Companies across all industries are increasing their online presence. As a result, competition for consumer attention is growing as well. For companies looking to personalize their content, data and analytics are an integral part of the process. Because personalization is now fairly widespread on the Internet, consumers are beginning to expect a personalized experience. One-size-fits all content strategy is a thing of the past. Companies in 2015 will begin to feel the pressure to personalize by studying consumer behavior and building content marketing strategies to remain relevant.
Here are three compelling statistics that show why businesses need to get personal with their content in 2015.
"74% of consumers get frustrated when website content appears that has nothing to do with their interests" - Janrain
While this isn't necessarily surprising, it is an indication that customers are no longer interested in dealing with irrelevant content. If anything, this statistic is evidence that brands need to personalize their content or risk losing leads and customers. Presenting your customer with irrelevant information is essentially like asking them to leave your website, which is a good segue to the next statistic.
"67% of online adults would lose their patience and leave a website if shown an ad asking for donations from the political party they dislike most." -Janrain
Showing your customer irrelevant content will leave them frustrated and may cause them to abandon their journey on your website. In the case of this statistic, researchers asked consumers what they would do if shown an irrelevant political ad, and well over half of them said they would leave the website.
You could substitute any type of irrelevant content in place of a political ad. The point is that if the content isn't relevant to the visitor, he or she is likely to abandon your website, which means you'll miss out on the opportunity to convert that visitor into a lead and ideally, a customer. Consumers react to the content they are presented with. Even if the rest of your content is relevant in some way, all it takes is frustrating the consumer once and you run the risk of losing them.
"71% of marketers are leveraging real-time marketing today" - Direct Marketing News
Companies need to personalize their content now, rather than wait for the future. The majority of marketers are personalizing right now. Companies that haven't personalized their content by now should be working towards doing so as quickly as possible. Any company that hasn't started the journey towards implementing personalization techniques will begin to fall behind as time progresses.
The Process of Personalizing Content
Personalizing content doesn't happen overnight. It's a process. It requires a budget and resources and specialized knowledge to execute correctly. The first step towards personalizing content is defining who your audience is and building buyer personas based on your findings. Next, you have to integrate real-time personalization and marketing automation tools to collect data about your visitors. Finally, you can leverage that data to deliver a personalized content experience to your customers, which will ideally drive leads and increase conversions. One thing is clear, personalization is important now, and will be an essential tactic for marketers looking to be successful in 2015.
Photo Credit: Personalization of Content/shutterstock