to get hold of it.
As a Florida internet marketing company, we know how important data is for hyper-personalizing content. So, how can you approach hyper-personalization without being creepy to your customers?
Consent - the big difference-maker.
In this article, we will share with you:
Hyper-personalization is an upgrade to standard personalization. It uses AI, behavioral indicators, and real-time data to provide highly relevant content suggestions and product recommendations to users.
Standard personalization is the use of personalization in your communications. Some examples are using a customer’s first name in emails and making product recommendations based on their past purchases.
Hyper-personalization, on the other hand, is the use of real-time data to provide a more responsive and relevant experience to users in real-time. It aims to have a deeper understanding of every user that interacts with your business online, from their unique habits to preferences.
Amazon and Netflix are two of the most well-known brands that were able to use hyper-personalization successfully without appearing like creeps.
However, in this article, we are going to look at two less popular examples that we think are equally as successful in effectively using hyper-personalization to provide a truly customized experience to their customers.
Stitch Fix is an online personal styling service that uses data science and recommendation algorithm to provide the ultimate outfit tailored for each user.
It aims to provide a more elevated buying experience to its customers by offering them personalized clothing items that are based on their size, budget, and style.
Stitch Fix’s business model is very unique. The company uses AI to select clothing items for a customer and then mail them the selection. Once the customer receives the package, the customer can then try the outfits on, pay for the items that they like, and return the ones they don’t like.
Plus, Stitch Fix offers free returns, exchanges, and shipping.
This solves the problem for every individual in the planet who doesn’t know what to wear to an event, date, or meeting, as well as for those who don’t want to go through the fuss of going from one store to another and trying on items.
But, how exactly does this business model work?
Here’s how Stitch Fix works:
We all know how important data is when it comes to personalization. So, Stitch Fix made sure that it collects as many accurate data as it could through various sources, such as signups, questionnaires, and social media.
During signup, Stitch fix collects customer data, including the following:
The company also collects information about a customer’s lifestyle via:
Using the data that they’ve collected; they can now align their offerings to each buyer’s different fashion needs.
The company takes note of every item a customer purchases or returns so that they can provide better recommendations the next time, and there will be fewer returns in the future.
Stitch Fix also uses customer feedback to gain a deeper understanding of each customer’s preferences. After every purchase or return, the company sends out surveys to shoppers, which they then respond to, allowing the company to identify areas they can improve.
The Results and Why It Works
Stitch Fix’s customers respond to surveys and provide feedback because they see results and enjoy the hyper-personalized experience they’re getting.
Thanks to AI-powered data, automation, and human experience, the company can:
In 2018, the company was reported to have generated more than $1 billion in sales and a customer base of over 3.4 million customers as of June 2020.
Given these impressive numbers, we can conclude that that Stitch Fix has indeed found success with hyper-personalization.
What Can You Learn from This?
Just like Stitch Fix, you want to collect as much data as possible! However, you do want to ask your customers for consent.
To get their consent, you need to let them know how you’re going to use their information and where you’re going to store them. You also want to assure them that their data is completely safe. Don’t hesitate to seek an expert’s advice on how you’re going to use the data you collect.
Vi is a digital fitness training and running coach device and app that helps motivate users to start and maintain an active lifestyle. It also provides a personalized training plan to help each user achieve their fitness goals.
Vi uses a combination of AI, real-time tracking, voice or audio content to encourage its users to engage in daily exercise and personalize their activities.
When a user registers on VI, the app collects personal data, including the following:
Using this data, the app can now provide the user a virtual coach who will motivate them to reach their goals. Plus, they also get other perks such as:
How Vi Works
The Vi app tracks a user’s speed, heart rate, and distance to personalize their workout recommendations.
It also responds to voice commands and converses with its users. For example, when a user says “Vi, How am I doing?”, it will tell you your stats.
Users can even join a running community, race virtually, and compete against each other through the app.
Vi Results and Why It’s Effective
Research on the app found that users loved it because it made them feel like they had a personal coach.
With the help of AI, the app knows exactly what’s going to push each user to get up and run. It also tells them highly personalized messages about their activities and performance, like “head up, straighten your back” which motivates them to do activities properly.
By delivering the right messages at the right place and time, VI can achieve the following:
What Can You Learn from This?
Giving your customers insight into their performance and real-time feedback is a great way to keep them engaged.
Vi also proved to us that you can rely on data to gain reliable insights on how to offer and create more personalized customer experiences.
With the help of hyper-personalization, Vi can:
As your go-to Florida internet marketing company, we believe that one of the best ways to avoid being creepy is to simply let your customers know that you’re collecting their data.
Tell them what kind of data you’re getting, why you’re doing this, and how you’re going to store them. You need to be 100% transparent to gain their trust and approval. Once you have their trust and consent, you can now move forward and use hyper-personalization.
Here’s how:
Your website can be a prospect's first interaction with your brand, so you want to make a good impression. One of the most effective ways to do this is to serve them personalized content from the start.
The idea here is to tailor your webpage based on a user’s search history and recent search activities so that you can serve them highly relevant content the moment they land on your site. The easier you make it for prospects to get what they need, the faster they’ll likely convert.
Another way to make it more convenient for visitors to find what they’re looking for on your website is to place a search function on the top right corner of your website and integrate a personalized site search.
Personalized site search uses a user’s search history on your site and their unique buying behavior to provide them highly relevant product recommendations.
It’s also a good idea to use drip email marketing to send personalized emails.
Drip marketing involves automatically sending out emails to your email list based on actions they take or changes in their behavior. Sending highly personalized and relevant emails during the most suitable times allows you to put your brand on top of your audience’s minds.
Have you noticed that whenever you visit an e-commerce site, you’re immediately greeted with a list of recommended products?
This is personalized product recommendation algorithm in play. It uses a user’s historical data, like previous purchases, views, and visits, to provide a highly relevant product recommendations list.
What’s great about it is that it allows you to guide users further down the sales funnel by showing them products or services they’ll likely be interested in, and encourage them to purchase. In fact, statistics prove that it’s responsible for 31% of a store’s revenue.
There are two ways you can use personalized product recommendations on your website:
Nielsen revealed that 83% of consumers trust reviews over advertising.
By showing website visitors your bestsellers based on the category of the items they’re interested in and as recommended by your other customers, you can influence them to consider it as one of their options, and maybe even urge them to buy.
What better way to urge consumers to buy than by offering them hyper-personalized discounts based on categories they recently viewed on your site?
As your go-to Florida internet marketing company, we suggest you go the extra mile by sending them push notifications, texts, or emails about these hyper-personalized discounts.
It’s clear - hyper-personalization plays a crucial role in helping businesses succeed in today’s highly competitive market.
Hyper-personalization is the way to create that one-of-a-kind experience every consumer wants from you! And, now that you know how to give it to them, the only barrier that’s stopping you from doing it is getting their consent.
In this post-pandemic era, consumers put huge importance on trust and reliability. So, in your pursuit of providing the ultimate customer experience to your audience using hyper-personalization, keep in mind to always be transparent when gathering data.
At Digital Resource, we can help you create hyper-personalized marketing strategies that are not creepy and provide your customers and audiences the ultimate customer experience they deserve!
Contact us today to know more!
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