AI shopping agents have raised consumer expectations for personalization well beyond name tokens and basic segmentation.
Zero-party data (information customers share directly) and first-party behavioral data are the strongest inputs for personalized email programs.
Advanced segmentation, conditional logic in automations, and predictive churn modeling are the tactics separating high-performing email programs from average ones.
Personalization drives measurable gains in conversion rate, retention rate, and ROI across industries.
Every Email Service Provider (ESP) has different capabilities, but any increase in personalization tends to move performance metrics in the right direction.
A “Hi, [first name]” token in a subject line used to feel personal. Today it barely registers. Consumers have seen it so many times that it reads as the absence of personalization rather than the presence of it.
What makes something alive? We simply don't know, but synthetic biologists are a step closer to providing an answer thanks to SpudCell, the most sophisticated attempt at creating an artificial life form yet
U.S. President Donald Trump and CEO of Ford Jim Farley clap, as President Trump visits a Ford production center, in Dearborn, Michigan, U.S., January 13, 2026.
Ford Motor vehicles are displayed for sale at the Leif Johnson Ford dealership on June 30, 2026 in Austin, Texas.
Brandon Bell | Getty Images
DETROIT — Ford Motor on Thursday reported a 10.3% decline in its second-quarter U.S. new vehicle sales as the company battled a supplier issue for its F-Series pickup trucks and a significant drop in all-electric vehicles.
Australia’s tiger quoll – as featured in Dan Werb’s Our Wild Familiars, out this month
Shutterstock/Craig Dingle
It’s a hot month in London – in oh so many ways. Life, being alive and death are big themes in the new popular science books out in July, not to mention that small thing of being a human and all the messy feelings and sensory stuff that goes with it. Then there’s also AI filling the future – in ways that worry one of the world’s leading forensic scientists, as well as ethicists who are paid to think about this sort of thing. I’m looking forward to delving into the worlds of volcanoes and pharmacology, which look positively safe and stable in comparison…
If you're a regular Lifehacker reader, you'll know Proton develops a range of privacy-first products, including an email service, a VPN, and cloud storage. It also now has its own AI chatbot, called Lumo—first launched in August 2025, and recently upgraded with a host of new capabilities, including image generation.
Faced with observations of early black holes and galaxies that weren’t expected to exist, scientists have come up with a wealth of new theories to explain them. Now they just need to figure out which ones are true.
Last week, I argued that habitual publisher traffic – direct and branded – has been eroding for years, and that the under-35s are leading the charge. Not directly provable, but a theory.
Stephen Johnson is a senior staff writer at Lifehacker covering pop culture and technology, including the columns “The Out-of-Touch Adults’ Guide to Kid Culture” and “What People Are Getting Wrong This Week.”
