Hi
@Garin Hobbs We got the first question submitted ahead of time from
@Amanda Amato ! Here you go:
Question: Are there any overarching trends regarding what personalization tactics work best to optimize subject lines? For specific context, I'm working on lifecycle communications to app users aimed at increasing engagement. Thank you!
Question: Are there any overarching trends regarding what personalization tactics work best to optimize subject lines? For specific context, I'm working on lifecycle communications to app users aimed at increasing engagement. Thank you!
Answer -
@Amanda Amato This is a really interesting question, and the answer isn’t exactly straightforward… Think about how you yourself interact with your own inbox. If you’re like me, you look at the sender first, then the subject line. Interestingly, it’s the sender name itself that is often the deciding factor in opening/not opening when triaging our inboxes. If I have perceived value or had a relevant experience in your previous messages, I’m more likely to open subsequent emails. From that perspective, focusing on the personalized content in the email itself is the best way to improve opens. The most advanced marketers seek to understand the intrinsic motivations of their customers (how the brand/product/service fits into their life, makes them feel, fulfills a need, allows a person to live their values, etc.) and leverage those motivations to strike the most resonant and relevant chords with each individual. Leaving that aside for a moment, there are a few tactics that can be effective “tuning” techniques to compel more clicks:
- Keep it short
- First name
- Mention something relevant from a previous purchase or visit
- Make it local/geo-specific
- Leverage/mention intrinsic motivations
- Limit punctuation
- Use emojis sparingly
- Test, test, test
What are 3 personalization tips you should live by when sending out a weekly newsletter to your subscribers?
@Garin Hobbs Another question that came in ahead of the AMA. This one is from @"Ann-Lee Chin"
Question: We're using Segment to pipe through PII information to Iterable via handle parameters. This enables communications to be triggered in real-time and allows the message to be personalized. Is there a way I can create a holdout group for triggered campaigns?
Super helpful - thanks so much, Garin!
Question: We're using Segment to pipe through PII information to Iterable via handle parameters. This enables communications to be triggered in real-time and allows the message to be personalized. Is there a way I can create a holdout group for triggered campaigns?
Answer - Great question @"Ann-Lee Chin" . The Iterable + Segment combination is truly powerful and truly increases the value of each component. For your use case, you can do an A/B split in a workflow.
The A/B split nodes only serve the purpose of randomly splitting users by percentages, but they don't report on anything like the actual experiments feature does.
You'll need to have a way of identifying which A/B split route a user went down. Most people typically achieve this by one of the following:
- Using separate campaigns
- Using "Add user to list" nodes immediately after the A/B splits to add users to lists that identify which experiment group they're in
- Using "Change Contact Field" nodes immediately after the A/B splits to set a value on the users' profiles that identify which experiment group they're in
Question - What are 3 personalization tips you should live by when sending out a weekly newsletter to your subscribers?
Answer -
@Julia Ryder, another great question! Leaving aside obvious answers such as "first name", I would recommend personalizing the subject line to align with the content or value each subscriber perceives in the newsletter.
For example: if I'm clicking into a regular section, topic, or block of content, reference that to contextualize the subject line. "The finance/entertainment/local news you're waiting for". This will increase opens as it strikes the resonant chords of personal motivation. Next, I would use that same data to prioritize the ordering of content within the newsletter itself, using stated preferences or click data to put the most personally compelling content in descending order. Last, consider other personal aspects such as delivery timing and channel.
Another pre-submitted question for you
@Garin Hobbs !
Question: How much personalization is too much, where the customer will be delighted but there is no added return for my brand?
Question: How much personalization is too much, where the customer will be delighted but there is no added return for the brand?
Answer - This is really difficult to quantify, but it may help to reframe your definition of “return”. Personalization is not a performance tactic whose value should be measured campaign-by-campaign, but a table-stakes customer expectation that is critical to both engagement and retention, and forms the basis of brand-customer relationships. The value of consistent and meaningful personalization pays off sustainably over time and dividends are more appropriately measured in LTV (or more specifically, LTV vs. CAC). Think about your brand’s mission or values statement. Often these values are what drives customers to feel affinity for a brand..it isn’t product or price. I would suggest putting “personalization” in terms of individual intrinsic motivations. Not customer groups, or sports/activity segments, but WHY they do those things; for overall health, for weight-loss, for weight-maintenance, for rehabilitation, for longevity, for lifestyle, or for passion, etc. These factors reflect how your brand fits into their lives, how it makes them feel, and how it empowers them to live their values. Using these factors, you can feature the same pair of shorts to 6 different people and personalize the value in 6 different ways that contextually resonate with each individual.. This will allow brands to leverage pragmatic personalization that is both efficient and effective by making simple changes to copy.
@Garin Hobbs Here's one that we see come up pretty often in conversations around getting started with personalization:
Question: How can I best leverage personalization in my Welcome series when little data about the individual is known?
Question: How can I best leverage personalization in my Welcome series when little data about the individual is known?
Answer - I recommend brands use some level of progressive profiling in their post-purchase workflow, and I recommend moving this up to the post-sign-up (simple email sign-up or Account Creation) workflow. This will allow brands to better understand individual profiles, needs and preferences but also the context driving them, and begin personalizing much earlier on in the engagement. It is important that the questions be casually presented (but in a way that is authentic to the brand voice) to ensure that respondents answer honestly and accurately.
It is suggested that brands understand the context of their products or services for each customer. For example, if the brand is a gaming company they should seek to understand why an individual plays games: (stress relief, competition, escape from reality, online community, etc.) to couch the context of message copy and creative (For example: Unwind with Civ5, vs. Create your Ideal World in Civ5, vs. Crush your Political Enemies in Civ5).
This data should be utilized in conjunction with (future) behavioral data for richer context in driving engagement or conversions (DLC, in-game purchases/upgrades). This data should be leveraged against any collected behavioral data for richer context, but in cases of contradiction, self-identified data should always be given the greatest weight of respect/priority. For example, if I say I’m only interested in shoes but my browse data reflects lots of page views of shorts, send a message with shoes in the hero slot, and shorts in 2nd position.
@Garin Hobbs Here's another one that came in ahead of time:
Question: Which features in Iterable will best help me meet my personalization goals?
Question: Which Iterable features will help me best meet my goals of Personalization?
Answer - The following Iterable capabilities/features can be activated in phases, according to the needs, goals and requirements of your content-to-contact strategy:
- Data structure optimized for flexible collection, utilization, expansion, and change management of rich and disparate data sets.
- Real-time data ingestion and segmentation to quickly surface and immediately execute on actionable insights
- Native cross-channel messaging for single-view development and orchestration of complex messaging strategies across all stages of the customer journey
- Snippets to personalize reusable content elements such as headers, footers, banners, and content blocks
- Data Feeds to power personalized content such as product availability, recommendations, and next-best dish
- Data feeds to power cross-channel status alerts (almost sold out, sold out, time to order, delivery on it’s way, food delivered, rate your meal, etc.)
- Data feeds from 3rd parties to trigger and contextualize messages
Catalog to power language personalization
Hi Garin, Is it possible to create personalized snippets within Iterable templates? For example, I've worked with other ESPs that featured snippets that were able to populate dynamic products recommendations based on the contacts' browse and purchase behavior. This only required linking e-commerce data fields in an initial setup and made personalization very streamlined. Is this feature available in Iterable? What would you recommend as the best resource to see the full suite of personalization Iterable supports?
Question: Is it possible to create personalized snippets within Iterable templates? For example, I've worked with other ESPs that featured snippets that were able to populate dynamic products recommendations based on the contacts' browse and purchase behavior. This only required linking e-commerce data fields in an initial setup and made personalization very streamlined. Is this feature available in Iterable? What would you recommend as the best resource to see the full suite of personalization Iterable supports?
Answer - Great question
@Khandeece Lee ! Short answer, yes, you can absolutely leverage dynamic insertions in snippets in several ways: handlebars, data feeds, Catalog, etc, though I'm not entirely sure if we currently support the linking of ecommerce data fields. I would recommend you reach out to your Customer Success Manager (CSM) for finer details. Our customer Care.com presented on advanced use of Snippets at our user conference, Activate. You can find the session recording here: https://iterable.com/activate/_schedule/how-to-standardize-marketing-messaging-for-maximum-efficiency/
Our User guide is a great resource for listing all of our personalization capabilities, though it's less helpful in suggesting use cases and ways in which personalization can be most effectively leveraged for your business.
Handlebars - https://support.iterable.com/hc/en-us/articles/205480365-Personalizing-Templates-with-Handlebars-
Data Feeds - https://support.iterable.com/hc/en-us/articles/204795659-Personalizing-Templates-with-Data-Feeds-
Catalog - https://support.iterable.com/hc/en-us/articles/360033214932-Catalog-Overview
Your CSM will also be helpful there, and I am always available for a free consult session!
Hey
@Garin Hobbs Not pre-submitted, but we got this one recently from a food service company that I thought was interesting and wanted to share your insights with the community.
Question: We're a fast-growing food delivery service that is currently at Level 1 maturity. How can we move to Level 2 and beyond.
Question: We’re a fast-growing food delivery service that is currently at Level 1 maturity. How can we move to Level 2 and beyond?
Answer - For most brands, growth goals compel you to seek a broader audience of greater disparity, which will require increasing the type and amount of data collected, as well as how that data is used for personalization.
## Data Collection
* Expand the account profile form to collect more self-identified info and preferences, make these fields available but optional to keep completion requirements low and decrease risk of attrition
* Launch progressive profiling in first welcome email after sign up (and after Join Membership) to collect basic profile data not captured on profile form
* Prioritize a sequence of additional progressive profile questions based upon actions taken:
- example: if no dietary preference is noted, launch progressive profiling if a vegetarian/dairy-free/gluten-free selection is made.
- example: launch progressive profiling for family composition after “family order” is detected
- example: after 3 orders delivered, launch progressive profiling asking about primary value/attraction of home-delivery (can’t cook, convenience, don’t like going out, hate shopping, everyone at my table wants something different, etc.)
* Cross-channel data centralization/synchronization to create 360° customer profile across all digital touchpoints
Level 2 Tactics
* Dietary preference/restriction for personalizing recommendations, alerting to scarcity (Example, “Hurry, your favorite is almost sold out!”), and informing food-prep of potential demand to optimize inventory
* Family composition and preferences for contextualizing recommendations (for you vs. for spouse vs. for kids)
* Cook at home/Dine out/Home Delivery frequency for workflow and cadence personalization
* Gift card balance/account credits personalized in top banner of email messages
* Send time to personalize consideration timeframe and optimize potential conversions
* Expand cross-channel strategy to include in-app, mobile push, SMS, and web push. Match message to medium:
- Example: Send SMS or mobile-push for credit card declined only if order pending (not for membership renewal)
- Example: Send “hurry, running out” web-push for low-inventory favorites
Level 3 Tactics
* Language preference for personalization of copy
* Channel personalization to optimize sending of messages by preferred channel of engagement
* 3rd party data feeds (weather, traffic, news/events) to further contextualize copy, creative, preferences, recommendations, timing, and channel as described above
Question: We’re a fast-growing food delivery service that is currently at Level 1 maturity. How can we move to Level 2 and beyond?
Answer - For most brands, growth goals compel you to seek a broader audience of greater disparity, which will require increasing the type and amount of data collected, as well as how that data is used for personalization.
Data Collection
* Expand the account profile form to collect more self-identified info and preferences, make these fields available but optional to keep completion requirements low and decrease risk of attrition
* Launch progressive profiling in first welcome email after sign up (and after Join Membership) to collect basic profile data not captured on profile form
* Prioritize a sequence of additional progressive profile questions based upon actions taken:
- example: if no dietary preference is noted, launch progressive profiling if a vegetarian/dairy-free/gluten-free selection is made.
- example: launch progressive profiling for family composition after “family order” is detected
- example: after 3 orders delivered, launch progressive profiling asking about primary value/attraction of home-delivery (can’t cook, convenience, don’t like going out, hate shopping, everyone at my table wants something different, etc.)
* Cross-channel data centralization/synchronization to create 360° customer profile across all your digital touchpoints
Level 2 Tactics
* Dietary preference/restriction for personalizing recommendations, alerting to scarcity (Example, “Hurry, your favorite is almost sold out!”), and informing food-prep of potential demand to optimize inventory
* Family composition and preferences for contextualizing recommendations (for you vs. for spouse vs. for kids)
* Cook at home/Dine out/Home Delivery frequency for workflow and cadence personalization
* Gift card balance/account credits personalized in top banner of email messages
* Send time to personalize consideration timeframe and optimize potential conversions
* Expand cross-channel strategy to include in-app, mobile push, SMS, and web push. Match message to medium:
- Example: Send SMS or mobile-push for credit card declined only if order pending (not for membership renewal)
- Example: Send “hurry, running out” web-push for low-inventory favorites
Level 3 Tactics
* Language preference for personalization of copy
* Channel personalization to optimize sending of messages by preferred channel of engagement
* 3rd party data feeds (weather, traffic, news/events) to further contextualize copy, creative, preferences, recommendations, timing, and channel as described above
That's all for today's Personalization AMA, thank you so much for the great questions, and thank you for joining!
I invite each of you to take our Personalization Maturity self-assessment here: https://iterable.com/personalization-maturity-model/.
I'm always happy to chat through the results with you! Cheers!
