- Christine Gerstenberger, head of CRM marketing, buch.de internetstores AG

Customer:
buch.de internetstores AG

Industry:
Retail

Deployment country:
Germany

Solution:
Business Analytics, Customer Relationship Management, Smarter Analytics, Smarter Commerce, Smarter Marketing, Smarter Planet

Smarter Planet:
Smarter Solutions for Retail

Overview

Founded in 1998 and headquartered in Munster, Germany, buch.de internetstores AG is a subsidiary of Thalia Holding GmbH. buch.de internetstores sells books and media online in Germany, Austria and Switzerland. With more than 150 employees, the company offers approximately seven million products, including books, e-books, audio books, music CDs and DVDs, movies, software, games, toys, stationery, office supplies and flowers.

Business need:
Online retailer buch.de internetstores AG offers more than seven million products throughout the European market and relies on email marketing to reach its audience. However, its existing analysis and email marketing management was a manual process—a situation that proved ineffective for marketing to the growing number of customers, which was in the millions. The company needed a coordinated and systematic process to promote individual offers or special purchase incentives tailored to the appropriate stage of the customer lifecycle.

Solution:
buch.de internetstores AG develops campaigns that are personalized dialogs with customers. By implementing an email marketing management solution, the company systematically tracks, integrates and analyzes all customer information from multiple channels, gaining deeper understanding of customer interests and preferences. The solution continuously builds on accumulated behavioral data to enable the organization to refine the level of personalization for future campaigns. Based on new insights, the business carefully orchestrates personalized communications in customer-preferred intervals.

Benefits:
Increased the customer conversion rate by more than 50 percent through personalized campaigns and cross-sales based on user-defined analysis Experienced a double-digit growth in sales through relevant and timely offers Reduced campaign costs by enabling more efficient and targeted recipient selections Accelerated campaign development and launches by consistently aligning marketing activities to the customer lifecycle

Case Study

Founded in 1998 and headquartered in Munster, Germany, buch.de internetstores AG is a subsidiary of Thalia Holding GmbH. buch.de internetstores sells books and media online in Germany, Austria and Switzerland. With more than 150 employees, the company offers approximately seven million products, including books, e-books, audio books, music CDs and DVDs, movies, software, games, toys, stationery, office supplies and flowers.

The Opportunity
Online retailer buch.de internetstores AG offers more than seven million products throughout the European market and relies on email marketing to reach its audience. However, its existing analysis and email marketing management was a manual process—a situation that proved ineffective for marketing to the growing number of customers, which was in the millions. The company needed a coordinated and systematic process to promote individual offers or special purchase incentives tailored to the appropriate stage of the customer lifecycle.

What Makes It Smarter
buch.de internetstores AG develops campaigns that are ongoing personalized dialogs with potential and existing customers. By implementing a sophisticated email marketing management solution, the company systematically tracks, integrates and analyzes all customer information from multiple channels, gaining deeper understanding of customer interests and preferences to accurately align its campaigns to individual needs and wants. The solution continuously builds on accumulated behavioral data to enable the organization to refine the level of personalization for future campaigns. Based on new insights, the business carefully orchestrates highly personalized communications in customer-preferred intervals.

Real Business Results
· Increased the customer conversion rate by more than 50 percent through personalized campaigns and cross-sales based on user-defined analysis
· Experienced a double-digit growth in sales through relevant and timely offers
· Reduced campaign costs by enabling more efficient and targeted recipient selections
· Accelerated campaign development and launches by consistently aligning marketing activities to the customer lifecycle

Components

IBM products and services that were used in this case study.

Software:
Unica Campaign, SPSS Statistics