John Lewis head of online delivery and customer experience Sean O’Connor said the tool helped increase sales in the five weeks to December 31 2011 beyond the usual spike expected during the Christmas period, and in comparison to the previous year.

When any shopper comes to our website, we want to provide them with the same personalised customer service we would if they visited us in one of our shops.”

He said that the recommendation and email personalisation platform delivered tangible results by offering customers relevant products.

Product recommendation works particularly well in the fashion category as it recognises shopper behaviour, patterns and recommends items of interest not only by product type, but by brand as well.

The tool is not integrated into social media so recommendations do not take into account what the customer's friends have bought or viewed – something John Lewis should possibly consider enabling as it has almost 317,000 Facebook fans.

However O’Connor said the tool and its recommendations are tuned in to "crowd shopping". 

This takes into account not only what the individual customer is doing on the site at that moment in time, but what other shoppers who are similar in product views have done before. 

We feel this is the very essence of social shopping: taking into account not just the individual customer's experience but those of the wisdom of the crowds."

At the moment the tool is only accessible via web, but O’Connor said the retailer was looking at introducing it to mobile.

We want our customers to have the same level of service and to provide a personalised shopping experience across all shopping channels.”

John Lewis has been quick to adopt mobile technology, launching a mobile optimised site in 2010 and trialling a virtual QR code store in Brighton in December.

It also introduced free Wi-Fi into its stores, a move which O’Connor says has been a big step forward in helping customers make an informed choice.

They can quickly and easily access our mobile optimised website, or use our iPhone app. Customers are free to access the whole of the web, including competitor sites to test our price commitment, however it primarily enables us to extend our John Lewis online content and services into our physical shops in a way that is convenient for them.”

Google's 2011 revenues (via scoop.it)

How big is Google? (via smashing apps)

Google algorithm changes of 2011 (via infographics showcase)

What does it take to get a job at Google? (via Search Engine Land)

Is Google making us e-tards? (via Daily Infographic)

How to search Google more efficiently (via Mashable)

The constantly connected customer (via buzzintechnology)

Google's most expensive keywords (via StateofSearch)

Who's using Google+? (via flowtown)

Intelligence on Google apps (via Cloud Infographic)

As detailed by Brent Csutoras on Search Engine Land, the company responsible for bringing them back is popular social discovery service StumbleUpon:

...on all content pages within StumbleUpon, you have a single button saying ‘Stumble This’, which when clicked takes you to an iframed version of the content.

Not only are they now iframing all content from the site, but if your logged into StumbleUpon, they are not even offering a way to remove the iframed toolbar, leaving you in stuck in the iframed version of the site. If you are not logged in, then there is an option to click X in the right side of the toolbar to remove it.

Csutoras observes that there hasn't yet been an uproar about StumbleUpon's change, despite the fact that iFrames have caused so much angst before. In the case of the DiggBar, to placate angry users, Digg founder Kevin Rose was forced to backtrack and admitted, "Framing content with an iFrame is bad for the Internet."

Is the lack of widespread anger here an indication that StumbleUpon's relevance has declined? Perhaps, even though unique visitors are apparently way up year-over-year. But regardless, there are more than a few publishers who still get a meaningful amount of traffic and link love from StumbleUpon. And they can't be too happy about this.

At the end of the day, you have to hand it to the iFrame. While it does have uses, it has arguably been one of the most abused 'features' of HTML. But you can count on companies ignoring internet history and using it in the worst ways imaginable.

As highlighted in the survey results, problems with email often comes from tactics. Companies who are creating precise and unique email campaigns continue to find the highest return. For them, this is often the best way for communicating with customers and prospects over the long-term.

Those who still compensate for relevance with volume by “batching and blasting,” have found the results have ebbed, deliverability has dropped, and list growth is slowing. No wonder email gets such a bad rap.

Some of the hurdles companies are facing, as outlined in this report, are due to budget restraints and the increased reach of social media:

• 75% of respondents describe competition with social media as “somewhat” or “very” challenging.
• In a similar vein, 69% believe that young people are abandoning email as a primary channel.
• 65% report that it’s a challenge to get the budget that their email programs deserve.
• Yet agencies report that the majority (60%) of their clients who use them for email are increasing their email usage.

With social media pulling focus from email, how well are companies integrating the two channels? Less than one in four organizations has a documented plan to integrate email and social. Other than the widespread use of sharing icons (69%), only 35% of companies have incentives for email subscribers to join their social programs.

This highlights perhaps one of key takeaways from the Email in Action Survey: companies need to acknowledge that online behaviours are changing in a profound way and on a massive scale. Certainly this means email strategy will need to be reconsidered.

The subscriber experience needs to be shaped with mobile and social in mind. It will be those companies who are already integrating their user experience across multiple platforms may find greater success in this traditional marketing medium.

The UK Econsultancy team are currently conducting a similar survey on email marketing with Adestra. If you are interested in taking part, you can fill out the survey until February 8, 2012.

New digital devices and services are causing large shifts in online behavior, altering how consumers are using email. Marketers are responding to the new mix, and adjusting their email strategies to compensate. Challenges abound, but there are also new opportunities just waiting to be maximized.

This 42-page study, asks over 450 in-the-trenches North American email marketing experts about:

• Integrating email and social media
• Email use trends
• Spending trends & Budget distribution
• Segmentation & Personalization 
• Automation
• Benchmarking KPIs

Conducted in partnership with the Email Experience Council of the Direct Marketing Association, this report features 45 charts, covering a range of topics, and broken down by target market. It will be an asset to all levels of marketers, from beginners who are just learning about email marketing, to experienced professionals seeking to benchmark their performance and outlook against their peers.

Table of Contents

1. Introduction
2. Executive Summary
3. Challenges to Email
4. Email and Social
5. Testing and Tracking
6. Budgeting and Financial Metrics
7. Email Benchmarks
8. Personalization & Segmentation
9. List Size and Growth
10. Automation
11. Improving Email Performance
12. Methodology and Respondent Demographics

Table of Figures

Figure 1: Challenges to Future Success in Email

Figure 2: Clients’ Use of Email: The Agency View

Figure 3: Social and Email Integration

Figure 4: Social and Email Integration (B2C)

Figure 5: Social and Email Integration (B2B)

Figure 6: Email Factors Tested

Figure 7: Email Factors Tested (B2C)

Figure 8: Email Factors Tested (B2B)

Figure 9: Email Metrics Tracked

Figure 10: Email Metrics Tracked (B2C)

Figure 11: Email Metrics Tracked (B2B)

Figure 12: Email Budget Distribution

Figure 13: Email Budget Distribution (B2C)

Figure 14: Email Budget Distribution (B2B)

Figure 15: Financial Metrics Tracked

Figure 16: Financial Metrics Tracked (B2C)

Figure 17: Financial Metrics Tracked (B2B)

Figure 18: B2C Lead Generation – Newsletter Benchmarks

Figure 19: B2C Lead Generation – Sales Email Benchmarks

Figure 20: B2B Lead Generation – Newsletter Benchmarks

Figure 21: B2B Lead Generation – Sales Email Benchmarks

Figure 22: B2C Direct Sales – Newsletter Benchmarks

Figure 23: B2C Direct Sales – Sales Email Benchmarks

Figure 24: B2B Direct Sales – Newsletter Benchmarks

Figure 25: B2B Direct Sales – Sales Email Benchmarks

Figure 26: Definitions of Inactivity

Figure 27: Factors in Personalization/Segmentation

Figure 28: Factors in Personalization/Segmentation (B2C)

Figure 29: Factors in Personalization/Segmentation (B2B)

Figure 30: Preferences Offered to Subscribers

Figure 31: Preferences Offered to Subscribers (B2C)

Figure 32: Preferences Offered to Subscribers (B2B)

Figure 33: Changes in List Size

Figure 34: Changes in List Size (B2C)

Figure 35: Changes in List Size (B2B)

Figure 36: Effectiveness of Automated Triggers

Figure 37: Effectiveness of Automated Triggers (B2C)

Figure 38: Effectiveness of Automated Triggers (B2B)

Figure 39: Word Cloud – “What’s the Key to Effective Email?”

Figure 40: Respondent Organizations by Type

Figure 42: Target Markets of Respondent Organizations

Figure 43: Respondents’ Primary Conversion Goal

Figure 44: Respondents’ Database Size (B2C)

Figure 45: Respondents’ Database Size (B2B)