A recent column from MediaPost’s Steve Smith got me thinking. Steve writes about the importance of personalization across multiple devices (web, mobile, and more.)Even more shocking, fewer than 10% of marketers can automatically update a customer profile based on their online interaction with them. If you can do this, makes tracking and personalization much easier. Much of this is due to the ways that marketers aren’t set-up with the proper tools to combine the vast array of data silos they have.
While some may believe this should be pretty automatic with technology today, in most cases marketers can’t take what they know about you from the spectrum of your “account/site/email/search/social/ad exposure/sms/mobile web/in-app/in-store/loyalty/etc.” activity and wrap it around a meaningful “I-know-you” experience.
Those that can do this are winning AND they have a better understanding of the true health of their business and where it can go. Generally those that can’t are either unable to make unilateral decisions across these channels to unify (likely due to organization structure-induced inertia), OR they are content to remain focused on building monolithic channel silos because it’s safe and generally accepted.
Unfortunately, that will keep them from delivering on the promise that mobility can truly deliver upon with access to this customer-centric data. While I understand that the flying cars and jet pack promises of my youth may be delayed, I am genuinely annoyed that the “available now” opportunity to deliver better experiences across my PC and especially mobile experiences is not valued enough by brands to explore the new options that would deliver these goods.
