The first thing you should know about Graeme Beardsell is that he was born in Penang, his father was in the Royal Australian Air Force stationed in Butterworth at the time and at the age of one, he left the Malaysian island.

The second thing you should know about the Chief Customer Development and Marketing Officer of Experian Asia Pacific is that, having lived in Singapore for six years, he is a foodie and named the conference rooms in the office after food items. As we walked past one named "Prata", I asked him what he would be if he were a food item.

"Hor fun. Beef. Dry. To be specific."

Being personal and specific is what Beardsell is all about these days as he tries to convince his customers of the new tools and technology that now make it possible for them to get personal with their customers, whether through emails, social media or mobile.

He calls it "embracing customer identity and analytics in the online space".

It means the ability to target email market campaigns and gain insights into customer behaviour and convert lookers to bookers. It means the ability to know a customer's profile and interests and target him with specific offers at the right time.

Imagine, you walking into Marina Bay Sands and getting a message on your smartphone offering you tickets for Wicked the musical at 30% off if you booked now.

But let's not get ahead of ourselves here. As a reality check, Beardsell believes that with the economic uncertainty in Europe and the US, there will be a constriction of overall marketing budgets this year.

"For a lot of CMOs and CEOs, the word is, proceed with caution. Budgets are being tethered and we will have to do more with less."

Full story:

www.webintravel.com//news/tighter-budgets-but-expect-more-to-go-social_2942