Dive Brief:

• Retailers have been investing in personalization for more than a decade, but nearly 3 in 5 U.S. consumers still have generic shopping experiences, even though 4 in 5 say personalized shopping is important, according to an Amperity survey released Tuesday.
• Consumers want to be remembered, but more than three-quarters of those surveyed say retailers often get personalization wrong through irrelevant, untimely or overly aggressive outreach. Just 8% of respondents say they don’t want retailers to remember them, their preferences or their past purchases when shopping online or in-app.
• Three-quarters of U.S. consumers say “truly personalized” offers and recommendations are more likely to make them purchase. Real-time adjustments matter, too, with more than two-thirds saying they’re more likely to buy when retailers update their offers as they shop.

Dive Insight:

Brands have long understood that personalized offers can increase purchase intent, but many of today’s offers don’t help consumers achieve their goals, undercutting personalization and trust. 

“Aspiration is not meeting execution,” Amperity said in its report.

Personalization efforts must be intentional, focusing on offers and interactions that are relevant and valuable to customers, Jessica Liu, principal analyst at Forrester, told CX Dive in September. So, businesses should ask their customers what types of personalized experiences would deliver the most value as they decide what to offer.

Younger consumers, in particular, are highly receptive to personalization when it’s done well.

“Not a single Gen Z or millennial respondent — in other words, not a single person under the age of 40 — said truly personalized messages would make them less likely to purchase,”  the report said.

However, consumers’ conflicting desires for privacy and personalization can make it difficult for retailers to deliver truly personalized offers and experiences. Most consumers, 7 in 10, worry their personal data could be used for hyper-personalized content, according to the Capgemini Research Institute’s annual global consumer trends report.

As a result, brands must earn trust through data transparency, informed consent and robust security policies, according to DataGuard