Intuit Mailchimp's Sarah Logan: retailers need clarity, not more campaigns, to drive profitable growth

By Sarah Logan, Head of Agency Partnerships, EMEA, Intuit Mailchimp

Despite having more ways of reaching consumers than ever before, retail marketers are finding it harder to convert customers. However, it’s not due to the lack of campaigns, but the lack of clarity: With so many touchpoints at play, it’s difficult to clearly see which channels, content and campaigns are actually driving revenue and which are simply adding to their costs.

According to recent Intuit Mailchimp UK research*, 39% say they lack clear insight into what drives results, while 42% of marketers fear they are wasting budget due to a lack of clarity. Overall, marketing leaders estimate they waste over a third of their working day (35%) switching between marketing tools.

It points to an environment that is increasingly opaque and oblique for many. But, for the marketers who can optimise their tools to gain the clarity they need, the opportunity for growth could be exponential. To succeed, they will need to make three mindset shifts.

Visibility over velocity

Only 38% of UK marketers say their digital tools integrate well, a sobering reality given they use an average of six tools in their day-to-day operations. The challenge is less about the individual tools, but rather their capacity to integrate and share data to unlock strategic insights and increase ROI.

For example, a marketing team may use one email system, another for SMS, and another for social media. If those tools are not interoperable with connected data, it’s easy to lose sight of the consumer. Customers rarely make a purchasing decision from just one interaction; they move across platforms and media. If retail marketers can’t reach them with the right message on the right platform, they’ve already lost the sale.

Data must be unified to deliver valuable insights. Combining browsing behaviour, marketing touchpoints, purchase history and more into a single platform enables teams to target audience segments with relevance, attracting new buyers and enticing repeat customers effectively.

Recent e-commerce focused enhancements from Mailchimp are designed to address this gap. An enhanced Shopify integration, a proprietary Site Tracking Pixel and integrations with review platforms such as Yotpo and Judge.me allow retailers to pull consented ecommerce and sentiment data into one place. Rather than stitching together insights from multiple tools, marketers can operate through a single source of truth.

An omnichannel marketing dashboard then brings email, SMS, automation performance and ecommerce events into a single view. Retailers can see which journeys generate revenue, where customers drop off and how to optimise spend across channels with confidence.

From acquisition to lifetime value

Marketers and retailers understand that acquisition is only the beginning; building loyalty is what enables greater revenue predictability. However, 40% of marketers struggle to retain loyal customers. Over a third (37%) even find it difficult to convert the first sales.

Consumers are willing to engage under the right conditions. According to Mailchimp’s The Art of the Opt-In: Why List Building is Only the Beginning report, 69% of UK consumers will opt in to email communications, the highest of the five countries surveyed, while 51% will do so for SMS.

Relevance is key however. Over half (55%) said they will unsubscribe if the content of communications is irrelevant. Personalisation is vital to long-term success. Blanket discounts and generic campaigns are simply not good enough for quality conversions. At worst, they even risk damaging trust if consumers feel their data is not being used properly.

With solutions in place to connect that data, retailers can move beyond one-size-fits-all campaigns towards effective segmentation that aligns with customers’ actual needs and interests, such as new product drops or restock notifications. Mailchimp’s predictive analytics capabilities also allow marketers to spot high-value and at-risk customers. This kind of relevance delivers more value than generic messaging or product recommendations that don’t resonate with the customer.

Simplification enables scalable profitability

A side effect of having so many tools and data spread across resources is wasted budgets and time. In constrained environments, efficiency is non-negotiable.

On the other hand, Mailchimp’s research found that businesses with fully integrated marketing platforms report significantly higher satisfaction and control. Streamlining benefits not just campaign execution, but also the bottom line.

There are tangible benefits to making the switch to all-in-one marketing platforms like Mailchimp. E-commerce businesses reported saving 16 hours per week on averageᐩ, and SMS users saw up to 22x ROI after launching their first SMS marketing campaign through Mailchimp±. 

By simplifying the tech stack, retailers can make more informed strategic decisions with less friction, so they can move faster and with greater clarity. That’s why Mailchimp has launched solutions that make it easier to migrate, bringing over contacts, segments and key flows with minimal downtime, and  AI-powered tools to build on-brand content and reusable templates quickly and easily.

Regaining control for better clarity

More campaigns does not always mean better results, but greater clarity does.

Achieving that clarity is not always straightforward. Retailers need to invest in aligning their data, insights and tech stacks to help them understand what is actually driving sales. When that foundation is in place, they can begin planning for long-term growth and strengthening relationships with customers to create a predictable revenue stream.

At a time where every interaction with the customer matters, clarity is the differentiating factor between an abandoned cart and a repeat customer.

*According to Mailchimp’s study in late July 2025, in partnership with Sapio research. The survey was conducted among 375 Marketers of all seniorities and 375 BDMs at manager level or above across all sectors in the UK. 

ᐩE-commerce customers who report time savings after implementing Mailchimp, cite an average of 16.4 hours saved per week across audience management, email & SMS content creation, campaign setup and management, and reporting and analytics.

± Up to 22x ROI: Based on ecommerce revenue attributable to Mailchimp users’ SMS Marketing campaigns and Mailchimp SMS spend (not including plan cost) within one year of launch of first SMS campaign from 10/01/24 to 10/17/25. ROI calculation requires an ecommerce store that is connected to a Mailchimp account. Excludes Short code SMS. Results may vary.