Dear (First Name) - It's Time to Get Personal

Tuesday, Jun 28th 2022
Man in Suit Using Finger to Demonstrate Power of Personalized Digital Touch

A friend of mine once worked for a large manufacturing company in a very competitive industry. Many of the company’s customers had been long-time clients—some for over a decade and more. 

When I asked my friend what the company’s secret was, he said it was the owner and his belief in the personal touch.

“When he started his company my boss was the primary sales and account person. He made a point of not just getting to know each customer’s business he got to know them as people. Whenever he met with a client he always took the time to ask how they and their family were doing. As his company grew he made sure to instill the value of the personal touch with every new hire ensuring it remained a hallmark of how the organization operated.”

Incorporating the personal touch into his business allowed my friend’s boss to grow his manufacturing company from a one-man operation into an industry-leading, multi-million dollar, worldwide enterprise.

A growing trend

These days many companies and organizations have recognized the value of embracing the personal approach and applying it to the customer experience they provide in order to generate the business results they desire. Check out these stats:

  • 66% of businesses believe personalization is a quality that best defines customer-centric brands
  • 96% of organizations site personalization as important to their customer experience strategies for the coming year
  • 50% plan to maintain or ramp up their personalization efforts
  • 30% plan to begin investing in personalization 

Why has it taken companies so long to get on board?

The concept of personalization isn’t new as the example of my friend’s boss clearly illustrates. So what holds so many companies back from diving in? The answer is a combination of organizational uncertainty, inertia and inefficacy. In other words, some organizations are unsure of how to put personalization into practice. Others get it but, for whatever reason, just haven’t made the full effort it requires. And then there are those companies that have dove in with both feet but their efforts haven’t been rewarded as expected because the actions they took weren’t the right ones.

Personalization is worth it

Even though some organizations may feel a little uncertain about ramping up their commitment to personalization, it’s worth doing. If a company’s goal is to truly create a better experience their customers’ personalization needs have to be at the heart of their efforts.

With personalization at the core of the customer experience, companies will make the customer engagement process easier, more enjoyable and more fruitful for their customers. In return, the customer will be inspired to return to this appreciative, understanding, value-added brand and more likely to tune out messages from competitors. Isn’t that what every organization hopes for?

Use personalization to attract and retain

There’s more to the personalization approach than just attracting new customers because personalization is even more valuable when it comes to building and maintaining a relationship with existing customers. Here’s why: when an organization is trying to catch the attention of new customers, a personalized approach allows them to present the right product or service to the right person at the right time.

By providing a deeply personalized and seamless experience across your customers’ preferred channels, throughout the entire customer journey, you build more loyalty, increase retention, create advocates and ultimately improve profitability ~ Tamir Sigal, Chief Marketing Officer , Quadient

When it comes to existing customers, personalization can be leveraged to optimize every part of the customer journey. As anyone in business knows the best customer is an existing customer. Personalization can help an organization nurture and strengthen their relationship with existing customers.

With personalization it’s easier to impress your customers

If a company misses the mark when trying to entice new customers with their marketing message, they’ve lost out on a potential customer but they can always try again with a different message. The story changes with an existing customer.

If an organization misses the mark when dealing with an existing customer they risk losing them as a customer all together and the future revenue that customer represents. Consider this: CCW Digital research discovered that with 62% of customers it only takes two bad experiences before an existing customer starts seriously thinking about jumping to a competitor. Some do jump and when they do more often than not they relay their bad experience to friends, family and peers and post it on social media.

There’s no room for error. A personalization approach acts as a safety net. Personalization helps reduce the chances of disappointing an existing customer. Personalization allows an organization to better understand the customer’s needs and wants and how they prefer to be communicated to.