Personalisation is more than “Dear Sarah”. Done well, it means a subscriber in Glasgow doesn’t get an invitation to an event in Bristol, a customer who bought a pushchair gets relevant accessories rather than the same offer again, and a lapsed donor gets a thank-you rather than an appeal. Done badly, it feels intrusive. For UK senders, the line is also a legal one.
Five levels of personalisation
- Names and greetings. Insert first names with dynamic fields, with a fallback such as “Hello there” when the field is empty.
- Location. Use a town, postcode area or nation field to show the nearest shop, local event or regional bank holiday opening hours.
- Behaviour. Use clicks on past newsletters to decide which topics to feature.
- Purchase or donation history. Recommend related products, or thank supporters for a specific gift.
- Dates. Birthdays, membership anniversaries and renewal dates can trigger automated emails rather than one-off sends.
Where the data comes from
Every field you personalise with has to be collected somewhere. Store it in custom contact fields, fill it through sign-up forms and surveys, or sync it from your shop or CRM. Collect only what you will use. UK GDPR’s data minimisation principle means “ask for date of birth just in case” is hard to justify.
Be open about profiling
Segmenting subscribers by what they click or buy is a form of profiling. UK GDPR requires you to tell people about it, usually in your privacy notice, and they can object to it for direct marketing at any time. Keep personalisation to what a reader would reasonably expect from the relationship. Using purchase history to recommend related products usually feels natural. Guessing someone’s health condition from what they browse does not. The ICO’s direct marketing guidance is a good reference if you are unsure.
Segments that work well in the UK
- By nation: England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland have different bank holidays and, in Wales, a Welsh-speaking audience that may prefer bilingual content.
- By customer status: subscribers who have never bought, first-time buyers and repeat customers.
- By permission route: contacts on consent versus soft opt-in, since the soft opt-in only covers similar products.
- By engagement: active readers versus those who haven’t opened in months.
Mailpro’s segmentation lets you build these groups from any field, and our email personalisation tips suggest where to start.
Test the fallbacks
The most common personalisation mistake is an empty or broken field: “Hi ,” or “Hi FIRSTNAME”. Preview the email as several different contacts before you send, including one with missing data.
Kept private
The more you personalise, the more personal data you hold. Mailpro stores it on private Swiss infrastructure, outside US jurisdiction, and never sells or rents it. Ready to build one? Start with how to create a newsletter.