3 Day Blinds, which sells premium custom window treatments, enlisted Marketo and Turn to apply data collected from email to improve its advertising. The result was a dramatic increase in ad effectiveness.


All too often, marketers pigeonhole themselves to find a specific type of person and this was the case for 3 Day Blinds which focussed its tactics around one customer personality; ‘Kathy’, a 35-plus, educated homeowner who drove German cars. Kathy was a composite customer, based on data of previous buyers. 

Having a composite customer, like Kathy, can be quite misleading for retailers as it encourages them to ignore other potential customers who don’t fit their mould. At the end of the day, anyone that is in the market for new window blinds is a customer they want. The retailer therefore decided to rethink its personalisation strategy in order to engage a wider audience and ultimately boost ROI. 


With a strong email database of leads, 3 Day Blinds realised that it could be doing more to integrate data collected from email into its digital advertising strategy. Commenting on this, Shawn Nelsen, manager of sales analysis for 3 Day Blinds, said; “We knew that there had to be a better way to communicate with consumers who might be interested in new window blinds, once we had their email addresses. We’ve got all these leads out there and we treated them all the same.”

The company used Marketo to automate its email communication, a process that involved breaking the email database down into segments. Then Turn, the digital hub for marketers, cross-referenced the data with behavioural targeting and was able to put ads in front of these consumers. 


By using anonymous online signifiers, like mobile device IDs and ad IDs, Turn and Marketo identified potential 3 Day Blinds customers by their profile and served them appropriate ads. Then, the ads were used to reinforce email-based messages. For example, if 3 Day Blinds sent out an email blast to people who they are trying to get to sign up for a second room, then the retailer could make sure it was getting additional frequency against that same exact segment population with their digital advertising as well.

Data from Marketo and Turn was also used to find “lookalike audiences” – consumers who fit a very similar profile to existing conversions, and therefore might be receptive to the ad messages. By expanding its target audience, the retailer was in a better position to engage more customers and inspire their loyalty.


Previously, 3-Day Blinds’ advertising was aimed at a broad swath of people who fit the approximate profile of Kathy. Now, the retailer is putting ads put in front of consumers who are much more likely than most to actually make a purchase. 

After running an ad campaign that was informed by email-based data, 3-Day Blinds’ click-through rates jumped an impressive 140%. Leads per click also rose 850%. Best of all, the appointments per impression went up 5,000%, meaning the company is now paying a fifth of what it previously spent to get the same results.