The Future is Predictive: Interview with Tiziano Barbagallo from Datatrics

“The future is predictive”. It seems like an oxymoron but it’s not. Predictive Marketing is still an obscure topic for many, especially in its practical applications. While in reality the technology exists, it is simple, immediate, and available to all companies.

This was clear to us after our chat with Tiziano Barbagallo, the Italy Country Manager of Datatrics, the Dutch company that developed a Predictive Marketing platform and has been part of the MailUp Group since 2018.

Datatrics then reached Italy in early 2019 under the leadership of Country Manager TizianoBarbagallo: born in Catania in 1985,Tiziano comes from Schibsted Media Group, where he had been the Country Managerof the Pagomeno comparator since 2017. Before that he worked at Subito from2013 to 2017, initially as a Program Management Officer and then as a BusinessDevelopment Manager. Going back even further, he was a Senior Project Managerat Vodafone from 2010 to 2013.

We asked him a few questions to understand how Predictive Marketing and theDatatrics platform works. Let’s see whathe answered.

Predictive Marketing is a set of marketingstrategies that, thanks to the collection of data and information on customerbehavior and habits, allows companies to anticipateand forecast their future needs.

To date, the main problem of PredictiveMarketing is its complexity: it requires specific knowledge of statisticaltechniques, predictive modeling tools, machine learning, and data mining inorder to analyze historical and current facts and provide predictions about thefuture or unknown events.

Datatrics, on the other hand, is a Predictive Marketing solution based onArtificial Intelligence that does not require specific technical orstatistical skills: it has a modern, simple interface and does not requireintegration or dedicated developments. It is a plug&play solution: it aggregates data from internal sources (CRM, email, socialnetworks, e-commerce, web analytics, etc.) and external sources (demographic data, weather conditions, trafficintensity, etc.) and uses them to build a complete database with comprehensive customer profiles.

Next, thanks to the artificial intelligencealgorithm Datatrics Predict®, you can predictthe interests of customers who interact with your website, emails, andmarketing campaigns (Google, Facebook, Display Adv, etc.), allowing you tocreate dedicated Customer Journeysand communicate with customized content that encourages a purchase.

In summary, Datatrics makes ArtificialIntelligence and Predictive Marketing technology accessible to all companies, thanks to a very simple and intuitiveUX/UI.

Let’s take the case of an e-commerce site selling electronic products. Thanks to theDatatrics-MailUp integration, the following operations can be carried out:

• Create a segment for users in the “Decision” phase, who aresensitive to discounts and interested in the “TV” category
• Customize a Facebook advertising campaign showing the most suited TV for thissegment
• When users click on the Facebook Adv andland on the website, Datatrics lets you display customized products (for example TVs and related products)
• If the user decides not to put theproduct in his cart and wants to close the website, then Datatrics displays a pop-up with a Newsletter subscriptionbutton in exchange for a coupon
• The user enters his email address andreceives a personalized email withthe coupon via MailUp, possibly along with a suggestion of products based onhis decision-making flow
• When the user purchases the TV andpasses on to the “Evaluation” level of the funnel, he receives another automatic email from MailUpwith suggestions for related and similar products, as well as an invitation toleave a review on Facebook
• Basedon the user’s interaction with the email sent by MailUp, it will always bepossible to define further marketingstrategies on the various touchpoints (adv, website, email).

The Datatrics-MailUp combinationlets companies work on all levels of the funnel, in anautomated and simple way.

An integrated strategy lets you activate different touchpoints – for example asAdv campaigns (in acquisition or retargeting), recommended content and pop-upson the site, personalized and automatic emails – deciding whether to activatethem on a specific level of the funnel or on all of them.

Here’s an example: a user in the“Consideration” phase can have a messageor personalized content displayed on the site; when that user closes thepage, he is sent a personalized email (at the best time in order to maximizethe open rate) to push him to land on the site again to finalize the purchase,possibly proposing a coupon. So with these operations, the user is accompaniedto the next level of the funnel, that of “Intent”.

Studies and research from prestigious Americanuniversities have demonstrated the success of predictive algorithms applied tomarketing, reporting average increasesin turnover of 10-15%.

While companies using Datatrics Predictive Marketing are obtaining incredible results,with average increases in turnover of over30% after just a few months. This is because companies generally increaseboth the conversion rate and the average receipt amount with Datatrics, with amultiplier effect on turnover.

Moreover, since it is real machine learning, the algorithm is constantly and continuouslyupdating, thus performance can also improve over time.

Datatrics does not require specific dataanalysis or development skills, as it is a platform developed specifically forthose working in marketing and has a veryfast and easy UX/UI.

This lets companies’ marketing teams focus ondefining the strategy and letting Datatrics work independently.

The combined use of Datatrics-MailUp brings great added value to any company, regardless of the sector to which it belongs. But the integration is truly decisive in the e-commerce/retail and travel/leisure sectors thanks to the high level of email personalization. This leads to a significant increase in email marketing and sales metrics.

Furthermore, information relating to userbehavior with emails (openings, clicks, etc.) can be intelligently reused to stimulate purchases on the site andoptimize advertising campaigns.

Datatrics has been very well received on the Italian market. Our country hasdifferent characteristics compared to Holland, where Datatrics was launchedover two years ago, and where the internet penetration and digital skills arefar ahead of Italy.

This is why the “education” aspect is decisive for us, that is, helpingcompanies understand the benefits of a tool like Datatrics. And the resultswill speak to this.

Thenumber of Datatrics customers grows every week,and in just a few months we’ve reached 10% of the Dutch customer base. Italiancompanies are very demanding; they encourage us to continue working to improvethe platform with new features and additions.

Datatrics Team
From left: Francesco Taurino (Account Manager), Francesco Prete (Client Success Coordinator) and Valerio Mensitieri (New Business Development Coordinator)

The future prospects are absolutely encouraging. We have a lot of room inthe Italian market, a large margin considering the increasing awareness of the need for Predictive Marketing tools.I certainly expect more competition in the coming years, but Datatrics willcontinue to work to be a step ahead.

The Italian team is growing: there are currently four of us splitbetween the Sales and Client Success areas. The commercial structure continuesto grow and we expect more new entries in the coming months with roles such as Account Manager and New Business Development Coordinator.Similarly, we will also enhance the Client Success area by adding a SolutionArchitect.

I also expect Datatrics to consolidate in theDutch market in addition to internationaldevelopment in other countries.