After announcing a new partnership with Facebook, IBM shared details on a series of new solutions and customer success stories during its annual Amplify conference. The event, which was held May 11-13, 2015 at the San Diego Convention Center, touted educational tracks that aligned with IBM’s overall vision, focusing on e-Commerce, customer analytics and marketing.
During the show, IBM announced new design and analytics capabilities within its marketing cloud. In an era where consumers demand seamless and personalized experiences at all stages of their shopping journey, IBM has released:
- IBM Journey Designer, which is designed to act as a “virtual whiteboard” where different teams can collaborate on planning, designing and executing multichannel campaigns based on customer behaviors.
- IBM Journey Analytics helps marketers easily sift through valuable customer insights, empowering them to visualize the shopper journey and align campaigns to these behaviors.
- IBM Customer Experience Analytics, which is a single platform to unify IBM’s Journey Analytics, Digital Analytics and customer behavior analytics capabilities.
- IBM Commerce Insights, which providesinsight into the performance, operation and growth of companies’ digital commerce business.
The above solutions are available within the IBM marketing cloud as individual offerings.
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Homebase Puts The ‘You’ In ‘Do-It-Yourself’
As one of the UK’s largest home and garden retailers, Homebase is leveraging IBM Commerce to provide highly personalized shopping experiences across all channels. Since partnering with IBM, the retailer has been able to integrate the store, e-Commerce site and mobile channels. As a result, the retailer has experienced double-digit growth in all digital channels, as well as a 30% boost in online visitors.
Offering more than 38,000 home and garden products, Homebase sought to help customers find the items, advice and inspiration they coveted. Advanced analytics allow retailer to better understand customer needs and deliver relevant tips and product information. IBM Commerce also has helped Homebase offer flexible fulfillment options, allowing consumers to reserve and collect products, or have items shipped to their home.
“Our business is changing rapidly,” said Jo Kenrick, Marketing Director at Homebase. “It’s not just selling wood, nails or screws, it’s about helping our customers live in a home they really love. By standardizing our platform on IBM Commerce, Homebase has transformed its digital presence into an interactive inspirational showroom that guides them through all their home improvement needs.”
Georgia Aquarium Increases Email Marketing Revenue By 32%
With many families visiting zoos and aquariums multiple times, Georgia Aquarium sought a new way to engage its customers and drive repeat visits. To improve its marketing practices, the Georgia Aquarium team developed customer personas, mapped customer experiences and designed tailored marketing campaigns.
Using IBM Silverpop Engage, a cloud-based digital marketing platform within IBM Commerce, Georgia Aquarium easily manages a variety of campaigns, which include pre- and post-visit email triggers. To date, Georgia Aquarium has increased revenue from email by more than 30%.
“Prior to revamping our digital marketing program, we were missing out on a lot of potential revenue,” said Rosie Judd, Director of Digital Media for Georgia Aquarium. “We went back to the drawing board — literally — and spent countless hours mapping a visitor’s path across different touch points. Then, we created one campaign at a time. After putting in place several tailored, automated campaigns, we have seen a huge increase in engagement rates and continue to build on this momentum.”
Moving forward, Georgia Aquarium plans to establish an automated member renewal program. The company also plans to develop messaging by leveraging purchase insights, milestones, visit history and behavior, web visits and mobile app experiences.
