Letters to the editor

The pick of this week’s letters from our readers

 

Micro-segmentation boosts experience…

Dwell
Dwell matches segmentation on CRM with customer behaviour

Just as the way shoppers move around a physical store provides retailers and marketers with insight (MWlinks.co.uk/ shopper), so does their online shopping behaviour.

Both of these things allow brands to provide a more integrated experience for consumers. Consumers use several channels on and offline to browse and obtain information before purchasing, so the whole experience needs to be seamless. The information provided by retailers and marketers must be relevant at the time and appropriate for the channel used.
However, ecommerce, particularly when tied to other digital tools such as social commerce, allows micro-segmentation in a way that in-store shopping never can because marketers have access to individual comments and buying intent, as well as past buying behaviour.

Savvy marketers will use this insight to their advantage, using more content to provide a better experience for their customers and in turn gathering more insight in the form of online data – it’s a virtuous circle.

Richard Anson, founder, Reevoo

 

…but insight is only valuable with customer understanding

Customer data collection and insight gathering are clearly major challenges for retailers and the advances in this area are to be applauded (MWlinks.co.uk/
shopper).

While information on customer behaviour increases through the use of hi-tech monitoring, on and offline, and through better information gathering and training of store owners and managers, I notice that there is still very little information on why customers behave in the way they do.

What is vital is to understand how customers think and feel when shopping, what motivates them to purchase and what incentivises them to choose the channels they do. Until we can anticipate this, we will only ever be reactive in creating seamless retail experiences.

We cannot influence behaviour until we truly understand it in the first place.

Lucy Unger, managing director, Europe and Russia, Fitch

 

Low prices alone can’t buy a brand love or engagement 

Tesco

Rosie Baker is right in her assertion that Tesco needs to start giving consumers a reason to engage with the brand again (MWlinks.co.uk/lovetesco).

All brands need to do more than just the basics. Competing on price is not nearly enough to make people love a brand.

Community has been a fundamental part of Tesco’s brand DNA for a while, encompassing initiatives such as the Computers for Schools scheme.

However, it needs to revisit communicating this core value with the wider public to build true brand affinity once again.

Hamish Pringle, strategic adviser, 23red

Recommended

Mr Kipling

Premier Foods hails power brand strategy

Russell Parsons

Premier Foods is to step up marketing activity for its eight “power brands” after reporting that the decision to throw its marketing budget behind brands it thinks have the greatest growth potential led to a 1.1% uplift in first-half sales.