Personalize your marketing with dynamic content
Ask marketing experts about your goals; one of the first answers is to offer your customers more personalized user experience. This is not only aimed at higher conversions. It’s more about meeting the growing expectations of customers.
In context: Five years ago, people were still impressed when Amazon suggested a product they would love. Nowadays, Netflix is expected to recommend the next captivating series that perfectly suits the taste.
So how do you, as a marketer, meet such a demand for personalized communication? The answer lies in understanding the power of dynamic content and how it completely overshadows the marketing of static content. The fact is that 74% of users are frustrated with websites that don’t have personalized content.
In this post, I describe seven simple ways that marketing experts can use dynamic content to connect with customers on a more organic and personal level.
Seven ways to use dynamic content
- Landing pages
- forms
- redirects
- Pop-ups
- Personalized recommendations
- Dynamic searches
What is the dynamic content?
Simply put, dynamic content refers to elements of a website or email that change depending on the information or behavior of a user.
For example, in a marketing email, the image of a hero could change to the image of a dream destination, especially for a user who just wants to book a vacation. An offer on a website would also adapt to a first-time visitor, as opposed to a returning visitor who would instead buy something. Another example would be that a clothing retailer shows you an advertising banner of jeans that resemble the jeans you acquired on this page last week.
Dynamic content creates a personalized web experience for the individual user. So not everyone who lands on your site or the same email always gets the same. Depending on how the user interacted with your company, they will also see something different, personalized.
Examples of dynamic content
The term “dynamic content” becomes somewhat more transparent with examples from the real world. Fortunately, this is relatively easy because practically everyone uses it to some extent.
Amazon
Oh, yes, Amazon. Whether you love it or hate it, this retail giant has been the pioneer in using dynamic content in retail stores. Everyone knows the ads for suggested products that you see when you first visit the website, or when you click on a product that you are interested in. No, this is not Amazon, which has an army of hired private investigators to uncover the interests of hundreds of millions of website users. That is dynamic content.
Netflix
Not only retail websites use dynamic content. Also, Netflix monitored, what you look for how long viewed has to personalized recommendations of programs that one might like to give. That means when you log into your Netflix account, you see something completely different than when your parents or one of your siblings logs into your account.
It would be strange if the most visited page didn’t use dynamic content. Google uses dynamic content in many different ways. What most people have experienced themselves is the search for a “service or shop near me “. In this case, Google delivers personalized content, depending on your location. So if someone searches in Berlin and someone in Munich for a “coffee nearby”, both will get different results.
More prime examples
Almost every industry leader makes good use of dynamic web content to personalize and improve the experience of users and buyers. With the help of dynamic location determination, Domino’s Pizza shows the user the closest shop based on its location. Hilton Hotels display different offers depending on the travel plan of the user.
A previous visit to the website or the purchase history is further options for using dynamic content. The online learning platform Udemy offers course recommendations based on the user’s purchase history, and YouTube continually updates the list of suggestions based on video history to date.
Fitbit monitors your food, exercise, sleep, and weight profile based on your goals at the beginning of registration. Throughout the day, the app will send you emails about your goals.
How does dynamic content work?
Understanding dynamic content is relatively easy. However, implementing it is more difficult – if you don’t have the right tools for it. Fortunately, automated marketing platforms make delivering personalized content much easier for your users. As light as surfaces that you can move around and adjust with the click of a mouse, without coming into contact with any code.
Dynamic content works like this: Once you have collected relevant data of your users (such as name, location, which website they visit, buying behavior, etc.), you can outsource it to your landing pages or emails to provide users with more individual information To target base.
Take, for example, a customer who visits an online retailer, searches for different products, makes a purchase decision, enters his data (name, address, etc.) in the form and buys the product. His contact details, the purchase process, and all the products viewed are data that are important for the user log. The next time this user visits the system, the system will recognize them and show them purchase recommendations for similar products from previous purchases.
To deliver dynamic content, it requires the following components:
A central marketing database
First of all, data must be collected and stored in a database. Every user receives a unique ID, and every interaction with the website is recorded in the database.
A “Dynamic Content Generator”
It must be ensured that the data is taken from the database and displayed on the page or in the email. A “Dynamic Content Generator” can show or hide this data in different elements depending on availability.
An editable landing page
For the “Dynamic Content Generator” to work, the website must be created in a formable manner. This not only allows a code of dynamic content to be placed anywhere on the page where necessary but also enables greater personalization that can be implemented in the future based on the data collected by users.
Integrated email
In order to implement personalized campaigns, your email marketing system must be integrated into your database.
Seven ways to use dynamic content
The examples at the beginning show that there are many ways to incorporate dynamic content into your marketing strategy. We now list seven ways for you, although of course you don’t have to limit yourself to just those. Feel free to try different options and experiment a little. The most important thing is and remains that you always pay attention to make the content meaningful for the user .
1. Landing Pages
Landing pages are a great way to turn the user into a buyer. Consider the impact of a personalized message to each user, the details of course depending on the product. Integrate the respective name into the website and refer to products that the lead has already used. Go one step further and personalize the “Call to action”. If a point has already downloaded one of the opt-in rewards, offer another so that it stays in the funnel.
2. Email
Providing dynamic content to users in email campaigns is a great way to increase opening rates and conversions. Again, there is much more to personalize than just the name of the user. Depending on the location or browsing history of the user, the content can be changed in the same way as it works on your landing pages.
3. Forms
With dynamic content, a website can provide better user experience by delivering personalized arrangements. If a visitor is identified as “known” compared to “unknown,” the site can show variations of styles or hide them entirely. For example, an unknown visitor can receive away with a special offer, while a known visitor only has to confirm his email address. Another website personalization will be if a well-known visitor sees a login page instead of a registration page.
4. Redirects
Another way to turn users into customers is to use redirects. For example, if a user were looking for more information about Berlin, they could be redirected to a page about Prenzlberg. Redirects can take place almost immediately, and the visitor may not even notice that they have been redirected.
5. Pop-ups
You don’t have to refer to past behavior to deliver dynamic content to users. By using real-time signals such as the time spent on a page, the length of inactivity, scrolling activities, or user clicks, you can provide intelligent pop-ups to perform a specific action. Typically, this prevents visitors from leaving the website without first entering the sales funnel. Use this dynamic content to guide it to the best content based on its location.
6. Personalized recommendations
We’ve already talked about how large online companies use customized recommendations. Both Amazon and Netflix use data-driven recommendations to encourage users to buy more items (in the case of Amazon) or to continue their subscription (in the case of Netflix). But proposals don’t just have to be product-related. You can also recommend content from your blog based on the articles that a user has previously read . In essence, this helps to “free” content from the “limits” of repeat purchases and to ensure that users see as many of your products as possible.
7. Dynamic searches
Search bars can quickly become unfriendly on large websites with hundreds or thousands of pages. Here you can use both individual user data and page-related data to achieve a personalized, user-friendly experience. One method would be to suggest the most common searches. Alternatively (or also), the page can provide results based on a user’s previous settings. For example, a user might prefer a particular clothing brand or only buy items in a specific price range.
Between us
If your company has so far not implemented dynamic content, now is the time to catch up. Put personalization first in your strategic planning and start creating the user experience your customers expect with compelling content. To be honest, it has to be said that such an undertaking requires resources and a budget.
