CMO releases report that 'clicks' take back seat to acquisition, retention

The new report, ‘Making Personalisation Possible’, was conducted in partnership with Microsoft and reveals that marketers are de-prioritising digital campaign metrics in favour of business-focused measurements that more directly tie customer experience to financial performance and business outcomes. Some 40% of marketers surveyed believe that because of these new business measures, they are better able to prove the impact of customer experience investments.

It also reveals that while 49% of marketers are hopefully optimistic about creating lasting relationships with customers through personalised engagements and campaigns, more than one in four are very confident that personalisation is the path to customer gratification and retention.

Key findings of the study include:

• 36% of marketers admit they are currently only able to personalise engagements in select channels but are struggling to properly align the data needed to personalise across the entire relationship in a consistent and meaningful manner

“Marketers are moving away from defining customer experience success through moments in time like clicks or views,” said Liz Miller, senior VP of marketing for the CMO Council. “Those have become critical tools for real-time campaign success. But to measure customer experience success and the overall impact of marketing on the business, marketers are turning to financial KPIs: revenue, costs, conversions and impact on the bottom line.”

Turning data to intelligence

As leading executives continue to make personalisation possible, they are actively seeking out tools and solutions that will amplify the customer’s voice and turn that data into real, actionable intelligence. Among the top strategies for accelerating value in 2016, marketers will look to bolster analytics and lifecycle management strategies and platforms (65%), along with implementing personalisation platforms (65%), engaging in comprehensive journey mapping (56%) and getting smarter about predictive analytics (52%).

“Marketing leaders are increasingly focused on personalisation,” said Gretchen O’Hara, GM of enterprise marketing at Microsoft. “In today’s data-driven marketplace, personalisation is imperative. As innovations like predictive analytics and machine learning technologies become more accessible and easier to manage, they have become an essential part of every marketer’s toolbox, driving an organisation’s competitive edge.”

The 11-page strategic brief is available for download and includes a summary of key findings, along with insights into the performance of best-practice leading respondents who are already well versed in personalisation and engagement. The study includes input from 179 senior marketers, with 34% hailing from organisations with $1bn (USD) in revenue or more, 48% from primarily B2B organisations and 34% from hybrid (B2B2C) businesses. For more information, go to www.cmocouncil.org/r/making-personalisation-possible.