Customers are demanding. Whether your application is sold to the enterprise or available to consumers for free, people demand a low learning curve, beautiful design, and fast performance.
Increasingly, customers also crave an experience that is tailored to their preferences, needs, and goals. While users are becoming more sensitive to the exposure of their data, it has been proven that customers will trade personal data for a more personalized experience.
According to a recent Salesforce survey, 57% of consumers would share "personal data in exchange for personalized discounts" and 53% would share data in order to facilitate "personalized shopping experiences".
As we look ahead to the rest of 2019, we believe personalization in software will become a key differentiation between good software and industry-leading software. In this post, we are going to discuss personalization software, its benefits, and how you can implement the best practices.
What is Personalization in Software?
Personalization refers to "producing something to meet an individual requirements". In the world of software development, that means designing a user experience that is aware of the current user and molds to fit their needs.
Personalization in software: Designing a user experience that is aware of the current user and molds to fit their needs.
There are two main goals for personalization in software. The technique is either used (1) to help users reach their intended result faster and with lower effort or (2) to engage users with the intent of purchasing more products. With clearly defined goals, personalization can provide a measurable lift in task completion and content engagement.
Adding a user's name to an onboarding screen is not personalization. Advances in artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) allow us to create deep correlations between user activity and intended results. For instance, we can identify key trends and user preferences based on certain user data points, which allow us to suggest that a particular user follows a specific flow through an application.
Successful personalization results in happier users and more conversions by catering your app's content, products, or interface to better suit an individual's needs.
Examples and Benefits of Personalization
Here are some popular examples of modern tools that you can use to leverage personalization in your application. When you consider personalization, it is important to start with the highest value areas of your product. For example, can you personalize onboarding or the main feature of your application?
If so, you will have more people reach a successful outcome more of the time, which results in higher retention rates and increased revenue.
Example #1: Amazon Personalize
Amazon Personalize is a machine learning (ML) service available to developers through an application programming interface (API).
For instance, you could leverage Amazon Personalize to create a recommendation engine in your mobile app that suggests new blog posts, music, videos, or products to users. Behind the scenes, Amazon Personalize will examine the data, select the right machine learning algorithms, and train the models for your specific purpose.
Beyond product recommendations, this API can also be used to create custom-tailored search queries and push notifications. Both of these features help users find the information they need, when they need it. Services like Amazon Personalize can help teams get up-to-speed quickly without investing heavily in a complete data science or machine learning team.
With Amazon Personalize, your team can create personalized user experiences by making simple API calls.
Example #2: Acquia Lift
For websites built with Drupal, there is also Acquia Lift. The Acquia Lift platform brings advanced personalization to users by aggregating user information and comparing against existing user behavior.
Their platform utilizes user data – such as demographics, geolocation, and device type – to create personalized calls-to-action (CTAs) and content recommendations. For instance, users who are engaged on a blog post about the best hotels in Los Angeles will be shown more information about food and hospitality in Southern California.
As an added benefit, Acquia Lift is designed to work specifically with Drupal. Out of the box, their solution leverages Drupal's "view modes" to display content in different blocks – including header images, thumbnails, and content blockers. Acquia Lift is compatible with decoupled Drupal architectures as well. In either setup, Lift will recommend content without your team having to manually change post tags or make updates as time goes on!
Example #3: SendLane
SendLane is a San Diego-based startup that has developed a sophisticated behavior-based email automation platform. Their solution allows you to set up automated emails that are sent based on user actions within your store, website, or application.
The SendLane platform is designed to "plug in" to your existing technology stack, whether you are a content creator, a software company, or an ecommerce storefront. They also have a generous amount of API integrations, including Shopify, Stripe, and Zapier.
Their intuitive web application allows your team to create dynamic email sequences that incorporate people who open emails, click the links inside of emails, add items to their carts, successfully purchase, and much more.
This level of specificity allows marketers to craft campaigns that speak directly to customers, instead of handing out generic 10% coupons to everyone in your mailing list.
Conclusion
Today, more than ever, customers are demanding. They crave experiences that are personal and unique. As we have seen, they are even willing to share their personal data in exchange for experiences that are more catered to their needs.
Personalization in 2019 touches a variety of different disciplines, including sales, marketing, customer support, and product management. There are also many powerful tools available to companies – including Amazon Personalize, Acquia Lift, and SendLane – to create personalized user experiences.
As you look to launch a new product or enhance your existing website, think about how personalize can increase customer satisfaction and revenue.
Have questions about personalization in software? Contact Tragic Media today for a free consultation. Our team is eager to learn more about your product and how we can build the right technical solution for your users and customers.
