These two powerhouse conferences were happening at the same time and (close to) the same venue in Boston late in September. While the Accorin team was attending and speaking at Connect2Convert (#Connect2Convert), our sources inside #KBOS19 kept us informed about the new Powerhouse ESP’s latest moves and future visions. In case you weren’t at either conference or weren’t glued to Twitter, or you were just out enjoying some of the finest weather Boston ever gets – here are our key takeaways – especially for e-commerce merchants and marketers.
Klaviyo User Conference (Boston Convention Center)
The Audience:
- Average Age: 28.71
- Typical Pants Worn: Bonobos
- Typical Shirt Style: Dark T
- Typical Shoe Style: Lots of Laces
- Blue Blazers spotted: 4
- Typical Title of Attendee: Owner – Operator
Key Takeaways:
Klaviyo is a leading ESP for e-commerce merchants and e-commerce marketers. It has exploded in popularity recently, has received tons of VC funding to scale quickly and it has a hip, millennial following (hence, the abundance of shoe laces). Both for our own internal marketing and for many of our clients, we at Accorin are using Klaviyo to acquire and manage customer growth. Here are some key takeaways from their 2019 user conference:
“OWN IT†was key conference theme:
Not surprisingly Klaviyo continues to push “Owned Media†as the key marketing focus and effort that e-commerce merchants should be spending time on. A number of merchants presented how owned media is becoming a key mid-funnel strategy for conversion – it is a major trust builder. Owned media are marketing channels that are completely under the control of the company/brand (e.g. website and social media accounts).
Customer Insight Analytics is Now Native on Klaviyo
Reports include the following:
- Order count
- Best sellers
- Export reports
- Discount code reports
- Segement reports (e.g. repeat customer, rev. by customer type)
Read more about this in this Klaviyo Blog
New Customer Analytics and SMS marketing for profiles with that data will be available in the “near futureâ€
SMS is going to be a key part of the owned media mix in the near future – and its why Klaviyo will support it. Use Cases? Just about everything in support of e-commerce handled by email right now.
Successful merchants aren’t just doing strategic drips they are using data to create customer segments and they harvest new conversions by sending relevant messages to those customer segments. All. The. Time.
Follow @beardbrand and @ministryofsupply if you want tips on how to own customers and manage your conversion funnels. They’re doing it right.
Connect to Convert (Westin Seaport)
The Audience:
This crowd was older and more strategic minded (more blue blazers; less shoe laces); there were a number of CMO types in attendance and this was definitely attended by many more corporate types, and the vendors that serve them, compared to the Klaviyo conference which was attended by many entrepreneurs.
- Average Age: 40.5
- Typical Pants Worn: No Jeans
- Typical Shirt Style: Solid color button-down
- Typical Shoe Style: Dark
- Blue Blazers spotted: Yes…a lot.
- Typical Title of Attendee: Director of Marketing
Key Takeaways:
Companies with truly customer-driven data strategies will win. Especially against Amazon.
Customer Journey mapping was a key aspect of a number of presentations; the general consensus from presenters is that it’s getting harder and harder to operate marketing channels in a vacuum of not knowing exactly what’s happening with all other channels and how customers perform in each one.
Other key takeaways included:
- Marketing is still about the 4Ps: Product, Price, Place and Promotion
- Calls to action, A-B testing, subject lines and envelope design STILL MATTER
- Lead nurturing is very important but if you do it with irrelevant and non-personal messages you are wasting your time. People expect personalization and relevance in every marketing medium now.
- Brands have a lot of power – still. That equity needs to be harnessed in all marketing channels. “81% of customers want brands to get to know themâ€
- Data is the true marketing lever of the future and the quality of it (a company’s owned data) is the best predictor of future growth
- B2B Sessions were NOT popular, and therefore, it’s clear that B2B is still lagging behind B2C in terms of marketing sophistication.
Bottom Line
The conferences were different. The audiences were different. The company types attending were very different. But there were great lessons to be learned for all e-commerce folks in Boston last week. We hope these events are staggered next year so participants can attend both!
Conferences are great, but infrequent, and rarely deal with your specific needs and challenges. If you’re in the business of e-commerce, you probably need a partner like Accorin to make sure you’re firing on all cylinders. Let’s talk about how we can help you!
