Last week we had the privilege of heading to one of our favorite cities, Los Angeles, to join our partner Iterable for their Activate Roadshow. We got to visit with so many businesses and chat about joyful experiences that drive connection with our customers.
(Oh, and we also had some fun chocolates. These definitely did not make it home!)

In addition to the great food and even better company, our CEO and Co-Founder Rishi Shah got to share in a fireside chat Q&A session led by Iterable’s very own CMO, Adrianna Gil Miner. The overall topic was: “Personalization to Drive Loyalty with your Brand to Achieve Maximized Growth”. Victor Ricci, CEO of Mattered, and Rishi got to share their experiences with personalization and growing a business.
We were able to save the Q&A summary and wanted to share it below. Hope you find it engaging, entertaining, and enlightening - which is what we hope to achieve with every interaction here at Digioh!
Adrianna: Welcome! I am so thrilled to have you both join me. Before we jump in, I would love for you both to share a bit about yourselves. What have you learned in your career?
Rishi Shah
CEO & Co-Founder of Digioh
I’ve learned how important it is to agree with the customer. It really doesn’t matter if they’re right or wrong, you can agree to show you are on their side. After that, you can show them how you can help solve their problems. Speaking directly to the customer and solving their specific problems lets you see the future before anyone else.
Victor Ricci
CEO of Mattered
I’ve learned to be prepared to be unprepared! We operate in one of the most volatile industries, where a single OS update can make all preexisting “best practices” obsolete.
Adrianna: I talked a bit about bringing joy to the customer by having the right data and really understanding it. What is your best advice for those who are trying to capture the right data for personalization? What do you think joy means for your customers in your case?
Rishi Shah
Absolutely. First: did you know that out of ALL data collected on customers that we as brands have, only 42% of that is demographic data? Imagine if we simply just ASK questions, such as "What is your name" or "Where do you live"?
It's crazy to hear these stats - but brands have more data (approximately 45%) on what they believe you are interested in purchasing from them (products, articles, etc.) as they do demographic data. There's a break here in the relationship - brands have more data on things to sell to consumers vs. data that tells them critical pieces of information about consumers.
The best way to capture data for personalization is to ask users for it in a fun and engaging way. So, how do we solve this at Digioh?
One way is quizzes. Quizzes are fun and enticing, and it serves both the customer to immediately feel special, and you to personalize their experience going forward using the data they just voluntarily gave you.
As far as what joy means for our customers: joy means delivering value quickly. For example: show the product or article results the user wants to see as soon as you can. Respond to an email in under 2 minutes. These bring joy to the customer because it shows them they can depend on you in the long term to solve their problems.
Victor Ricci
We have two sets of customers: brands and their customer base. Tracking events that might signal or indicate “what not to do” is equally as important as tracking positive indicators. For example, don’t send an email after someone leaves a 1-star review.
On the client side, part of our job is to find areas of improvement for the business we are working with, even better if we can find a solution to a problem they did not know was “solvable.” Creatively solving a problem that might not appear apparent or obvious.
Adrianna: If marketing is a service, where do you see marketing fitting into a consumer’s life? Where do we as marketers drive the most value for customers?
Rishi Shah
Great marketing meets the right customers with the right solutions at the right time. To talk to customers effectively, you have to understand their pain points and show up where they need them the most. Emphasizing their pain points or what causes they are passionate about; only ~25% of all brands we surveyed actually have information on pain points or cause affiliations across their customer base.
Marketers can drive a ton of value (and revenue) by executing the above. Customers receive value from marketing messages that solve their problems, it’s as simple as that!
Victor Ricci
We drive the most value when we are not “marketing” but rather building meaningful customer relationships. So, how we fit into consumers' lives is a case-by-case basis that should stem from honesty and authenticity.
This can 100% be done through traditional marketing channels, but we like to challenge ourselves and clients to go one step further if they can in an authentic way.
Adrianna: Finally, we all want to achieve this state of marketing as a service to drive joy. How can brands make it a reality in their own customer experiences?
Rishi Shah
Practically, our customers are doing this every day by increasing their personalization as much as possible through engaging quizzes and surveys. They are truly getting to know each and every site visitor by using data collection tools and automating all of their personalization. This truly makes a joyful impact on customers who get to experience that full-service concierge-like experience every time they interact with a brand.
Victor Ricci
Listen and do what you say you are going to do. Do something for your customers that they do not need but that will make you stand out in a sea of brands all executing the “best practices.”
