LTR 2019 Conference: How DraftKings Is Pushing the Limits of Personalization

AUTHOR

Tiffany Duncan

Marketing Department Coordinator, Braze

Targeting messages to customers based on their individual behaviors is a powerful way to drive stronger engagement across channels. The importance of personalization was one of the main topics at this year’s Long-Term Relationships (LTR) conference. The two-day conference offered insight from thought leaders and industry professionals on the benefits of using technology to individualize communications with customers. By personalizing messaging, brands enhance their customer engagement strategy.

Customers want to receive relevant and valuable information, not be bombarded by generic messages. DraftKings, a sports technology and entertainment company founded in 2012, shared how they make use of this approach to optimize their marketing efforts at the “Pushing The Limits of Personalization” session on day 2 of the conference.

This session will cover:

How DraftKings uses personalization to create high engagement in their contests
Using data to optimize and iterate on audience segments
Crafting an effective cross-channel strategy for specific campaigns

How Braze Helped DraftKings Take Personalization to the Next Level

DraftKings allows its customers to play in private contests and public tournaments spanning ten professional sports played in seven different countries. Veronica Mynders Hamel, Senior Director of Marketing, and Jeff Singer, Senior Software Engineering Manager, explained how DraftKings increased audience engagement in its contests by utilizing the Braze platform’s ability to send its users individually customized in-app messages.

These in-app messages enticed app users to enter in contests by providing them with a recap from the previous football season. Recap details included the amount of lineups entered by each customer, their Best Value Player, and their Highest Scoring Lineup. By presenting each individual with these key statistics, DraftKings motivated its customers to earn even more than they did in the previous fantasy football season. They also only targeted users with contests they were most likely to join.

The Braze Platform equipped DraftKings with the ability to increase automation of personalized messaging using Connected Content and API-Triggered Campaigns. Connected Content enabled DraftKings to pull consumer data and use them to inform and customize messages in real time.