“Hi Monica, here are 5 ways for you to maximize return on your retirement portfolio.” 

Monica, who actually has a retirement portfolio, is more likely to read through the newsletter with the above title than something like “5 ways to maximize returns on portfolio investments”, which she comes across a few times daily. Personalization is the key to higher open rates, higher engagement, great customer experience and higher revenue.

Why personalize marketing communication? 

Customers no longer like to be treated as a group of people with similar interests, they prefer to be treated as individuals with very specific likes and dislikes. There is already a lot of marketing ‘noise’ from various businesses on the web, on social media platforms, and even in the mailbox. Majority of the communications, even though relevant, are skipped by the customers for the lack of a relevant and eye-catching title. To get the customer’s attention, your message needs to stand out. Personalizing with the first name in the title or subject line, for example, creates an instant connection with the customer. The impact of personalization is seen directly in business - 80% of customers are more likely to make a purchase when your brand offers a personalized experience.

How can marketers personalize better?

• Nurturing the prospects - especially for the products that have a long sales cycle. The final purchase from the customer may come after several days or weeks of reading about the product, features and competing brands. In this cycle, it is important for marketers to create communication to engage and nurture the customers through this stage and help them to make the purchase decision. The more personalized this educational content is, more will the customer be convinced to buy the product. For e.g. “Hi James, here are the 3 benefits of Life Insurance to secure your child’s future” would likely get James to read the email or article if James is planning to invest in Life Insurance for his child’s education.
• Highlighting relevant products and features - businesses (think financial services, mutual funds, insurance, electronics) today have dozens of varieties of products. Customers either have a variant in mind or need more information about the product. If you are able to help the customer and provide relevant information to help them make a decision, the customer is more likely to warm up to the final purchase.
• Personalized communication - from the example at the beginning of this article, we saw how personalizing the communication with the customer name and the use case stands out as compared to a generic message. The communication can be further augmented by other pieces of customer information which are available at your disposal. For e.g. “Hi Sarah, Life Insurance is an excellent way to plan for retirement and secure your child’s future” uses Sarah’s age and family details to propose a customized plan which would be very relevant for Sarah.
• Personalize across channels - the communication can be personalized on emails, website, recommendations, targeted ads and brochures sent over whatsapp. There are multiple tools available in the market, like sharpsell, which can help execute personalized marketing at scale. 

What business results can personalization drive?

• Better customer experience -  If customers are happy with your products and the communications they receive from you, they’re more likely to stick with you over your competitors. Effective personalization results in great customer experience.
• Improve conversion rates and revenue -  If you share informative articles and product recommendations to the customers that catch their interest, they’re more likely to consume it. This helps improve conversion rates across the funnel leading to higher revenue.
• Build brand loyalty - You most likely prefer to go to a business where the sales executive remembers your purchase history. With greater personalization, you can drive brand loyalty. It is also easier to retain existing customers than acquire new ones.

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sharpsell equips sales reps with personalized content to engage with customers and customized presentations to share with customers as per their needs. All the content is accessible through a single source- the sharpsell platform. Companies using sharpsell have seen an increase in sales productivity with higher number of products sold, higher ticket size, increased visibility on prospecting, reduced content creation cost, reduced time to first sale, reduced costs of training, and uncovering insights on product feedback.