Website Personalization Strategy for SEO
Mar 21, 2023 • 4 Minute Read • Dan Meister, Digital Marketing Lead
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Testing & Personalizing for Digital Experience
Jan 19, 2024 • 6 Minute Read • Andrea Goldstein, Senior Director, Digital Marketing
More and more, consumers want personalized experiences, thanks in part to all the emerging tech around artificial intelligence (AI), machine learning, and data analytics. About 73% of folks are expecting personalized treatment, and the trend is not slowing down.
However, here's the catch: 65% of global consumers want companies to present products, offers, or content that aligns with their needs, but a whopping 61% feel like most companies treat them like a number. This gap means brands are presented with the opportunity to navigate and deliver on those expectations skillfully.
Meeting these demands requires a step-by-step plan and a way to test what works best by customizing efforts and consistently checking if those efforts are hitting the mark.
This iterative digital marketing approach requires a testing strategy. Testing lets you stay flexible and change along with what customers like, your marketing messages, and your business objectives. A/B testing is a beneficial method for studying user experiences and a promising way to improve digital channels. Think consistency and personalization.
5 Reasons You Should A/B Test
A method-driven testing strategy focuses on optimization and a return on investment (ROI), helping you show the additional value your website and marketing activities have on top-line growth. If you’re not sure if A/B testing is right for you, consider how it helps you to:
- Provide User Preferences and Insights - First, A/B testing helps identify what specifically resonates with users. It nearly eliminates the guessing game of what works due to the precise control capabilities of testing features and low-risk modifications.
- Measure Return on Investment (ROI) Through Comparative Analysis - It's a straightforward approach that shows how improvements positively impact your audience engagement and drive more conversions, making it clearer to see the benefits of changes made to your content, products, or company. You're essentially comparing two versions of something, like a webpage, app interface, or marketing strategy, to see which performs better, version A or B. You can identify which version is more effective by measuring click-through rates, conversion rates, or user engagement.
- Maximize Your Current Traffic - Get more from your existing website or platform visitors without spending extra to attract additional traffic. A/B testing focuses on optimizing the experience for users already visiting your site.
- Cultivate a Mindset of Seeking Improvement - You can continuously run different versions once you set up your testing framework. By consistently refining and testing different elements, you create a work environment or culture that values and seeks constant improvement.
- Create Historical Records to Address Pain Points - Its iterative nature and data-driven approach give a history of what customers want, highlighting areas where customers face difficulties or dissatisfaction. These insights inform your efforts so you can help solve pain points.
Are you ready for testing or personalization? Check out this blog post on A/B Testing vs. Personalization to explore the differences between the two.
Personalization: Elevating Marketing & CX
Investing in a personalization strategy pays off. It's linked to making your business grow and keeping customers happy too.
According to McKinsey insights, implementing personalized marketing has the potential to slash customer acquisition costs by up to 50%, elevate revenues within the range of 5-15%, and amplify ROI by 10-30%. Businesses experiencing rapid growth benefit even more significantly, with 40% more revenue attributed to personalization compared to their slower-growing counterparts.
We conducted a proprietary study in 2023 focusing on empowering digital customer experiences (DCX) and optimizing marketing, technology, and operations. When asked about the impact of personalization, the positive ROI is evident, with 40% of organizations embracing personalization and reporting a substantial return on investment. Interestingly, while 57% have seen only slight ROI, the universal trend is that all organizations are realizing returns.
Integrating personalization into your marketing efforts not only enhances the perception of your brand but also plays a pivotal role in shaping the overall customer experience. This is particularly significant as 80% of consumers assert that the quality of a company's products and services is equally matched by the importance of the experience it provides.
What does personalization look like?
Imagine transitioning customers from mass one-to-many messaging to tailored one-to-one experiences. Understanding your audience drives precise content and product recommendations, ensuring a seamless, measurable shift toward personalized experiences that boost revenue. Here are a few examples of personalization in action on your website and digital marketing:
- Relevant Recommendations: This experience is like your personalized shopping buddy on a website. Use tech to look at what consumers bought before or what they've been eyeing to suggest things they'll probably love. Beyond that, it's dynamic. Relevant recommendation tools can switch up what they show based on behavior, such as how the visitor has been clicking around or what they're into.
- Timing & Reminders: Think of it as those handy reminders you get when you forget something in your online cart, like a sweet message after you've bought something cool or an automated welcome email when you visit a new site for the first time. It's all automatic, triggered by what a user does.
- Omnichannel Alignment: This is all about making sure your brand's experience is the same, whether it's on a desktop, a mobile phone, an email, an online ad, or an in-store kiosk or checkout. Consistency is key to delivering a unified brand experience.
Implementing Personalization: Tools & Integrations
Companies aim for unified customer profiles integrating both online and offline interactions, offering a complete view of preferences and behaviors across touchpoints. In that same proprietary study, 39% of participants recognized data's role in personalizing digital advertising and tailoring content. Integrating data from diverse sources—online purchases, in-store visits, customer service, loyalty programs, and browsing—is key to achieving unified profiles. This consolidated view enables tailored marketing, personalized recommendations, and improved service.
For instance, a retailer could offer personalized deals based on past purchases and targeted suggestions online and in-store. Additionally, this ensures a seamless and individualized experience across channels and optimizes overall customer satisfaction.
Tips for Securing Company Buy-In
With a strategic approach, you secure support from higher-ups and emphasize learning and quick wins. It's all about driving a culture of optimization and improvement.
Securing Executive Buy-In:
- Outline clear benefits and measurable KPIs with assigned dollar values.
- Communicate the significance of the testing program, including unsuccessful tests as learning opportunities.
Fostering a Culture of Learning:
- Emphasize the value of learning from unsuccessful tests to drive continuous improvement. Consequently, you avoid negative feedback when all tests aren't winners by demonstrating the learning aspect of unsuccessful tests.
- Highlight the importance of understanding what doesn't work as a valuable part of the process. The ultimate goal is to learn, and learning what doesn't work well also provides value.
Starting with Quick Wins:
- Begin tests in high-traffic, low-conversion areas to demonstrate immediate positive impacts.
- Showcase data-driven optimizations to set an example for the entire organization.
Cross-Departmental Involvement:
- Creating an online submission form allows anyone within the organization to propose test ideas. This reinforces a sense of collective ownership.
- Reinforce ongoing participation with regular meetings or forums to showcase test scoring, priorities, and the roadmap. This helps to ensure transparency and alignment across teams.
- Share results, especially with the original test idea submitters, to enrich your testing ecosystem.
- Set up a Center of Excellence for feedback and optimizations on the testing program.
Facilitating a Results Research Hub:
- Shared access for major test findings enables others to use them as data-proven optimizations.
- Incorporate findings and reference the hub often in meetings to build on the testing takeaways and continue showing the value of the testing program and the impact of its outcomes.
Conclusion: A Holistic Approach
Uniting everyone around a comprehensive testing approach backed by data insights is pivotal. Testing and refinement become your pathway to success, marking a shift from standardized communication to results directly translating into business growth (a.k.a. revenue-driving personalized experiences).
Success in testing and personalization hinges on organizational support and a robust management system. A data-driven strategy backed by clear KPIs easily demonstrates tangible impacts on business outcomes.
Ready to test and personalize without the guesswork? Elevate your audience's experience and achieve measurable success. Reach out to discover how we can assist you.