ARCHIVES: This is legacy content from before Marketing Dive acquired Mobile Marketer in early 2017. Some information, such as publication dates, may not have migrated over. Check out the new Marketing Dive site for the latest marketing news.

Lenovo targets shoppers by demographics, channels


Lenovo, which makes personal computers and other technology, partnered with Neustar to divide its shoppers into eight segments based demographic characteristics to drive increases in traffic. The company is also leveraging the celebrity star power of Ashton Kutcher and his 2.3 million Twitter followers to make a bigger splash on social media.


Mr. Koehler spoke Tuesday at a keynote session called ?Knowing Our Customer and Helping Prospects Get to Know Us? at eTail East 2014 in Philadelphia. 

Segmenting shoppers 
The primary focus of Lenovo?s effort to create a more personalized experience for shoppers involves segmentation work melding its own data with that of Neustar. Lenovo can use the data it now has on 25 million households to create differentiated online experiences based on trends and shopping histories. 

As a result, the company has created eight different homepage ?experiences? based on which segment it believes shoppers belong to, based in part of the type of product consumers are shopping for. 

?We used to just give one experience, but we started customizing the experience based on the attributes of these groups,? Mr. Koehler said. 


Justin Koehler

The campaign has driven an increase in pages per visit and other positive metrics. It also led to a 9 percent increase in intent to purchase a product from the company?s Yoga line, in one example that was tested against shoppers who were only exposed to the previous version of the Web site. 

Lenovo has also recently been experimenting with responsive design to optimize the experience on mobile, and has been active in other mobile marketing efforts as well. 

For example, the company also has experimented with local search, creating pages targeting consumers in specific cities with a Google Map integration and partnering with retailers including Staples, Office Depot, Best Buy and Office Max (see story). 

In addition to segmenting customers to customize experiences on Lenovo?s home page, the company also wants to take the experience deeper into the site and use segmentation to continually present appropriate web pages to shoppers as they dig deeper on the site. 

In addition, Lenovo wants to use its data capabilities retarget customers with appropriate messaging. 

?We want to use this to-retarget, and turn people who have bought from us into advocates,? Mr. Koehler said.

Final Take 

Mark Hamstra is content director at Mobile Marketer, New York