Behavioral marketing is all around us whether we realize it or not. Spotify uses it to recommend you playlists you’ll love. Netflix picks the next best movie for you. But it’s most closely associated with shopping, especially e-commerce. But what exactly is behavioral marketing? What are some behavioral marketing examples? How can you succeed while introducing behavioral marketing strategies to your business? Let’s find out. 

Behavioral marketing strategy in e-commerce

Plainly speaking, behavioral marketing is a strategy that uses data about a person’s behavior, such as their actions on websites, social media activity, purchasing history, and other digital interactions, to tailor marketing efforts. This approach allows companies to provide personalized customer experience by analyzing their online and offline behaviors and using this data to predict future actions and preferences.

The goal of behavioral marketing is to deliver more relevant and targeted messages to users, increasing the chances of engagement and conversion. Unlike traditional marketing, which relies on broad demographic data, behavioral marketing focuses on the individual's specific actions and behaviors.

Behavioral marketing can help you:

• Drive higher user engagement and conversion rates. Personalized content is more likely to engage customers and lead to conversions.

• Improve customer experience. Customers receive more relevant, personalized content and offers, which enhances their experience with the brand.

• Increase customer loyalty. Customers who feel understood and valued are more likely to remain loyal to a brand. Customer satisfaction is strictly tied with personalization - and this can be built by analyzing their past behavior.

• Improve customer lifetime value. In months following the first purchase, the value of returning customers can rise by 67%. If they're satisfied with the shopping experience, they're more likely to return, shop more, and recommend your services to their friends.

Using behavioral data to improve marketing

Behavioral marketing strategies are based on information. To make your customers behave in the way you want them to (buy more, return to abandoned carts, participate in special promotions), you need to understand what makes them tick. And where can you get the information necessary to launch behavioral marketing campaigns? 

To implement behavioral marketing effectively, a variety of user behavior data is collected and analyzed. Here are some key types of data needed:

Website behavior data. This includes page views, time spent on the site, navigation paths, clicks, scroll depth, and forms filled out. Tools like Google Analytics (or similar web analytics) can provide insights into these behaviors.

Purchase behavior. Information about previous purchases, including what was bought, when, how frequently, and average order value. This data helps in understanding buying patterns and predicting future purchases.

Email engagement. Data from email campaigns, such as open rates, click-through rates, and the specific links clicked within emails. This data can help you understand which content resonates with the user.

Social media activity. Insights into likes, shares, comments, follows, and interactions with branded content on social media platforms. This can help gauge a user’s interests and preferences.

Search behavior. Data on what users search for on your site, search engines, and how they interact with search results. This helps in understanding what the user is actively seeking.

Geolocation data. Information about the average customer's location. This can be useful for local marketing efforts or for understanding regional trends and preferences.

Device and browser data. Understanding what devices and browsers customers use can help optimize content delivery and understand the context of a user's interaction.

Referral data. Knowing where users are coming from, such as direct visits, social media, or other websites, can help you learn how they found you and their journey to your site.

CRM data. Customer relationship management (CRM) data, such as contact details, interactions with sales and customer service teams, and account details, can provide a fuller picture of the customer journey.

Surveys and feedback. Data collected from customer surveys, feedback forms, or reviews can provide qualitative insights into customer preferences and satisfaction.

These actionable insights can help you shape your behavioral marketing strategies by showing you behavior patterns. This data allows you to implement grouping customers based on their actions and preferences.

Behavioral segmentation and behavioral targeting

After the information is gathered, it's time to take the first step into behavioral marketing tactics. Targeting and segmentation are great first steps.

Marketing segmentation is the process of dividing a broad target market into smaller, more manageable groups based on shared characteristics. These segments can be formed based on factors such as demographics (age, gender, income), psychographics (lifestyle, values), geographic location, and behavioral data (purchase history, browsing behavior).

By understanding the unique needs and behaviors of your behavioral segments, you can develop tailored marketing strategies that speak directly to those audiences. Segmentation allows for more effective use of marketing resources and ensures that the messaging is relevant and engaging for each group, leading to increased brand loyalty and higher conversion rates.

Targeted marketing is the practice of tailoring your marketing efforts to specific segments of your audience, delivering personalized messages to groups that are more likely to respond to your products or services. Instead of casting a wide net, businesses use customer data—such as demographics, behavior, interests, and purchasing patterns—to create highly focused campaigns that resonate with the intended audience.

This precision increases the chances of conversion, improves customer engagement, and boosts the return on investment (ROI) for marketing efforts. With targeted marketing, brands can create customized offers, content, and experiences that meet the specific needs of their customers, ultimately leading to more meaningful interactions and better long-term relationships.

Let's take a look at some behavioral segmentation examples. And since we're web and mobile push specialists, we'll focus on that.

Targeted push campaigns use data about push subscribers' activities on a website or in a mobile app. Those are collected without using third-party cookies. With all the drive towards better personalization, you should never forget about your customers' privacy.

Once the user subscribes to the notifications, we can gather data about his behavior on a website or in the app, selected item categories, purchases, and items in the cart. If they allow it, we may even gather data about geolocation, which may come in handy if you have brick-and-mortar stores and you want to drive traffic to those locations. From there, you can build targeted marketing campaigns. Here are some behavioral targeting examples:

• Invite a segment of customers interested in a specific item or category to come back and browse it again.

  

• Encourage users in a specific location to check out your store in the area.

• Upsell or cross-sell segments of your audience with products complimentary to their previous purchases. For example, other books by the same author in the case of online bookstores.

• Segments of users can be segmented into categories of prospect clients, one-time clients, and returning clients. This can help you personalize the messages you send them. Such customer loyalty segmentation can turn more visitors into loyal customers.

• Advertise special promotions for returning customers. Let them be the first ones to know about new product or service. Could you give them something to show your gratitude?

• Potential customers can also be targeted with a specific offer for their first purchase. If you collect the data to segment your users by status (returning, one-time, or potential customer), you can create ads that advertise the benefits of shopping with you.

Grouping your target audience into segments is just one of the types of behavioral marketing. Let's explore further. It's time to talk about automation scenarios that help you target a specific user based on their customer behavior.

Deep personalization in behavioral marketing - automation scenarios

Unlike targeted campaigns and segmentation, automation allows you to communicate with a unique user with a message directed to them. with a target audience of one, you can focus on building more personalized communication via push notifications, email marketing, or in-app (on-site) recommendations. Those can be set up to activate on every customer journey stage. Marketing messages built via scenarios may include:

Abandoned cart reminder

Behavior: A user adds items to their shopping cart but doesn’t complete the purchase.

Message: “Still thinking about that pair of sneakers? They’re waiting for you in your cart! Complete your purchase now and enjoy free shipping.”

Objective: To remind the user of items they’ve left behind and incentivize them to complete the purchase.

Re-engagement based on inactivity

Behavior: A user hasn’t interacted with the app or website for a certain period.

Message: “We miss you! Here’s 20% off your next purchase. Come back and check out our new arrivals!”

Objective: To re-engage lapsed users by offering an incentive, like a discount or promotion.

Personalized product recommendations

Behavior: A user browses certain products or categories on an eCommerce site but doesn’t make a purchase.

Message: “We noticed you were checking out our latest smartwatches. Here’s a top pick we think you’ll love.”

Objective: To offer personalized product recommendations based on browsing behavior, to encourage customers to return visit, and purchase.

Those are just some of the possibilities of personalized behavioral marketing. In truth, the sky's the limit. You can build strategies in a way that best fits the benefits sought by your company. to advertise your product or service.

Transactional messages and behavioral marketing

Behavioral patterns can serve you far beyond marketing strategy. They're also useful after the purchase or transaction is completed. And since we're focusing on push notifications, we've split the subject of scenarios into two parts. In the previous chapter, we focused on building scenarios based on the data collection through the push messaging tool. Now let's look at what happens when you gather even more information about customer behavioral patterns. You can combine data from different sources to create even more personalized strategies.

Order updates

Transactional messages about completed orders can build trust and increase sales in the long run. They require combining the push notification tools with your CRM systems in order to target the right user with the correct message. The flow for this scenario is as follows:

Behavior: A user places an order and it’s being processed or shipped.

Message: “Good news! Your order has shipped and will be delivered on [date]. Track it now!”

Objective: To keep users engaged by providing real-time updates on their order status, improving the post-purchase experience.

Loyalty program update

Behavior: A user has accumulated points in a loyalty program.

Message: “You’ve earned 500 points! Redeem them today for exclusive rewards and discounts.”

Objective: To encourage users to engage with the loyalty program by highlighting their points balance and prompting redemption.

Activity-based motivation in fitness and wellbeing apps

Behavior: A user hasn’t completed a workout recently or missed their scheduled routine.

Push Notification: “You’re almost at your weekly goal! Just one more workout to go. Let’s crush it today!”

Objective: To motivate users to stay on track with their fitness goals by nudging them based on their workout behavior.

Personalized marketing is in demand

Dividing and researching customer bases based on behavioral patterns serves multiple objectives and builds far more trust and loyalty than just employing Google ads everywhere. There are still some downsides to take into account.

• Privacy concerns. Collecting and using behavioral data can raise privacy concerns. It’s important to be transparent with users about data collection and comply with regulations like GDPR or CCPA.

• Data management. Handling large amounts of data can be complex and requires robust systems and analytical tools.

• Data accuracy. Ensuring the data collected is accurate and up-to-date is crucial for effective marketing.

Building a behavioral marketing scheme takes time and practice. Once you've got your users segmented via their behavioral patterns, you should think about the best and fastest way to communicate. This is where web and mobile push come in handy. If you want to learn more about PushPushGo services and the opportunities we give you to target your subscribers, contact us: at [email protected]