The most recent Cheetah Digital 2022 Digital Consumer Trends Index survey found that 74% of global consumers want brands to treat them as individuals. Therefore, personalisation is a critical factor for companies to consider as the economy points to more challenges ahead.
In the latest Cheetah Digital Signals executive interview series, Barbara Spiering, Starbucks’ VP of marketing technology, highlighted four key elements of a successful customer personalisation strategy. In this short overview, our team at CXM summarizes the key points from this conversation to help you leverage your CX strategies.
1. Don’t let tech take the wheel
According to Spiering, tech should never interrupt the connection between a brand and its customers. Used properly, technology can strengthen relationships across formats, with customer personalisation as the foundation of all communications.
“The goal of technology is to create that bridge between the physical and the digital, so customers feel as seen in all of our digital channels as when they walk into the store”, Spiering said.
2. Customer personalisation is everything
More than 60% of Starbucks orders are customized to the individual user. Based on the findings mentioned above by Cheetah Digital, many brands will have to explore ways of making their customers truly seen.
“People want to be seen and known from the digital to the physical. We know who you are, and it’s throughout the entire lifecycle. And that is really our goal, to create that connection”, shared Spiering.
3. Clean data > Big data
Tech is great at collecting data, but it requires a guiding hand to ensure the collected is accurate and useful. Also, technology partners must share the same vision for executing relationship marketing at the highest level possible.
Additionally, brands will have to think about the ethical aspect of gathered data and build less biased algorithms. While big data can be helpful, it can cause more harm to some people.
4. POV matters
Brands need to stand for something when communicating with customers. That’s the authenticity customers expect nowadays.
“You need to understand the message you want to send to your customers, and why you want to have that dialogue, Spiering said. “Personalization won’t be effective unless brands know what relationship they want to build. Bring the head with the heart, and that’s your message”, added Spiering.