3 Ways to Collect First-Party Data | Maximise Your Marketing

When creating successful marketing campaigns in an evolving digital landscape, it’s essential to have a clear understanding of your shoppers.

This knowledge can be derived from your first-party data – specifically from email lists , subscribers and website analytics.?

In this article, we’ll delve into examples of how to get first-party data and how you can use these strategies to achieve your business goals in a cookieless era.

Download your free report: Harnessing First-Party Data in Retail

3 example of first-party data collection

Let’s explore how to collect first-party data effectively through strategies that will enrich your data acquisition and maximise future sales opportunities.

1. Leverage website interactions

As a retailer, you already have access to a whole host of information from both your web analytics and Google Analytics.?

It’s crucial not to overlook website interactions as a first-party data source as they offer some of the most detailed insights into your shopper’s interests and habits, such as:

• Browsing patterns
• Buying habits
• Engagement levels
• Audience demographics
• Marketing campaign performance

Collecting this form of first-party data allows you to inform future marketing campaigns, automate segmentation and deploy communications that respond directly to your shopper’s browsing behaviours.?

What you can do: Take advantage of AI-driven solutions, such as Email Sequences , to collect and use this data.

This tool creates accurate profiles about your on-site visitors from their very first click. Enabling you to easily use your first-party data to retarget your shoppers with personalised campaigns.

The campaigns we recommend deploying to maximise engagement and boost sales opportunities include:

• Abandoned Orders: Identify shoppers who’ve left behind their baskets and send them a reminder of the products they loved, encouraging them to complete their purchase.?
• Post-Purchase Recommendations: Retarget your customers based on their purchase history. Use this campaign to send personalised product suggestions directly to their inbox, tailored to complement their most recent order.
• Re-engagement Emails: Identify shoppers who haven’t interacted with your website for a while and send them targeted emails based on their own interests to re-inject them back into the buying journey.?

By ensuring that each email aligns with your shopper’s personal preferences means you can maximise the lifetime value of each customer, future-proofing your online store.

2. Encourage account creation

When prioritising first-party data collection it’s crucial to consider long-term loyalty and customer relationships as a goal.?

Encouraging your shoppers to make an account on your site allows you to gather valuable data on your shopper demographics, such as:

• Full names
• Email addresses
• Mobile numbers
• Birthday information

Account creation offers value for your user as it allows them to revisit their order history, purchases, and saved items more easily, serving opportunities for them to shop more effortlessly with your brand.

In return, this offers brands greater collection of first-party data and detailed insights into purchase activity.?

What you can do: Take advantage of the unique data collected through account creation by sending personalised offers – such as a message on their birthday.?

By doing this, you can improve your email open rates and reignite interest in shopping with your brand.

3. Incentivise email sign-ups

An effective method brands adopt for collecting first-party data is building up their email and newsletter subscriber lists.?

Digital stores should aim to encourage users to opt into their newsletters through their on-site marketing efforts, focusing on making customers feel compelled to willingly share their data in exchange for a newsletter sign-up.?

To achieve this, we recommend that retailers deploy data capture technology on-site using Overlays .?

With the help of this tech, you can increase email newsletter subscribers whilst building a bank of first-party data.?

To ensure maximum Overlay performance and data collection, be sure to make the following optimisations:?

• Display a full-screen Overlay on the second-page load
• Offer a monetary discount
• Communicate the value of your newsletter and email campaigns?

A strategy for increasing email subscribers is now crucial in today’s digital landscape, not only for increasing your access to first-party data but also for enhancing the precision of retargeting email campaigns.??

Pro tip: Use the Incentivise Mailing List Sign Up Overlay campaign to target shoppers at exactly the right time in the funnel, unlocking the ability to build up high-quality, GDPR-compliant subscriber lists.?

Maximise your first-party data to thrive in the cookieless era

As the removal of third-party cookies approaches, brands must prioritise first-party data collection.

It’s essential for retailers to explore every avenue for first-party data collection, using Salesfire’s data capture technology you can grow your email subscribers at scale and future-proof your approach to more accurate retargeting in the cookieless era.

To discover more ways to collect first-party data, read our full article: ‘6 Ways to Collect First-Party Data: Sources, Examples and Collection Methods ’.