In the wake of COVID-19, brands have seen years worth of digital transformation in a matter of months. With physical stores bleeding money, it's critical that brands maximize their impact online.

As such, the renewed attention to ecommerce personalization comes as no surprise. Personalization has always been at the core of good digital experiences. It powers the contextual, relevant interactions that foster loyalty and growth. 

Why ecommerce personalization matters now

Customers expect personalized experiences

• 80% of consumers are more likely to buy from a brand that provides personalized experiences.
• 91% of consumers say they are more likely to shop with brands that provide offers and recommendations that are relevant to them.
• 72% of consumers say they only engage with personalized messaging. 

Personalization fuels loyalty and lifetime value (LTV)

• 80% of frequent shoppers only shop with brands that personalize the experience.
• 56% of online shoppers are more likely to return to a website that recommends products. 

Customers now value personalization over privacy

• 90% of consumers are willing to share personal behavioral data with companies for a cheaper and easier experience. 
• 83% of consumers are willing to share their data to create a more personalized experience. 
• 64% of consumers are fine with retailers saving their user history if it allows them to offer more personalized experiences.

Poor personalization leads to customer churn

• 42% of consumers get annoyed when content isn’t personalized.
• 63% of consumers will stop buying from brands that use poor personalization tactics. 
• 66% of consumers say that impersonal content would stop them from making a purchase.

6 Brands that are leading the way 

Sephora 

It's no secret that we love Sephora. Whether it’s in-store, through email, or in-app, Sephora meets customers where and how they prefer. 

How Sephora wins with ecommerce personalization:

• Conversational technology plays a critical role in how Sephora delivers personalized digital experiences. When shopping with a brand feels like shopping with a friend (a friend that knows your tastes and preferences), brands unlock a whole new level of personalization. 
• The brand's omnichannel strategy is unmatched. Triggered notifications, like back in stock and abandoned cart messages assist customers at every stage of the customer journey. 
• Sephora's Beauty Insider program is a robust rewards program. Free, personalized gifts are certainly one way to keep customers coming back. 

Adidas

Like Sephora, Adidas builds its relationship with shoppers through leveraging its expansive data points. It collects product and content feedback to create better experiences on multiple channels for a succinct, omnichannel approach.

How Adidas wins with ecommerce personalization:

• The more you engage with the Adidias (on all channels) the more reward points you receive. This helps Adidas gather the information it needs to create highly personalized experiences. 
• Engagement triggers tailored content. This can be anything from sports news to product collaborations or discount alerts. 
• In large part due to these efforts, Adidas' gross margin is projected to increase to around 52% this year. 

Rent the Runway 

Rent the Runway is an online service that provides designer dress and accessory rentals. The brand creates detailed member profiles and curates reviews that include customers’ sizes and measurements for context.

How Rent the Runway wins with ecommerce personalization:

• Rent the Runway takes product recommendations to the next level. It collects a shopper’s size, height, weight, bust, torso, and rib measurements to recommend clothing that based on style and fit. 
• The brand also offers a rich mobile experience on its app, with push notifications that help customers return clothing on time, reminds app users to finish their transactions, and assures them that their clothing will arrive in time for their event. 
• The mobile push notifications have gone a long way to both combat lost conversions and also foster customer loyalty. 

Urban Outfitters 

After committing to invest in data and analytics to improve personalization, Urban Outfitters saw significant improvement in customer engagement. 

How Urban Outfitters wins with ecommerce personalization:

• Again, a well crafted omnichannel strategy keeps the retail experience relevant. Urban Outfitters uses a mix of reactive and proactive triggered messages to assist customers throughout the customer journey, like birthday wishes and back in stock notifications. 
• The more a user interacts with its app the more nuanced product suggestions become. The app has a 4.9 rating in the iOS App Store and more than 265,000 reviews. 
• Like Rent the Runway, Urban Outfitters leans on user-generated content to enhance the digital experience. Shoppers can easily see how products look on real people and get inspired. 

Home Depot

Lastly, let's change gears from fashion to home improvement. Home Depot has boosted customer engagement by 238% by focusing on personalization and user experience.

How Home Depot wins with ecommerce personalization:

• Home Depot's app operates as a virtual customer service agent. It helps shoppers with inventory information and even helps shoppers navigate through physical stores. 
• Home Depot's comprehensive online content includes DIY videos, home improvement tips, style inspiration, and much more. Informational videos are matched with product recommendations to help customers turn their vision into reality. 
• Home Depot's product recommendations include items that are "frequently purchased together" which helps ensure customers have everything they need to get their project done. 

The bottom line

The common thread between these examples is the way in which they unify the customer experiences across channels. Going into 2021, data science, personalization, and omnichannel strategies go hand in hand. 

Brands need to find ways to collect and unify customer data. Curated and relevant experiences are the new normal, and those experiences are built on robust customer profiles.

The key is collecting that information in a way that is not intrusive, and more importantly, provides value for the customer. It's an ongoing process that should always have a clear benefit for the shopper. 

Aggregating communication channels is a clear place to start on the personalization journey. Siloed communication channels are a reality that many retail brands are working to outgrow. 

Want to create a tailored experience that increases customer satisfaction, and retention? Learn how the world's leading ecommerce brands use Hubtype to drive revenue, reduce customer churn, and optimize engagement.