It’s that time of year again…where the greatest minds in email marketing come together for insightful sessions, adventurous networking activities, and some awesome after-hours themed parties. I’m talking about Media Post’s annual summer edition of their Email Insider Summit. Tropical Storm Colin tried to rain on our parade—but nothing can stop this crowd!
This was my first time at Email Insider Summit and it definitely lived up to the hype. I got a chance to step back into my email marketer shoes and interestingly, a lot of the challenges we were talking about a couple of years ago are still top-of-mind for folks today. That’s not to say no progress has been made, but it serves more as a reminder of the monumental challenge that all marketers are trying to tackle on a daily basis: connecting with customers in the right place and at the right time. Here are my four key takeaways from Media Post’s Email Insider Summit 2016:
- This is the Age of the customer. Yeah, I get it…tell you something you don’t know, right? But seriously…now more than ever, everything and everyone is connected. Customers have extraordinarily high expectations. Just as the old-time general store clerk used to know exactly who you were, what you liked, and what products you preferred, we've come full circle. Modern consumers are expecting personalized, one-to-one interactions from the companies they’re doing business with, and as you know, it ain’t easy. No company in their right mind would say, “We don’t care about our customer!” so having a customer-focused approach is critical.
- It’s not all about you. Don't think about customer touch points and interactions from the lens of the data you want to collect. Think about how they view their interactions with your brand. What bottlenecks or choke points in your customer experience are you finding? Use the data to guide improvements and streamline the experience.
- Email addresses are not just for emailing anymore. When was the last time you changed your personal email address? Email addresses, especially consumer Gmail addresses, are very sticky. Because of this, emails could be used as a unique identifier for marketers that are looking to create a single customer view.
- Set up yourself up for success. When creating a cross-channel strategy, take a look at your internal structure first. Is your org chart set up for success? Is your marketing team working in a silo? How can you leverage the IT team to help you create meaningful, smarter connections with customers? You have to be set up internally for success before you can start creating seamless cross-channel experiences for your customers. If you don't have a CDO or another data-driven executive, marketers need to step up and be that change agent for an internal culture shift.
We had an awesome time at Email Insider Summit in Amelia Island, and can’t wait to see everyone again in Park City in December! To learn more about how Experian Data Quality can break down silos get data into the hands of your marketing team, check out our data management solution, Experian Pandora.
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