Effective marketing has always involved a careful balancing act. It tends to require a targeted or a truly one-to-one approach whilst also avoiding the risk of being perceived as overly intrusive. This applies to online as much as offline activity.

That said, a recent study by Yahoo finds that most consumers are not only aware of online personalisation but that they believe that it provides added relevance – with 78% of those surveyed expressing a desire for some type of personalised content. And, according to Piers North, strategy director at Yahoo UK, the greatest opportunity for marketers today lies in managing personalisation on mobile devices. He admits, however, that this is not easy and he points out that access to data is the key.

Walk the line
Yet the decision as to where to draw the line with regards data collection is not always easy. For instance, Sam Diamond, head of brand at Gumtree, admits that the UK's most visited classifieds site could offer a "better, more personalised" service if the decision was taken to demand registration, but he says that this could add a layer of friction to the overall experience.

"It's a debate we often have around the office," he says. "I think people are slowly coming round to the fact that companies knowing who you are isn't necessarily a bad thing."

Indeed, many other brands have already reaped the benefits of increased personalisation, thanks to a variety of tools and technologies. Sally Pemble, digital acquisition manager at James Villa Holidays notes that since working with agency Captify to implement search re-targeting – a technology which re-targets consumers based on previous online searches – her team has managed to double click-through rates.

Product curation
"We offer over 50 destinations, so we are able to put the best, most relevant offer in front of people," she says. "The approach is quite subtle as it's about presenting you with a banner ad related to what you've been searching for elsewhere already."

Meanwhile, Matthew Finn, CRM manager at jewellery brand Astley Clarke says that implementing SmartFocus technology to personalise the online experience via what he refers to as 'suggestion choreography' has resulted in some 60% uplift in conversion rates.

But he admits the process has not been without challenges and that it involves constantly tweaking algorithms to increase performance. He says that the brand is now 'stripping back' some of the overly complex algorithms to make the process more manageable – noting, too, that the company's product catalogue is now too large for such personalisation to be delivered manually.

And, for many companies, personalisation is a central plank of the overall approach to marketing and sales. Jon Owen, retail director at Shop Direct, says that the retail giant – which operates brands such as Littlewoods.com and Very.co.uk – is viewing personalisation as 'the foundation' of its growth strategy. But he, too, admits that the process is hard and that it varies a lot by channel.

"You have to make sure you have customer data safe but also easily accessible, and while some aspects [of personalisation] are easy, others are very complex," he admits.

A starting point for the retailer was to personalise its email communications. "A sales email tends to drive demand, but we have found that if we populate emails with items browsed but not bought, response goes through the roof," claims Owen. "The customer benefits from an easier shopping experience and this leads to increased sales for us."

"The benefits are more so than we had forecast," he adds. "There is just such a huge benefit in putting the right product in front of the right customer."

Owen notes, too, that the greatest challenge was not creating the ability to do personalisation in and of itself, but what he refers to as "the clever bits" – "exactly what to do and the use of insights around propensity, margin and benefit".

"You have to really think carefully. It's not just like-for-like in terms of product one or product two. It involves lot of testing," he warns.

And personalisation is, of course, more achievable for some sectors than it is for others. Nick Dutch, head of digital at takeaway pizza company Dominos points out that, "a customer is not willing to give away their life story in order to get a better price on a pizza."

He says that "about 95%" of what Domino's does is about "targeted" communications as opposed to pure personalisation. The remaining 5%, he says, may be around direct mail or email if, for instance, a pizza delivery was late. "It's about being personal but not big Brother-ish," he explains.

Personalisation to drive relevance, convenience and value
So it seems that, despite all the opportunities for increased personalisation today, it's important not to personalise for personalisation's sake – nor to become fixated on the latest tools or techniques.

In fact, Michael Smith, marketing leader for mobile and social business at IBM, points out that it's important to understand how your customers want to engage with you before doing anything at all. "Customers expect something in return for their data," he says. "It's easy to become fixated by the technology … be sure you're using it to address a need."

Lucy Fisher is a freelance journalist specialising in media, marketing and technology

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