Shopper Profiling Methodology: Detailed Instructions for Personalized Shopping Experience Customization
In the dynamic world of mobile commerce, understanding and catering to the unique behaviours of app users is crucial for business success. Here's how effective user segmentation and personalization strategies can help revive lapsed customers, engage first-timers, and boost sales.
Segmenting Users for a Revival
At risk of churn, but once loyal, these users require a special approach. By employing behavioural segmentation, we can group users based on their actions within the app. For instance, identifying a user who clicked directly to the clearance tab, filtered by size, and left within 30 seconds, signals potential for revival. Offering them personalized win-back offers, such as surprise free shipping or a 15% discount, could entice them to return.
Understanding Your Audience
Mobile app audience segmentation tracks the "aisles" users walk down and what they pick up along the way. This data helps us understand user behaviour, preferences, and tendencies, enabling us to tailor our strategies accordingly.
Key Behavioural Segments
- First-Time Users with High Browsing Intent – these users explore extensively but haven’t purchased yet, indicating potential for conversion with personalized incentives.
- Repeat Buyers with Predictable Purchase Cycles – recognizing their timing allows targeted promotions or reminders to drive repeat buying.
- Cart Abandoners with Consistent Drop-Off Points – segmentation enables cart recovery campaigns or incentives tailored to their behaviour.
- High-Value Buyers (Top 5% Spenders) – identifying the most valuable customers by spend amount enables premium offers, loyalty rewards, or exclusive access strategies.
Additional Dimensions
- Purchase Frequency and Recency: RFM analysis helps identify loyal customers and those at risk of churn.
- Category or Product Preferences: Grouping users by the types of products they buy supports highly relevant recommendations and promotions.
- Engagement Level and Benefits Sought: Understanding if customers are bargain hunters, seasonal shoppers, or brand loyalists can tailor marketing accordingly.
- Usage Patterns within the App: Tracking in-app behaviours like feature exploration or reporting usage signals readiness for upgrades or premium offerings.
Personalization Strategies
Effective user segmentation strategies for apps focus on grouping users by their actions and interactions rather than just demographics. Personalized marketing tactics such as targeted offers, time-limited promotions, reminder notifications for abandoned carts, or exclusive deals for loyal shoppers can significantly boost sales.
Combining behavioural data with other dimensions (like demographics or device usage) can enhance segmentation accuracy. In practice, these behavioural segments enable personalized marketing tactics such as targeted offers, time-limited promotions, reminder notifications for abandoned carts, or exclusive deals for loyal shoppers.
Sources:
- Seven key behavioural segments for e-commerce apps: first-time browsers, repeat buyers, cart abandoners, high-value spenders, etc.
- Behavioural segmentation based on purchase behaviour, readiness to upgrade, and targeted in-app messages.
- Purchase frequency, recency, category preferences, and engagement level segmentation explained with practical marketing uses.
- What to do: Use social proof ("X users bought this today"), or surface UGC (real customer photos, reviews). You might also A/B test showing product bundles vs. single SKUs.
- Loyal Browsers Who Rarely Buy: They open the app frequently, check out new arrivals, save products, even share them, but rarely convert.
- To persuade "lifestyle" enthusiasts always updated with the latest technology, consider implementing personalized 'push notifications' for exclusive sale announcements in the "education-and-self-development" category within the 'no-code app builder'.
- For the shoppers seeking deals and discounts, tailor 'push notifications' highlighting clearance sales or limited-time offers within the 'shopping' section of the app as part of their lifestyle preferences.
- To engage first-timers in various categories, utilize 'push notifications' as a platform for showcasing user-generated content and social proof, encouraging exploration and conversion in the 'shopping' or 'education-and-self-development' sections of the app.
