Introduction:

Mobile marketing is said to be the future of the digital marketing so it essential that brands begin to focus their advertising budgets on this (Batra & Keller, 2016). In particular, the app sector is expected to continue to grow at a rapid rate showing companies that there is much market growth potential (Anitha, 2014). There has been a dramatic increase in smart phone use in recent years and, evidence shows that 90% of mobile time is spent on apps (Chaffey, 2018; Arora et al, 2017). This growth has meant that users expect an individually tailored experience. Evidence also shows that personalisation increases an individual’s affinity and loyalty towards the brand which is imperative in this competitive market (Parker & Wang, 2015; Anitha, 2014). This in turn affects purchasing intentions specifically in terms of repeat purchases (Srivastava & Kaul, 2016). Below are some examples of personalisation:

Table 1 – Recommended list based on the previously searched items:

Source: ASOS, 2018

Table 2: Advertisements that differ based on the weather at your location:

Source: Very, 2018

Tips/ Guides – How to personalise well:

Top Tips:

1. Journey Mapping – Know your users and what they want:

Users should be treated as individuals and not ‘trends’. If you have the right mobile  analytics in place you can gain a lot of valuable information about users e.g their physical location, where they went in your app and the last time that they opened it.  With this knowledge you can provide personalised messaging that links to different places within the app serving users with most the most relevant and interesting information for them. This can result in greater user loyalty and retention. There are 3 levels of data that you should account for:

• General Usage (When was the last time the user visited and for how long?)
• Behaviour (What did the user do in the app? Which screens did they see?)
• Back-end data: Integrate the different channels so you can sync back end data e.g. age, gender

(Simplified Insights, 2016; Alluf, 2016)

Table 3 – Example of a way to Journey Map
                                                                                   Source: Simplified Insights, 2016

2. Real Time Responses: Conversations vs. Single messages:

In many cases app communications are a single flow of actions that are generated from the user. Often apps lack in-app engagement flows that provide numerous steps in communication that listen and respond to user’s feedback. Ideally, marketers should respond individually to each users feedback e.g. if the user provides you with negative feedback the company can email asking them for further information.

(Alluf, 2016)

3. Test, Experiment and Optimise:

This is key to being successful in most aspects of marketing. This includes testing the apps content but also messaging frequency, in app location features and engagement features against each other. This experimentation is one way you can realise your apps full business potential. However, most companies are not there yet and are mainly focused on the app’s core functionality and less on engagement features that drive people to convert and return.

(Alluf, 2016; SOASTA, 2014)

Benefits:

Increased Customer Engagement

App personalisation and functionality expands the average 90 second visit to 120 seconds or more. It does this by increasing relevance the longer and more frequently a customer visits your app. For example, creating targeted offers based on the consumers previous searches. If you engage with consumers in this targeted way when they return to your website you can remind them of previous items that they have looked at which acts as a nudge. It can also increase engagement by creating targeted content in response to in-session behaviour in order to influence the visitor’s urgency and increase likelihood of purchase (Knexus, 2016).

Increased Retention and Conversion 

Personalisation and functionality helps to increase recurring conversions, advocacy and retention. Research shows that post-purchase loyalty programmes which contain personalised offers are one of the most important factors in increasing repeat purchase. Retention is built on relationship and familiarity and personalisation facilitates this (Davies, 2013). It also increases retention through the creation of more relevant and tailored experiences with the brand (Knexus, 2016)

Personalisation makes your marketing useful:

Currently, the app market is extremely saturated and consequently there is much competition. This means consumers are continuously bombarded with new content, products and services. This makes it difficult for brands to stand out – personalisation can help to do this. An individual who receives a piece of information that is tailored to them is more likely to respond to it over a piece of generic content. This can also help to build brand loyalty (Kurve, 2015).

Risks:

Security:

Personalisation means that companies are collecting and dealing with a lot of sensitive personal data. Side effects of this can be sensitive data leakages or transmissions. Is data is leaked customers will lose trust in the brand and ultimately they will have a tainted reputation. Therefore, companies need to ensure that they have safe data storage facilities that are protected by hardcoded passwords or keys (Pollock, 2018).

Overly Invasive:

While some argue that personalisation provides a tailored experience others state that it is digital stalking. Individuals trade data for a tailored experience. This is why people instantaneously agree to terms and conditions within an app. This includes giving access to location, emails and publishing things on their behalf. However, there has been customer backlash about how much information they receive and the ways in which they use it (The Guardian, 2014).

REMEMBER – like anything personalisation is expensive to implement and does not necessarily culminate in a successful Rate of Return!

References:

Alluf, P. (2016) 3 Steps to Mobile App Personalisation. [Online] Available at: <https://blog.marketo.com/2016/06/3-steps-to-mobile-app-personalization.html&gt; [Accessed 7 Feb 2018]

Anitha, T. (2014) Appurify: Facilitating a Next-Generation Debugging, Testing, and Performance Optimization Platform for Mobile Apps. [Online] Available at: <http://web.a.ebscohost.com.ezproxy.brighton.ac.uk/ehost/pdfviewer/pdfviewer?vid=3&sid=598f3df9-32c1-47bc-8944-67bd84cae6d4%40sessionmgr4006&gt; [Accessed 18 Jan 2018]

Arora, S., Hofstede, F. & Mahajan, V. (2017) The Implications of Offering Free Versions for the Performance of Paid Mobile Apps, Journal of Marketing, Vol 81, No 6, p62-78

ASOS (2018) Men’s Trousers. [Online] Available at: < http://www.asos.com/men/trousers-chinos/cat/?_cclid=v3_477fd53c-3fb6-501d-bc77-07b3fea3e4bc&affid=12493&channelref=paid+search&cid=4910&cr=4&gclid=CjwKCAiAqvXTBRBuEiwAE54dcG18fR9hpRc_uVnAmvsFA4uaLLDerl9-RK9OMAX3EreBVrG4OfiZDhoCAIQQAvD_BwE&ppcadref=867428335%7C44153106432%7Caud-342902777401:kwd-330470137365&gt; [Accessed 9 Feb 2018]

Batra, R. & Keller, K. (2016) Integrated Marketing Communications: New Findings, New Lessons and New Ideas, Journal of Marketing, Vol 80, p122-145

Clark, N. (2014) Tailored experience or digital stalking? Has personalisation gone too far?, The Guardian, 19 August 2014. [Online] Available at: <https://www.theguardian.com/media/2014/aug/19/tailored-experience-or-digital-stalking-has-personalisation-gone-too-far&gt; [Accessed 7 Feb 2018]  

Chaffey, D. (2018) Mobile Marketing Statistics Compilation. [Online] Available at: <https://www.smartinsights.com/mobile-marketing/mobile-marketing-analytics/mobile-marketing-statistics/&gt; [Accessed 18 Jan 2018]

Davies, A. (2013) Three major benefits of using personalisation in marketing. [Online] Available at: < https://econsultancy.com/blog/63212-three-major-benefits-of-using-personalisation-in-marketing&gt; [Accessed 7 Feb 2018]

Knexus (2016) 5 Key benefits of personalised user experiences. [Online] Available at: <https://www.knexusgroup.com/show/blog/five-key-benefits-of-personalised-user-experiences/&gt; [Accessed 8 Feb 2018]

Kurve (2015) 3 Benefits of personalisation. [Online] Available at: <https://www.kurve.co.uk/blog/3-benefits-of-personalisation&gt; [Accessed 7 Feb 2018]

Parker, C. & Wang, H. (2015) Examining hedonic and utilitarian motivations for m-commerce fashion retail app engagement, Journal of Fashion Marketing and Management, Vol 20, No 4, p487-506

 Pollock, C. (2018) The mobile app Top 10 Risks. [Online] Available at: <https://www.owasp.org/images/9/94/MobileTopTen.pdf&gt; [Accessed 7 Feb 2018]

Simplified Insights (2016) Journey Maps Exposed – Why Personalisation Rules!. [Online] Available at: <http://www.simplifiedinsights.co/journey-maps-exposed-3-major-types/&gt; [Accessed 12 Feb 2018]

SOASTA (2014) The importance of mobile app testing: why and what to test. [Online] Available at: <https://www.soasta.com/blog/the-importance-of-mobile-app-testing-why-and-what-to-test/&gt; [Accessed 12 Feb 2018]

 Srivastava, M. & Kaul, D. (2016) Exploring the link between customer experience-loyalty-consumer spend, Journal of Retailing & Consumer Services, Vol 31, p277-286

 Very (2018) Homepage. [Online] Available at: < http://www.asos.com/men/trousers-chinos/cat/?_cclid=v3_477fd53c-3fb6-501d-bc77-07b3fea3e4bc&affid=12493&channelref=paid+search&cid=4910&cr=4&gclid=CjwKCAiAqvXTBRBuEiwAE54dcG18fR9hpRc_uVnAmvsFA4uaLLDerl9-RK9OMAX3EreBVrG4OfiZDhoCAIQQAvD_BwE&ppcadref=867428335%7C44153106432%7Caud-342902777401:kwd-330470137365&gt; [Accessed 9 Feb 2018]