Millennials, Generation Y, Generation Consumer, call them what you like, but their shopping habits and preferences will tell you a lot about how you should be marketing to them.
Today’s “always on” culture has formed a new breed of consumer.
They want things now; they want to hear about stuff that’s important to them and they want a more personalised experience.
To use one of the latest God-awful buzzwords – they’re looking for the omnichannel experience whereby all contact with a company is seamless.
What’s so great about online shopping?
I think the answer to that is pretty obvious – it’s always there. In fact recent research by Tryzens showed that 79% of UK customers rate the freedom to shop at any time as being the most significant benefit of online shopping.
Great, you know they like shopping online, what can you do to make the experience even better for them?
Earlier I mentioned that consumers want a more personalised experience when they shop. Not always an easy thing to achieve, but with a bit of thought you can really make a difference.
Think about how you communicate with your customers.
As an online retailer email will probably be your preferred choice.
So how can you make that more personalised?
Email marketing personalisation
Starting from the top, always address your email to the person who’s receiving it.
Don’t start it “Dear sir, Dear customer” or anything like that. If the recipient’s name is Dave say “Hi Dave” – it’s the little things that have the biggest effect.
The next thing to think about is segmenting your email list.
Your marketing list could have several thousand names on it and you can bet they’re not all interested in the same things.
Looking at your previous sales data and the information you collect from your customers when they create an account with you, will give you a great insight into what they like. This big data will help you create specific offers that will appeal to individual customers.
After all, an email with an offer or tailored content that’s relevant to them will have far more impact than a generic effort that tries to be all things to everyone.
To give you a few pointers, here’s an infographic created by EmailonAcid.
It’s a simple strategy that’s often ignored even though, as Lyris discovered in a recent survey that:
- 39% of marketers who segmented their lists experienced higher open rates
- 28% experienced lower unsubscribe rates
- 24% experienced better deliverability and greater revenue
Isn’t it time you thought about giving your customers a more personalised experience?