How to Work Within Data Privacy and Still Personalize Your Marketing

Consumers’ desires for hyperpersonalization and stricter data privacy rules present a classic catch-22 scenario for marketers. How do you ensure both sets of needs (and regulations) are met when one seems to negate the other? While the answer doesn’t always involve a cookie-cutter approach, there are ways to navigate this growing dilemma. It is possible to maintain data privacy while personalizing your marketing messages.

But it’s OK if you’re wondering how to walk the fine line between the two. You may already have some ideas and experimented with a few. If you want to dive deeper into balancing data privacy and personalization, the advice below should help. Here are some approaches and tools you may not have heard about yet.

Use Predictive Audience Models

Marketers are familiar with audience segmentation based on demographics and lifestyle habits. Sometimes referred to as psychographics, lifestyle habits are characteristics and behaviors that can influence brand or product perception. When used together, demographics and psychographics can predict which audience segments are most likely to respond well.

The old-hat way is to gain this data through third-party sources, including web-based cookies. But with third-party lists and cookies becoming a thing of the past, marketers must find other ways to segment. One way is to build predictive audiences based on consumers’ actions instead of their characteristics.

Say a segment of your website visitors spend more time browsing your online store. They haven’t made a purchase yet. However, this same set of lingering would-be shoppers has also visited your site repeatedly. Say to the tune of five times in the past month. This set of visitors is more likely to buy something than a segment with fewer, shorter sessions.

Predictive audience models help you uncover these segments and send personalized messages based on identified behaviors. A timely promo email to the audience identified above may be the motivation they need to become customers. Predictive audience models can also identify customer lifetime value, churn risk, and when clients need to reorder products. And these models do it without relying on third-party data, which can become intrusive and out of touch.

Collect Zero-Party Data

In a soon-to-be cookieless world, you’ve probably heard about first-party data. It’s consumer information your company collects firsthand, usually from your website. Simultaneously, first-party data isn’t information customers and website visitors hand over intentionally.

In contrast, zero-party data is info consumers willingly and purposefully provide to your brand. For example, website visitors take an interactive quiz on your website. The quiz asks them about their skin type, concerns, and grooming preferences. In exchange, those visitors get customized product suggestions and incentives. The data they’ve intentionally given you sets the foundation for building relationships and personalizing their experiences.  

A clear advantage of zero-party data is it’s directly from the audiences already interested in what your brand offers. Unlike third-party data, you’re not seen as the door-to-door salesperson or telemarketer randomly showing up unannounced. Consumers feel like they’re in the driver’s seat and marketers don’t have to play a game of cat and mouse.

Be Transparent

Consumers still have worries despite the growing need to use first-party and zero-party data. A PCH Consumer Insights study found that 86% of Americans have greater concerns over data privacy than the economy. Plus, two-thirds aren’t aware or are misinformed about how companies use their information. They also don’t know who is accessing personal data they might want to keep private.

Intrusions like random emails and direct mailers from organizations you’ve never heard of are examples. While consumers may not be surprised by these marketing efforts by now, it doesn’t mean they appreciate them. They wonder how the company got their name, address, and email. It can erode trust in the brands they engage with, even if they can’t pinpoint a direct link.

That’s why transparency about how your company intends to use, protect, and potentially share consumer data is so critical. Furthermore, it’s essential to allow consumers ways to opt out, prevent, and tailor what information they provide. Most brands have a website page dedicated to the legalese of data privacy, but it can be gobbledygook to consumers. Make the language more accessible and ensure it’s not difficult or tedious for consumers to exercise their options.

Leverage Transactional First-Party Data

Transactional first-party data is essentially an existing client’s purchase history. It’s what and how they’ve bought with you in the past. For instance, you might have a set of customers who prefer to order ahead using an app. They also tend to alternate their purchases between the same set of three products. Sometimes they deviate, but they also have a predilection for ordering from a particular store on specific days.

These insights provide opportunities to personalize your brand’s marketing on several levels. Targeted in-app messages, notifications, and emails are prime examples. You can offer this audience a promo on one or more of their favorite products. Your brand could also deliver those messages on the days those clients are more likely to buy.

If you want to go more granular, the promo could be for order-ahead app purchases from their go-to location. Another example is targeting audiences who frequently use curbside pickup. You could offer occasional one-time incentives on curbside pickup purchases as a way of saying thanks. Product recommendations also fall into the category of leveraging transactional data.

Working Within the Lines of Data Privacy and Personalization

Consumers don’t appreciate generic, random marketing. At the same time, they don’t want their data out there for the world to see and potentially misuse. Walking the fine line of personalizing your marketing while respecting consumer privacy is an evolving craft.

Aside from adhering to stricter regulations, marketers have to shift how they go about audience segmentation. Focusing on first-party and zero-party data still leads you to the end goal of creating personalized brand experiences. And by letting consumers control what information they give you, you’ll steer clear of violating their data privacy concerns.