The company that came up with the data-driven Tesco Clubcard is now promising greater-still levels of personalisation following a new acquisition.
dunnhumby, now part of the Tesco group, has bought Berlin-based Sociomantic Labs for an undisclosed sum.
The deal, says 25-year-old dunnhumby, will combine its own insights into the shopping preferences of millions of consumers with Sociomantic’s intelligent digital-advertising technology and real-time data from more than 700m online consumers to improve the way advertising is planned, personalised and evaluated.
That means, says dunnhumby chief executive Simon Hay, that marketing content can be created for the first time for individuals in real-time and at scale, based on their interests and shopping preferences and delivered across media and mobile devices.
“Our strategic priority is to engage consumers and earn their loyalty wherever they shop, in-store and online, with personalized communications that are valuable and meaningful,” said Hay“Applying this approach to make online media a better experience for consumers and marketers is paramount to us. Our observed campaigns to date have shown that increased relevance leads to significantly better engagement and response rates,” he continued. “Doing that at a scale of more than a billion people is unprecedented.”
Thomas Brandhoff, managing director and co-founder of Sociomantic, said: “Together, we can help brands improve the relevance of their messages to create more personal interactions with their customers online and across mobile devices.”
Big data specialist SAS predicts a new focus on personalisation as a result of the deal.
Mike Blanchard, head of integrated marketing management at SAS, said:
“According to a report by SAS and the Centre for Economics and Business Research (Cebr), better customer intelligence can reap £74 billion in benefits for the UK economy over the five years to 2017. It is one of the most valuable assets for any organisation to build customer trust and improve interaction. It also offers retailers and other service providers new ways to add value to the customer, by personalising the advertising and promotional offers to suit individual preferences and buying habits.
“Big data-driven analytics hold much potential in the realm of customer intelligence. The ability to profile and segment customers based on socioeconomic characteristics can allow firms to market to different segments based on their discrete preferences, inducing increases in satisfaction levels and better customer retention rates.
“Approachable analytics and speed of insight is key to leveraging big data. If an organisation can’t easily visualise and act on an opportunity or risk quickly – or completely misses seeing it at all – that greatly impacts a company’s competitive advantage. Over time, customers will move onto other brands that have shown they understand and care about individual needs, and be able to provide the right products or services tailored to their circumstances.”
