Personalization In Marketing

NEWS 21/10/25: Department of Homeland Security obtains first-known warrant targeting OpenAI for user prompts in ChatGPT According to a recent article by Forbes, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has secured a federal search warrant ordering OpenAI to identify a user of ChatGPT and to produce the user’s prompts, as part of a child-exploitation investigation. https://lnkd.in/eatmK3zv? Key details: - The warrant was filed by child-exploitation investigators within DHS. - It specifically targets “two prompts” submitted to ChatGPT by an anonymous user. The warrant asks OpenAI for the user’s identifying information and associated prompt history. - This is described as the first known federal search warrant compelling ChatGPT prompt-level data from OpenAI. What this means for privacy: -Prompts are treated as evidence. What users have assumed to be ephemeral or private entries in a chat session with an AI service may now be subject to law-enforcement production. -Scope of data retention and access must be reconsidered. If prompt history can be identified and requested, both users and providers should evaluate how long prompts are stored, under what identifiers, and how anonymised they truly are. - Implications for user trust and provider responsibility. AI companies may face growing legal obligations to disclose user-generated content and metadata, which may affect how the services present themselves (privacy guarantees, terms of service) and how users engage with them. - International context and legal cross-overs. For users in jurisdictions with strong data-protection regimes (for example, the General Data Protection Regulation in the UK/EU), the fact that prompt-data can be subject to U.S. warrant may raise questions about extraterritorial access and data flow compliance. In short: this isn’t just another law-enforcement request. It marks the first time a generative-AI provider has been legally compelled to unmask a user and disclose their prompt history. ============ ↳I track how stories like this shape the ethics and governance of AI. You can find deeper analysis at discarded.ai. #AISafety #AIRegulation #Privacy #Governance #Ethics Image AI Generated

Tired of hearing that you should personalize cold emails? "You should personalize cold emails" has become "no sh*t Sherlock" advice. The real challenges you're having: ❌ You end up wasting hours going down a “research rabbit hole” ❌ The exec team is worried about activity levels dropping ❌ You don’t know how to connect personalization to the rest of the email ❌ Your personalization attempts haven’t increased reply rates ❌ Your prospects have very little public information available Personalization increases reply rates by 1,200%+ (Lavender 💜) So let's dig into how to "personalize at scale" It’s all about finding patterns. Without these patterns, you’re going to spend hours looking for something that should take 5-10 minutes tops. It’s what our clients are mastering right now to dramatically cut down on research time without sacrificing quality. Start by finding patterns in these three values buckets: ✅ Accomplishments — What does the prospect or company brag about? Examples: Company awards, personal achievements, customer reviews, case studies, testimonials, charity work, podcast interviews, features in publications, etc. ✅ Education — What does the prospect or company educate their prospects and customers about? Examples: White papers, case studies, ebooks, podcasts, webinars, conferences they host, blog posts, LinkedIn articles, etc. ✅ $$$ — What does the company invest in? Examples: mergers, acquisitions, new products/services, funding, new locations, contraction, new countries, hiring, etc. ~~~ Once you find patterns in the 3-5 most common triggers across prospects, use the attached image to find those triggers. You can also reverse-engineer your best meetings and closed/won deals to find patterns in triggers. Then create workflows for them. Write down the exact steps you use to search Google, company websites, LinkedIn profiles, quarterly reports, etc. Over time, you’ll build a process that eliminates most of the busywork. ~~~ Sales leaders—provide bumper guards and guidelines for reps so they know exactly what to look for and where to find it. You'll see amazing results over time when you can streamline this process. #sales

In the clutter of D2C brands, customization can make you win. Last weekend, I was trying to buy a gift for my friend's anniversary, but every option felt generic. Basic. Non-memorable. Then, I found a leather wallet and cardholder set online where I could add their initials, choose the leather texture, and even include a hidden photo inside. Suddenly, it became a gift they’d remember. This experience made me realize that as the landscape matures, we’re moving from an era of 'product-market fit' to 'product-person fit.' Here’s why I think mass customization is becoming the new competitive advantage in retail: 1/ The New Consumer Psychology Five years ago, customization was a luxury add-on. Today, it's becoming the baseline expectation. When I asked my teenage nephew why he refused a popular sneaker brand, his answer was telling: "If I'm wearing the exact same thing as everyone else, what's the point?" The data confirms it: > 60% of Millennials and Gen Z prefer customized products. > More surprisingly, they’re 4x more likely to recommend brands that offer customization. 2/ The Business Transformation The most fascinating insight I’ve discovered as an investor: Customization is creating an entirely new business model. Take Traya – they analyze your background, health, diet, and lifestyle through a 30-question diagnostic, then create regimens with 4x higher efficacy. The result? ₹7Cr → ₹300Cr in 2.5 years. Or Bombay Shirt Company – by letting customers design everything from the collar to the thread, they’ve achieved what seemed impossible: mass-produced customization at scale. 3/ The Economic Advantage When we analyze the unit economics, customized products are creating an unfair advantage: > Customer acquisition costs drop by 35% (word of mouth increases). > Return rates fall by 55% (customers keep what they helped design). My favorite examples: > Perfora’s name engraving on toothbrushes. > Mokobara’s luggage monograms (they started it). > Lenskart.com’s custom-fit frames. Yes, it adds cost and effort. But it makes you stop while you’re scrolling. And it makes the customer feel like the ONLY customer. That’s everything today. 😉 Which customized product experience has impressed you the most? #ConsumerTrends #Customization #Retail #D2C

Over the past 9 years, I’ve acquired 1,000+ clients for my agencies. If I were starting over today, here’s exactly how I’d land my first 10 clients: Step 1: Start with the right data The biggest challenge when starting out? Finding highly targeted prospects who are ready to buy. Here’s how I’d solve that: Google Maps. Yes, I said Google Maps. Why? Because it’s an untapped goldmine for qualified leads. With over 4,000 B2B categories, it’s packed with local businesses and SMBs often overlooked - or missing - from LinkedIn. These are hidden gems waiting to be discovered. Scrap (https://scrap.io/s/9MYK) transforms this goldmine into actionable leads by extracting from Google Maps listings: - Emails, phone numbers, & websites - Social media profiles - Website technologies - Even Google Maps ratings & reviews Filter and focus on your ideal targets in just 2 clicks. For example: - Restaurants with 4+ ratings but no Instagram. - Local businesses with websites but no ad pixels. - SMBs in specific niches or locations. Scrap’s real-time data extraction ensures you always have the most accurate info - and it’s available as a Chrome Extension for instant insights. Step 2: Personalize your outreach Generic outreach doesn’t work - relevance is everything. Try this playbook: - Subject Line: Use something attention-grabbing like “Quick question about [business name]” or “Idea for [service].” - Personalize: Reference their Google Maps reviews, website, or niche. For example: “Congrats on your 4.9-star rating - I can see why people love your café.” - Partner Up: “I help cafes like yours boost foot traffic through email marketing. I noticed a few opportunities I’d love to share.” - CTA: End with a low-pressure ask: “Does this sound worth exploring?” Pro Tip: Pair the emails from Scrap (https://scrap.io/s/9MYK) with LinkedIn outreach - connect or engage with their posts to build trust. Step 3: Stay consistent and scale your efforts Build momentum through persistence: - Follow Up: Most responses come after the 2nd or 3rd touch. Example sequence: Email → LinkedIn connect → Follow-up email → Call. - Track Metrics: Monitor open rates, replies, and booked calls. Aim for a 20%+ email response rate and 10%+ meetings booked. - Leverage Referrals: Once you’ve landed a few clients, ask, “Know anyone else who might benefit?” and share testimonials like, “We helped a local coffee shop grow foot traffic by 20% in 30 days.” - Automate: Use Scrap for fast lead gen and a CRM to manage outreach. Recap: - Use Scrap (https://scrap.io/s/9MYK) to turn Google Maps into a lead-gen machine for local businesses, SMBs, and niche prospects. - Personalize your emails with insights and a clear CTA. - Stay consistent by following up, tracking results, and leveraging referrals. - And remember: Your first 10 clients lay the foundation for scaling. #ScrapPartner

Your "followers" won’t buy from you... because they 𝘥𝘰𝘯’𝘵 actually care. Your audience ≠ Your community Most people build an audience. Few build a community. An audience listens. A community participates. An audience consumes. A community contributes. An audience watches. A community advocates. And that’s the difference between being followed… And being fought for. Having 100,000 followers means nothing if they’re just scrolling past your content. Let’s break it down, shall we? Only 1–3% engage → 1,000–3,000 people Of those, maybe 5% truly care → 50–150 real advocates The average conversion rate is 1–3% → 0.5–4 sales That’s why a big audience ≠ big business. Community does. Want to turn your audience into community? Start here. 1. 𝗖𝗿𝗲𝗮𝘁𝗲 𝗰𝗼𝗻𝘃𝗲𝗿𝘀𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻𝘀, 𝗻𝗼𝘁 𝗷𝘂𝘀𝘁 𝗰𝗼𝗻𝘁𝗲𝗻𝘁 Stop broadcasting. Start interacting. Ask questions. Spark debates. Make people feel heard. 2. 𝗣𝗿𝗶𝗼𝗿𝗶𝘁𝗶𝘇𝗲 𝗲𝘅𝗰𝗹𝘂𝘀𝗶𝘃𝗶𝘁𝘆 𝗼𝘃𝗲𝗿 𝘃𝗶𝗿𝗮𝗹𝗶𝘁𝘆 People don’t just want access. They want 𝘣𝘦𝘭𝘰𝘯𝘨𝘪𝘯𝘨. Inner circles. Private groups. Masterminds. 3. 𝗠𝗮𝗸𝗲 𝗽𝗲𝗼𝗽𝗹𝗲 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗵𝗲𝗿𝗼𝗲𝘀 Your brand isn’t the star, your community is. Cheer for them. Put them in the spotlight. DM them. 4. 𝗠𝗼𝘃𝗲 𝗯𝗲𝘆𝗼𝗻𝗱 𝗰𝗼𝗻𝘁𝗲𝗻𝘁—𝗰𝗿𝗲𝗮𝘁𝗲 𝘀𝗵𝗮𝗿𝗲𝗱 𝗲𝘅𝗽𝗲𝗿𝗶𝗲𝗻𝗰𝗲𝘀 A newsletter is good. A live roundtable is better. A podcast is great. A mastermind is next level. 5. 𝗥𝗲𝘄𝗮𝗿𝗱 𝗲𝗻𝗴𝗮𝗴𝗲𝗺𝗲𝗻𝘁 𝘄𝗶𝘁𝗵 𝗿𝗲𝗰𝗼𝗴𝗻𝗶𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 People crave status. Give them roles. Contributors. Ambassadors. Champions. 𝘛𝘩𝘦 𝘉𝘰𝘵𝘵𝘰𝘮 𝘓𝘪𝘯𝘦? Attention fades. Algorithms change. But a strong community sustains your brand... no matter what. That’s why personal branding 𝘀𝘁𝗮𝗿𝘁𝘀 𝘄𝗶𝘁𝗵 𝗺𝗲𝗱𝗶𝗮. Not an audience. Not followers. 𝘈 𝘤𝘰𝘮𝘮𝘶𝘯𝘪𝘵𝘺. P.s. how many people are there in your core community?

If you over-curate & overthink your personal brand to perfection, your engagement will be dead! You see them everywhere—polished, poised, and perfectly positioned personal brands. Yet, their engagement is flat. Their audience? Passive. This is the"Perfect Persona" Effect—where people curate an online brand so flawlessly that it becomes unrelatable. And science backs this up. 📌 A study from Harvard Business Review found that leaders who share their struggles increase trust by 66% compared to those who only share polished success. 📌 Social psychologist Dr. Elliot Aronson’s "Pratfall Effect" proves that people perceive those who show vulnerability as more likable than those who appear perfect. The brands that win aren’t the ones that look flawless. They’re the ones that feel real. This is how we work this out with SackBerry clients: 1. Show the process, not just the results. ❌ “We grew our business 10x in a year!” ✅ “We struggled for months with zero sales—here’s what finally worked.” People relate to struggles, lessons, and real journeys. Share the how, not just the highlight. 2. Write like you talk. The easiest way to sound human? Read your post out loud. If you wouldn’t say it in a conversation, rewrite it. 3. Share your unpopular opinions. The fastest way to stand out isn’t to blend in. Take a stance. Challenge industry clichés. Say what others won’t. 4. Use the “3-Post Rule” to create trust. Your content should rotate between these formats: A personal story (human connection) An actionable insight (expert credibility) A polarizing take (sparks discussion) 5. Don’t fear the “mess.” -Not every post needs to be perfect. - Test new ideas. - Share drafts. - Build in public. People love watching something unfold in real time. So, tell me—what’s one thing you wish more people shared online? #PersonalBranding #Authenticity #BuildingInPublic #ContentMarketing

A few days ago, we had a small celebration at home with family for my daughter's 6 month birthday. For the sake of convenience, we turned to Zomato for a big food order. The order must’ve caught their attention because shortly after, I got a call from their team. They asked if we were having a party and after I confirmed, they said, “We’d love to send you a cake for the occasion!” Fast forward an hour later and they sent over a Theobroma cake, accompanied by a personalized birthday card. All of this organized through their app. Zomato didn’t just deliver food that day, they delivered an experience that goes beyond a mere transaction. Here's what marketers can learn from this moment of personalization: 📌 Customer Delight Is the New Loyalty Program Zomato didn’t have to send the cake since it wasn’t part of their service but by doing so, they turned a transaction into a memory. They’ve now created an emotional connection with me as a customer, something discounts and coupons can never replicate. 📌 Hyper-Personalization Wins They paid attention to my order size, made an educated guess about the occasion and added a personalized touch. In an age where AI can assist with data insights, these little human interventions make all the difference. 📌 The Power of Word of Mouth By going the extra mile, Zomato has not only retained me as a customer but also turned me into a brand advocate. Personalization + customer delight = organic marketing. As marketers, it’s easy to focus on scaling strategies, optimizing campaigns or driving ROI. But let’s not forget the basics: 👉 Listen to your customers 👉 Understand their context 👉 Show them you care It’s the little things that often make the biggest impact. What’s one example of a brand that went above and beyond for you? #Marketing #CustomerExperience #Personalization #CustomerDelight

I've reviewed 50+ #RecSys architectures. The most expensive mistake I keep seeing: Using a 70B LLM to do real-time ranking. It fails in production. Every time. Here's why and what actually works instead 👇 At Amazon and Twitter, we operated under strict latency budgets. You cannot run autoregressive inference over a massive catalog in ~50ms. That's not a modeling problem. That's physics. The real issue isn't that LLMs are weak. It's that they're being used in the wrong place. The pattern is called LLM-ERS (LLM-Enhanced Recommender Systems): Layer 1 - Retrieval + Ranking (keep it traditional) Fast. Scalable. No LLM needed here. → Two-Tower embeddings → Vector DB retrieval → Top ~1K candidates in sub-10ms Layer 2 - Offline Data Augmentation (highest ROI) Move the LLM off the critical path entirely. Use it to improve your training data instead: → Generate hard negatives for triplet loss → Plausible-but-wrong items that force tighter decision boundaries Zero latency cost. Massive modeling gain. Layer 3 - Post-Ranking Personalization (controlled LLM use) If you need real-time LLMs, keep the blast radius small: → Take only your top 3–5 ranked items → Generate "Why you might like this" explanations You get personalization + better UX - without breaking P99. The rule that separates robust systems from expensive ones: → Traditional ML decides what to show → LLMs enhance how it's understood Boring architecture for scale. LLMs for the final mile. This is Part 3 of my Generative RecSys series. Next up: I'll break down the Generative Retrieval Paradigm. I'm genuinely curious: where in your stack have LLMs actually moved the needle vs. just adding cost and latency? Drop your answer + one sentence on why. A) Retrieval B) Ranking C) Explanation / UX layer D) Offline data augmentation E) Nowhere yet - still evaluating

How many times have you logged on to Linkedin and found yet another email that starts with: "Hey [First Name]," followed by a generic pitch that does not concern your interests or needs. Sound familiar? We've all been there. And it's frustrating. As a fractional CMO/Consultant, I've seen this happen repeatedly. Businesses think they're doing personalization right but need to do better. It's not enough to use someone's name or company. 👉🏾 True personalization is about understanding their challenges, goals, and needs. For example, on LinkedIn, scroll through their feed and see what they post, talk about, like, and comment on. This helps as a starting ground on how to approach them and what to discuss. So, instead of sending a LinkedIn message that says: "I'd love to connect and learn more about your business," try something like: "I noticed you're working on [specific project]. I have some ideas on how you could [achieve a specific goal]. Would you be open to a quick chat?" See the difference? It's not just about being personal; it's about being relevant. And when you're relevant, you're not annoying — you're helpful. 👉🏾 So, think about this the next time you craft a personalized outreach campaign. →"Would I find this message valuable? →Does it address my specific needs and interests?" If the answer is no, it's time to return to the drawing board. 👉🏾 Also, tools like Crystal Knows help you fine-tune your message and tone when reaching out to maximize the impact of every conversation. Let's aim for genuinely helpful messages, not just another annoyance in their inbox. What do you think about personalized outreach? #b2bmarketing #demandgeneration #leadgeneration #ABM

The era of celebrity marketing is evolving faster than ever. What do you think about this one? Not long ago, creating a campaign featuring global icons like Lionel Messi or superheroes such as Spider-Man required Hollywood-scale budgets, months of production, licensing negotiations, and large creative teams. Today, AI is changing the equation. Generative AI allows brands to visualize concepts, prototype campaigns, test dozens of creative directions, localize content into multiple languages, and personalize marketing for different audiences—all in hours instead of weeks. Imagine a campaign where Spider-Man and Messi appear together to promote a new football boot, beverage, or AI-powered experience. While the commercial use of these characters and celebrities still requires the appropriate intellectual property and publicity rights, AI can dramatically accelerate the creative process before production even begins. The numbers are compelling: ⚽ AI-generated creative can reduce campaign concept development time by up to 80–90%. 📈 Personalized marketing has been shown to increase conversion rates by 20–40% in many digital campaigns. 🌍 Brands can now generate thousands of localized creative variations for different markets almost instantly. 💡 Marketing teams spend less time creating assets—and more time testing, learning, and optimizing. The future isn't AI replacing creativity. It's AI amplifying it. The brands that win won't simply have the biggest advertising budgets. They'll have the fastest ideas, the shortest creative cycles, and the ability to deliver the right story to the right audience at the right moment. AI isn't changing marketing. It's changing the speed of imagination. #AI via @tomholland2013 #GenerativeAI #Marketing #SportsMarketing #DigitalTransformation #Innovation #CreativeAI #Football #Leadership #FutureOfWork