Ai Editorial: Personalisation is about Positivity

Tracking users who have deserted a travel ecommerce shopping cart and approaching them with a relevant message or ad is becoming common. But doing the same with a seemingly blind targeting tactic is dangerous.

There is something wrong with the current level of personalized retargeting.

A recent experience exemplifies this. I accessed a car rental OTA website and checked options for moving around in London. The site stood out for its functionality, especially the mapping feature and the ease with which one could compare options.  All in all, it was a pleasant experience, but I chose to leave the site before booking.

After doing so I was bombarded with a display ad, session after session, encouraging me to click and book the rental car that I searched for. There was no modification in the content of the ad at any stage; the ad formats just changed depending upon the site that was being accessed. Quite annoying to say the least.

So if travel advertisers are attempting to capitalize on the identity of the user and their search behavior, but are only re-approaching users with the same cart content, conversion value or even the opportunity to upsell can go awry.

“It is a clear case of spam,” says Dave O’Flanagan, co-founder and CEO of Boxever.

“If done intelligently, re-marketing can serve the intended purpose of directing a traveller back to the website which can drive conversion, but blanket retargeting without any intelligence applied definitely presents the risk of annoying a customer and potentially driving them to a competitor,” he says.

Experience optimization

Personalisation isn’t only about conversion and revenue optimization, but also about experience optimization. A personalized experience can create positive sentiment and increase brand loyalty. 

Identifying the right person and the customer that is most likely to buy are just two components of personalisation. “How the ad served is affecting a particular brand also needs to be assessed, as well as monitoring responses to ads in order to determine its effectiveness (too needs to be done),” said O’Flanagan, who acknowledged that the travel industry is in the early stages of serving content that aligns with the interests and activity of the user.

“It’s also important to know when not to retarget, as unnecessary targeting can annoy a customer. Knowing when not to do it requires a certain level of sophistication,” he added. There have been instances where customers end up complaining that their booking flow is interrupted or disturbed by unsolicited ads and messages on a travel supplier website.

“What's important in these scenarios is understanding which customers will be most responsive to that tactic - and at what saturation - based on propensity scoring, past behavior, current context, and so on. In some cases the best action may be to take no action at all, and save the re-marketing dollars for a better prospect and ensure that you don’t annoy the customer,” explained O’Flanagan.

Count on personalisation as a journey

It’s important to view personalisation as a journey, not a single moment in time.

Airlines are in the midst understanding the whole game.

In a recent interview, Nik Laming, general manager, loyalty division at Philippines’ leading carrier Cebu Pacific Air, shared that identifying customers across proliferating social platforms, devices and channels is difficult and becoming more difficult every year.

So how should airlines go about building up resources and infrastructure in a practical way to address these concerns?

O’Flanagan, who agrees with Laming, says airlines, OTAs, and hotels have been awash in traveller data for years; the challenge is pulling it all together into a meaningful profile that can be acted upon with intelligence and recommendations. “It's important to define what you want the end goal to look like (e.g., 1-to-1 offers across all digital and offline channels), and then build toward that in phases. For example, perhaps you start by merging web site data with email data, and then layer on customer service history and social data, to create a more robust customer profile.  Each time more information is added, it creates new opportunities to understand your customer, refine segmentation, messaging, and offers across one or more marketing channels,” summed up O’Flanagan.

Travel companies are certainly beginning to infuse more personalization into the booking process and beyond.

Referring to one moment of surprise and delight, O’Flanagan shared a recent experience: “I travelled with Air New Zealand (a Boxever client) recently and when I arrived in the airport their app asked what type of coffee I would like in the lounge. So I selected a cappuccino and made my way through security. Once I made it to the lounge, the barista had my cappuccino waiting on the counter with my name written on it. It was a complete surprise, seamlessly blending the online and offline worlds into a delightful customer experience.”

Sounds exciting indeed.

By Ritesh Gupta

Learn more about personalisation at Mega Event in San Diego which is taking place on the 4/5th of November.  More information at www.MegaEvent15.com

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