In the fast-evolving landscape of marketing, it’s no secret that success hinges on understanding your audience like never before. In a world where consumers are bombarded with messages from all directions, the traditional methods of audience creation have proven themselves to be insufficient. This realization has led us to pivot our focus towards a more sophisticated approach backed by data science. Join me on this journey as we explore the shift from conventional audience strategies to the realm of data science and personalized engagement.
At Postie, we’re passionate about leveraging the power of data science and machine learning to reshape how businesses connect with their customers. We advocate for our clients to inject cutting-edge tools into their direct mail marketing efforts. In our line of work, we frequently encounter the shortcomings of CRMs and audience-building methods. This realization has driven Postie to champion a new era of audience creation.
For many marketers, the temptation to rely on generic audience targeting is strong – largely because they don’t understand the nuances of audience building. What most people rely on is this: audiences crafted from scratch, perhaps based on a few finite attributes, or even mailing blended audiences without a thoughtful analysis of their characteristics. However, I firmly believe there is a more effective approach – one that involves the creation of meticulously developed audiences.
Convincing clients to transition from generic targeting to personalized engagement is a challenge that pays off. I’ve seen this at Postie over and over.
As marketers, our goal is to optimize messaging, creative design, and campaign strategy. This is where audiences come into play. By crafting audiences, we’re able to tailor outreach efforts to resonate more effectively with specific segments of a customer base. The result? Enhanced customer lifetime value, improved cross-selling opportunities, and potent re-engagement strategies for abandoned carts, at-risk customers, lapsed customers, and more.
Yet, the real challenge lies in successfully implementing a high level of personalization. This is where Postie steps in as a valuable partner, ready to roll up our sleeves and tackle the complexities of personalized marketing. The power of personalization is undeniable, but the question arises: how do we cultivate true, custom personas?
Enter first-party data – the digital gold that every company possesses. Understanding customer demographics is a crucial starting point for crafting a tailored message. However, in today’s competitive landscape, these basics are merely the starting point. To truly stand out, you need to harness the combined power of first-party data and behavioral spending data. The true advantage emerges when we overlay these datasets to create targeted clusters within a customer base.
Use Case: Postie CRM Strategy in Action
To illustrate the impact of this approach, consider a beauty brand preparing for their season. Their aim is to drive additional purchases before the season ends, rather than just pulling forward inevitable sales. A standard strategy might involve targeting top-tier customers based on lifetime value and demographics. However, our experience shows that this approach often falls short in generating true incremental benefits.
The turning point comes when we introduce a single piece of spending data – the difference between a customer’s overall spending on beauty products and their spending with the brand in question. This insight reveals the untapped spending that is currently going to competitors. By leveraging this spending data alongside a plethora of other behavioral data points, we’re able to create custom clusters that form the backbone of personalized marketing strategies.
What distinguishes these clusters from generic segments or traditional personas is their specificity. A true cluster segmentation is unique to a brand and its customer base. This uniqueness is what drives the effectiveness of personalized messaging.
The litmus test is simple: ask whether the provided personas are tailored to your brand and customer base. If not, you’re likely working with general personas based on broader consumer demographics – a far cry from the tailored clusters created by Postie’s machine learning.
Postie clusters are more than just data points; they embody the essence of your customer base. Armed with relevant and impactful clusters, you’re ready to implement a strategy that drives additional purchases throughout a sales cycle. I recommend focusing on clusters identified through rigorous testing and analysis – not personas developed while brainstorming on a Zoom call. True clusters exhibit the purchase behaviors and demographics most likely to spur additional buys.
Take the example of our beauty brand once more. By targeting clusters with high-frequency beauty purchases, top-tier spending in the beauty category, and a proven response to mail-based advertising, we executed a series of focused campaigns. The outcome was undeniable – higher revenue than past campaigns, driven by additional conversions in the lead-up to their busy season.
The Era of Generic Audience Targeting is Behind Us
The modern marketer embraces data science, machine learning, and behavioral spending data to craft custom clusters that power personalized engagement. These clusters are unique to each brand, reflecting the distinct characteristics of their customer base. The result is a higher level of personalization that drives meaningful connections, enhances customer value, and ultimately propels businesses toward success in the age of data-driven marketing. So what are you? If you’re a modern marketer, what are you waiting for?
Reach out to Postie and book a demo today!
