Personalizing the Customer Experience: A Twitter Chat with Benyamin Elias

Personalization. We love it as marketers, because it helps us deliver relevant content to our customers. We love it as customers when brands send us content that is something we actually care about…and might not have even known we actually needed. But when we don’t love it, it gets a little creepy. Right? What’s the right balance? How do we gather the info to personalize? Are we personalizing in a way that really is improving our customer’s experience, or are we doing it strictly because we only have data to personalize in a handful of ways? So many questions! So, we were so thrilled that Benyamin Elias, content marketer at ActiveCampaign joined us as our special guest on this week’s #CMWorld Twitter Chat.

While there was a definite split in our community on the love or sheer dislike of candy corn, we were all very aligned when it came to personalization. There’s a time and a place, and there’s a right way and a wrong way. Read on for a few insights from our community, then check out our Twitter Moment for more tweets from our smart community.

As always, you can dive into the #CMWorld hashtag on Twitter to see the entire conversation that included hundreds of tweets from a fast-paced and educational hour. Thanks again to Benyamin, Vera and the ActiveCampaign team for being so insightful, prepared, and engaging during our #CMWorld Twitter chat.

We kicked it off with some basics. How does personalized content impact the customer experience?

Q1: How does personalized content impact the customer experience? Is personalization equally important in every aspect of the funnel? #CMWorld pic.twitter.com/R1OjcVsfJc

— Content Marketing Institute (@CMIContent) October 8, 2019

A1: It’s easiest to see the effects of personalization closer to “money moments.” Sales especially, but any time you have a clear conversion action to measure, it’s worth looking at how personalization can help #CMWorld 2/3

— Benyamin Elias (@BenyaminElias) October 8, 2019

A1: More relevant > less relevant. Would you rather read content that solves your problem, or someone else’s? Personalization let’s you show each person the info that they specifically care about #CMWorld 1/3

— Benyamin Elias (@BenyaminElias) October 8, 2019

A1: Personalization can be viewed as a positive – or a negative. As in too soon, too creepy, too much, etc. #CMworld

— Michelle Garrett (@PRisUs) October 8, 2019

Then…we run into the problem of data, technology, integrations and more. How are we limiting ourselves?

Q3: What barriers exist that keep marketers from implementing a personalization strategy? #CMWorld pic.twitter.com/VJUsgfZotr

— Content Marketing Institute (@CMIContent) October 8, 2019

A3: Marketers sometimes deal with second-hand information (i.e. they don’t have direct access to customers). Without talking to customers directly, it can be difficult to figure out what kind of personalization to do. #CMWorld 2/3

— Benyamin Elias (@BenyaminElias) October 8, 2019

A3. I honestly think they create their own limitations. Sometimes tools and resources make it easier, but even with site copy and blog articles you can make things more personalized. This issue is so many still don’t get that this needs to be done. #cmworld

— Stevie Howard (@MyMktingSense) October 8, 2019

A few helpful resources were shared during the chat.

• ActiveCampaigns:Activate Takeaways: Oli Gardner on Metrics with Meaning
• ActiveCampaigns:The 3 Email Retargeting Steps that Will Win You More Customers
• ProfitWell: Customer Research: Benchmarks and Common Mistakes

Does your company use personalization in your marketing efforts? If yes, what successes have you seen? If not, what’s holding you back?

There was many more conversations going, so be sure to check out our Twitter feed.

What a great time! We’d love to have you join our #CMWorld Twitter chat on Tuesdays at noon Eastern. Connect with content marketers from around the globe and discuss a different topic every week.