This document outlines 10 best practices for personalization presented by Dave Sawyer and Waqas Hussain. The best practices are: 1) Collect data first before establishing a personalization strategy; 2) Connect customer data across systems; 3) Automatically segment visitors using detectable criteria; 4) Enrich content with metadata tags to make it targetable; 5) Recognize returning visitors; 6) Tailor messaging consistently across channels; 7) Recommend additional relevant content; 8) Conduct experiments and learn from results; 9) Measure performance consistently and analyze data regularly; and 10) Establish security guidelines and respect user privacy.

1. FFWagency.com @FFWglobal
Personalization Best Practices
Episode 4 in a 5-part series
September 19, 2017

2. Dave Sawyer
Senior Solutions Consultant
FFW
dave.sawyer@ffwagency.com
About the presenters:
@cmsdave
cmsdave

3. Waqas Hussain
Manager, Customer Success Team
Acquia
waqas.hussain@acquia.com
http://www.acquia.com
About the presenters:

4. • One of Acquia’s leading partners worldwide
• More than 250 Drupal specialists and 120 Acquia Certified Developers on staff
• In 2016, FFW was the recipient of the Acquia Partner Site of The Year award in the non-
profit category for our work with the YMCA of Twin Cities.
We create engaging digital experiences
and the platforms that power them.
FFWagency.com @FFWglobal

5. Who this webinar is for:
Anyone involved in:
• optimizing digital experiences
• managing personalization solutions
• developing a personalization strategy
Ideal for digital marketers, marketing practitioners, and web
team members.

6. New to personalization?
Check out our recorded Acquia Webinar which
outlines the key concepts and prerequisites:
Real-time Personalization: How to Get Started
https://www.acquia.com/resources/webinars/real-time-
personalization-drupal-how-get-started

7. Other episodes in this webinar series
Personalization Begins with Content
https://www.acquia.com/resources/webinars/episode-1-personalization-begins-content
Define Customer Segments Using a Data-driven Approach
https://www.acquia.com/resources/webinars/episode-2-define-customer-segments-using-data-
driven-approach
How to Execute a Persona-based Content Strategy at Scale
https://www.acquia.com/resources/webinars/episode-3-how-execute-persona-based-content-
strategy-scale
Personalization Best Practices
https://www.acquia.com/resources/webinars/episode-4-personalization-best-practices
Using Technology to Accelerate Your Personalization Initiative
https://www.acquia.com/resources/webinars/episode-5-using-technology-accelerate-your-
personalization-initiative
EPISODE 1
EPISODE 2
EPISODE 3
EPISODE 4
EPISODE 5

8. Agenda
• Introduction
• 10 Best Practices for Personalization
• Q&A

9. Industry leaders agree that personalized content
is vital for increasing customer engagement and
driving conversions.
In order to remain competitive and to meet the
expectations of today's users, many companies
have begun to experiment with the enablement of
real-time personalization solutions.
BACKGROUND

10. FFWagency.com @FFWglobal

11. FFWagency.com @FFWglobal

12. FFWagency.com @FFWglobal

13. Devising a personalization strategy comes with a
range of challenges, and best practices for deploying
personalization successfully are still emerging.
In this webinar, we’ll walk through ten best practices for a successful
real-time personalization solution in your organization.

14. Collect Data First
BEST PRACTICE #1

15. Start to collect data first – before you establish your
personalization strategy.
Use previously-collected visitor data to:
● Understand how your audience can be segmented
● Preview the size of an audience segment that will be reached with a
specific set of compound criteria
● Establish baseline metrics to put optimization goals in context
● Identify gaps in user data and determine what additional tracking is
needed to make new targeting possible
BEST PRACTICE #1: COLLECT DATA FIRST

16. Connect Customer Data
BEST PRACTICE #2

17. Customer data typically exists in multiple places.
Connect data silos for a more complete profile.
● Take steps towards developing a more complete view of your customer/user
● Perform an audit of all the places customer data exists – e.g. CMS, CRM, Email
Marketing Platform, Customer Support System, etc.
● Integrate general web analytics with personalization analytics to correlate visitor
session data
● Make data “joinable” by using globally unique identifiers
● Only connect customer data to your personalization platform if you can foresee using
that data
BEST PRACTICE #2: CONNECT CUSTOMER DATA

18. Segment Visitors Automatically
BEST PRACTICE #3

19. Identify important segments of your audience with
criteria that can be automatically detected.
● Put users into “buckets” based on what you can detect about them
● Start with the “who”, then consider the “what”
i.e. who you are trying to target and what is the detectable criteria that distinguishes
those users from others
● Leverage both explicit data and implicit data
● Combine quantitative data and qualitative data
Further Reading: Blog post with examples of explicit and implicit data for segmentation:
https://ffwagency.com/digital-strategies-blog/web-personalization-prerequisites-identifying-audience-segments
BEST PRACTICE #3: SEGMENT VISITORS AUTOMATICALLY

20. Enrich Content with Structure
BEST PRACTICE #4

21. Source: http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives

22. Enrich content with structure to make it machine
understandable. Tag content to make it targetable.
● Enrich web content with metadata in order to expose that data to your
personalization platform as well as search engines (Examples: Meta tags,
Schema.org)
● Traditionally, tagging has been used to classify the content’s categories, topics,
or subject matter.
● In a personalization strategy, we can also use tagging to describe the who (the
persona the content is intended for) and the when (the stage of the customer
journey the content is relevant to).
BEST PRACTICE #4: ENRICH CONTENT WITH STRUCTURE

23. FFWagency.com @FFWglobal
Taxonomy is the glue that
connects content to users.

24. Recognize Returning Visitors
BEST PRACTICE #5

25. “When you ask buyers what they want
from their shopping experiences, they tell
you they want to be recognized; they want
to be valued; and they want to be known.”
– Penny Gillespie, Research Director, Gartner Inc.
Source: EContent Magazine

26. Personalization begins with recognition.
● Let users know they are recognized. They’ll appreciate it.
● Recognition builds trust and loyalty.
● Welcome back repeat visitors.
● Consider a real-world example, like going to your local coffee shop.
● Allow users to pick up where they left off.
For digital experiences that involve moving through long-form content or a series of
steps, store the user’s progress along with their profile attributes.
BEST PRACTICE #5: RECOGNIZE RETURNING USERS

27. Tailor Messaging
Across Channels
BEST PRACTICE #6

28. Although you may have separate channels or platforms,
your customer only sees interactions with a single brand.
● Be consistent with your messaging across channels
● Integrate web personalization with email marketing
● Set up triggers to automate the delivery of personalized emails based
on specific website interactions
BEST PRACTICE #6: TAILOR MESSAGING ACROSS CHANNELS

29. Recommend Content
BEST PRACTICE #7

30. Use contextual information about the user’s current
session to recommend relevant content
● Many approaches such as by simple tag similarity (e.g. Drupal modules and
views) or via content recommendation engine (e.g. Solr)
● Ideal for use cases that involve a lot of content
● Commerce use case: Recommend products based on products viewed or
previously purchased
● Content use case: Recommended articles based on articles previously
viewed or shared
BEST PRACTICE #7: RECOMMEND CONTENT

31. Conduct Experiments
and Learn As You Go
BEST PRACTICE #8

32. Use real data as your compass. Conduct experiments and
learn from your results.
● Personalization strategies need to evolve over time to accommodate shifts in
user behaviors, needs, and expectations.
● Find out what works for your audience.
● Develop a data-driven culture and a practice of conducting content
personalization experiments.
● Use A/B tests to evaluate the effectiveness of targeted messaging and calls-to-
action.
● Use a platform that provides a framework for running content experiments such
as Acquia Lift, Google Optimize 360, or Optimizely.
BEST PRACTICE #8: CONDUCT EXPERIMENTS AND LEARN AS YOU GO

33. Measure Consistently and
Analyze Regularly
BEST PRACTICE #9

34. Ensure that data is collected in consistent way over time.
Establish a regular review of your web analytics and
visitor profile data.
● Reduce the signal-to-noise ratio: Focus on clear KPIs that are actionable for
your organization
● Use business intelligence layer or marketing dashboard to easily interpret the
data that matters (e.g. Domo or Tableau)
● Hold a regular review meeting (weekly, bi-weekly, or monthly)
BEST PRACTICE #9: MEASURE CONSISTENTLY AND ANALYZE REGULARLY

35. Establish Security Guidelines
and Respect User Privacy
BEST PRACTICE #10

36. Ensure you have identified any personally identifiable
information (PII) and how/where that data is stored and used.
● Don’t collect data that you can’t use or won’t need.
● Get consent to use data and be transparent about how it is used.
● Consider all market regulations as well as applicable laws in all countries that you do
business.
● Be aware of the policies of third-party systems that are also part of your digital
ecosystem.
For example, Google’s policy states that you can’t store any PII in custom variables/dimensions in Google Analytics.
Recommended blog post: Understanding the EU's new General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR)
https://ffwagency.com/digital-strategies-blog/understanding-eus-new-general-data-protection-regulation-gdpr
BEST PRACTICE #10: ESTABLISH SECURITY GUIDELINES AND RESPECT USER PRIVACY

37. Dave Sawyer
dave.sawyer@ffwagency.com
@cmsdave
FFWagency.com @FFWglobal