German retailers are investing in personalization

Personalization is key for German retailers. Many of them are looking to invest in personalization solutions during this year, with more than half of them expecting to spend over a million euros to achieve this.

That’s one of the main conclusions from Germany Online, a benchmark report from eTail Germany. Olapic commissioned a study from Worldwide Business and surveyed 100 top executives at major German retailers. All of those surveyed said they are looking to invest in personalization solutions over the next twelve months.

Most of them, 56 percent to be precise, said they are planning to invest over one million euros, while 7 percent is thinking about an investment between 750,000 and one million euros, while almost one in four (23 percent) is aiming at investing between 500,000 and 749,999 on personalization solutions. And finally, 14 percent is planning to spend over 250,000 euros, but no more than 499,999, on this.

What to do to encourage shopper loyalty

Olapic also asked the retail executives what they do to encourage shopper loyalty online. Most retailers make use of the basics: they encourage users to create online profiles, they store card details for repeat purchasing and they give access to upgraded delivery options. Over half of respondents also integrate user-generated content in product pages and show personalized recommendations. About 40 percent give personalized offers to customers.

In Germany, it’s hard to follow customers online

The survey also shows that many retailers aren’t able to effectively model the customer journey, due to a lack of time and resources. “A big challenge for retailers is, to integrate data sets of customer journeys across different devices and manifold touchpoints. To understand a complete customer journey it is necessary to identify the customer on all devices”, Gerhard Wagner of the University of Siege explains. “However, when customers switch devices it is hard to follow them, which is due to technological and legal restrictions, especially in Germany.”