What customers want and what businesses think they want are often two different things. In the digital era, personalization has risen steadily in recent decades and has been largely a ‘south to north’ phenomenon. Evergage and Researchscape International surveyed 300 marketing professionals from the US, the UK, India, Canada and Germany in 19 different industries to gain a better understand the behavior, usage, and attitudes of marketing professionals toward personalization.

Take a sneak peek at the top line findings of 2018 Trends in Personalization:

Marketers’ Attitudes Toward Personalization

• Almost all marketers believe that personalization has at least some impact on advancing customer relationships, with nearly 74% believe that personalization has a “strong” or “extreme” impact on advancing customer relationships.
• 88% of respondents claimed that they believe that their prospects/customers expect a personalized experience, with just 31% believe that they’re currently getting personalization right.

A Graph Shows the Impact of Personalization on Advancing Customer Relationships

Personalization Usage and Satisfaction

• In general, 77% of marketers in the US, the UK, India, Canada and German reported that they’re applying personalization to emails and 52% are personalizing their websites.
• B2C companies are more likely to personalize their mobile apps (45%), while B2B companies are more likely to personalize email (80%) and website (50%).
• 70% of marketers are moderately or slightly satisfied with their current personalization efforts, 18% are not satisfied at all, while 12% are very or extremely satisfied.
• More than half of marketers (55%) feel they don’t have sufficient data and insights to drive effective personalization. 58% of these companies are B2B ones.

A Graph Shows the Availability of Data and Insights for Effective Personalization in B2B and B2C Companies in 2018

Personalization Formats and Types

• The most commonly used personalization formats are banners (45%) and call-out messages (40%).
• 71% of marketers apply personalization in email content, while 45% do so on the home page.
• 43% use campaign source in targeting audience, while 39% us location and 37% use demographics.

Personalization Measurement and Budgets

• More than half of marketers (51%) of digital marketers measure the value of their personalization efforts by looking at improvements in conversion rates, while 49% look at the clickthrough rate.
• Increasing visitor engagement (55%), improving customer experience (55%) and improving brand perception (39%) are the top three benefits of personalization.
• 60% plan to maintain their spending on personalization at the same level, while only 37% plan to increase their investment in personalization.
• 42% of marketers not currently using machine learning/algorithmic personalization plan to do in the next year.

A Graph Shows the Planned Investment in Personalization in 2018

Methodology:

Data were driven from 300 marketing professionals from five countries in 19 different industries. 93% of respondents were located in the US. Another 2% each were from India, the UK, Canada, and Germany. (Total exceeds 100% due to rounding).