First-party signals (1P Signals)
First-party signals are behavioral data of leads and prospects visiting a website or using your software. They are the key to hyper-targeting since it reflects the buying intent of your leads and prospects.
This behavior data includes your website visitors’ identity, intent, time spent on pages, button clicks, demographic, firmographic, and product usage data.
This process of collecting and processing first-party signals is a crucial step in the account-based marketing (ABM) strategy.
In this article, we’ll discuss how 1P signals are collected and used to identify and retarget warm leads. We’ll also give you a couple of free tools to help you get started with a first-party signal collection to grow your business.
First-party signals and first-party data
First-party signal (1P signals) is one form of first-party data (1PD).
The first-party data consist of:
Out of these, behavioral data and social media interactions are considered as first-party signals.
Why?
Though signals are a subset of data, they are different in nature.
Signals are time-sensitive and hence can be categorized as actions in the present whereas data is a collection of past actions.
Signals of any kind represent an event that has happened or is happening right now. They demand a response.
Here’s a granular comparison table of signals and data:
| Aspect | Signals | Data |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Signals are a subset of data. | Data is a collection of records. |
| Real-Time Representation | Signals represent real-time data. | Data represents both real-time and past records. |
| Response Requirement | Requires immediate responses. | Does not require immediate responses, except for Signals. |
| Usage | Used to identify and hyper-target warm leads. | Can be used in both targeting and nurturing campaigns. |
| Sales Cycle | Short sales cycle due to immediate hint and response. | The sales cycle could be longer since most data is time-insensitive. |
| Personalization | Hyper-personalization possible. | Personalization possible. |
| Types | 1P signals, 2P signals, 3P signals. | First-party, second-party, and third-party data. |
| Examples | Behavioral data, such as real-time identification of website visitors, page intent, social media interactions. | All types of first-party data (including signals), second-party data, and third-party data. |
For example, a website visitor roaming around on your website is an event. Getting a real-time notification of this event is a signal that requires an immediate response from your sales representative to close the deal.
For every 1P signal you are getting, you or your team respond as soon as possible to reap the benefits.
For other types of first-party data, urgency is not needed. The response can be delayed at any time.
Hence, time-sensitive data is further classified as signals despite being categorized under first-party data.
Now, you must have a clear understanding of how 1P signals slightly differ from the typical classification of first-party data.
Importance of first-party signals?
Cold emailing has become ineffective for many b2b businesses due to the oversaturation of lead databases and the fierce competition for attention in cluttered inboxes.
The competition for attention has flooded the inbox of cold leads.
On the other side, Gmail and other email service providers (ESP) have increased the standards for marketing and cold emails. Hence, most of the emails with generic detailing and emails with spam trigger words are easily identified by spam filters and filtered to the spam folder.
Even surface-level personalization, such as first name and company name personalization are overlooked by leads and prospects since they see 100’s of such emails every week.
So, what’s the solution for a better conversion rate?
You need to think above surface-level personalization and try to leverage every potential signal you’re getting around your leads and prospects.
To understand the importance of first-party signals, take a look at the following email copies:
Email with surface-level personalization
Subject: Marketing strategy for {company name}
Hi {first name},
Are you struggling with your organic growth?
Create AI-powered forms, capture leads, and automate content, cold outreach and email marketing with GoZen.
Our customers have seen 30% higher win rates.
I’d love to show you how we can support your marketing strategy and take it to the next level. Do you have 15 minutes for a quick demo call?
Best regards, Salesrep name. Designation, GoZen
Email with 1P signal-based personalization Subject: ABM strategy for {company name} Hi {first name},
I noticed {company name}’s market expansion and wondered if you’re facing challenges in implementing the ABM strategy.
GoZen helps demand generation experts achieve more sales by automating the process of finding key decision makers, personalizes outreach at scale using social signals, and provides detailed insights into who’s visiting your website.
Our customers have seen 40% higher win rates and 30% shorter sales cycles on average.
I’d love to show you how we can support your ABM strategy and take it to the next level. Do you have 15 minutes for a quick demo call?
Best regards, Salesrep name. Designation, GoZen
Here’s why this first-party signal-based personalization converted a high-potential deal for us:
Hyper personalization at the right time, based on page intent and LinkedIn social signals, is the key to this email’s success.
GoZen HyperReach automatically generates this email based on the visit of a warm lead.
How are first-party signals collected?
First-party signals are collected throughout the buyer’s journey.
As the name suggests, businesses directly collect first-party signals from their website visitors, newsletter subscribers, social media followers, or customers.
It is considered a high-quality and reliable source of information since it comes directly from leads, prospects, and customers.
First-party signals are considered legal because they are obtained with the consent of the individuals providing the data.
Like first-party data, the first-party signals can be collected in two ways:
On websites
Behavioral signal capturing
You can track 1P signals using the free behavioral tracking tools, such as Microsoft Clarity and PostHog.
Microsoft Clarity is a free heatmap and session recording tool that reveals how your warm leads are navigating your websites. It can reveal potential 1P signals, such as mouse movement, clicks, and time spent on different web pages of your website. The PostHog is a product and web analytics tool that will help you identify the potential signals, such as:
- Web analytics signals: Page views, sessions, unique website visitors, top pages, devices, and demographics of your leads and prospects.
- Product analytics signals: User paths of any feature, user lifecycle, session recording, retention, custom field tracking, and stickiness.
The combination of these free tools is good to get started in tracking 1P signals. However, these tools pose a limitation of deanonymizing website visitors.
The website visitor identification is a crucial signal of all 1P signals, which allows you to target the right warm lead at the right time.
To track your website visitors, you need an account selection tool like GoZen HyperReach.
GoZen HyperReach not only anonymizes your website visitors but it pushes them into Slack in real-time. It also automates signal-based hyperpersonalized outreach content for all your warm as well as cold leads.
Cookie data
Apart from the behavioral analytics tools, you can use first-party cookies to track how often a person visits your site, which pages they’re visiting often, and where they are from.
As third-party cookies are phased out, first-party cookies are important in building retargeting strategies.
If you want to capture first-party data along with first-party signals, you can use free lead forms.
In the applications
Getting into in-app analytics is one of the best ways to collect first-party signals. While monitoring web analytics gives you potential intent and signals of your warm leads, in-app monitoring reveals the intent and signals of your free users (as well as paid customers).
If you have a freemium pricing strategy, focusing on in-app behavior analytics is essential. In this context, certain first-party data, such as user lifecycle, product stickiness, and retention rate should be treated as first-party signals to convert your free users to paid users.
One of the best free tools to monitor in-app behavior analytics is PostHog.
As I mentioned earlier in the “On Websites” section, PostHog can do both web and product analytics.
PostHog can track:
How to use first-party signals to increase sales?
Now that you’ve learned how to gather first-party signals, let’s explore how you can leverage it to close deals.
First-party signals are information goldmines that can be used throughout the sales cycle. If used well at the right time, they allow you to convert ready-to-buy leads.
Hyper-personalized Outreach
Targeting the right lead at the right time with the right context is the key to winning sales in the future.
The ability to capture 1P signals and process them is the one inevitable skill that every marketer and sales representative needs to outperform any crowded market.
As we already talked about signal capturing, let’s see how to utilize 1P signals in hyper-personalization.
Instead of first name and company name-level personalization, you can segment your warm leads and hyper-target them using 1P signals you gather using GoZen HyperReach and other behavior analytics tools.
Here’s an email template derived based on the 1P signal gathered: Subject: Boosting Email Deliverability for {Company Name}
Hi {First Name},
I noticed you recently visited our email deliverability page—are you working on improving inbox placement for your outreach campaigns?
At GoZen, we help businesses like {Company Name} achieve better email performance with tools that:
Our customers have seen significant improvements in deliverability, leading to higher open rates and more responses.
Would you be open to a quick 15-minute chat to explore how we can optimize your email outreach and ensure your messages land in the inbox?
Looking forward to connecting!
Best regards, [Salesrep Name] [Designation], GoZen
Since implementing the 1P signal (the page intent), this email got us a demo, followed by deal closure.
The secret sauce here is hyper-targeting the right warm lead at the right time.
Find your website visitors and their intent and automate outreach content creation at scale for free.
Retargeting ad campaigns
1P signals are potential input for interest-based and lookalikes ad campaigns in Meta and affinity audience ad campaigns in Google Ads.
For example, once you get the identity of your website visitors from website visitor identification software, you can leverage it to either retarget them or target a new set of similar audience.
This level of retargeting and hypertargeting lowers your customer acquisition costs (CAC) and increases your return on investment (ROI) of your ad campaigns.
This is how 1P signals eliminate the need to purchase expensive B2B lead databases that are oversaturated.
Data-Driven upselling
1P signals not only converts your warm leads but your existing customers too.
The intents you get from web and product analytics allows you to conduct predictive analysis and determine the optimal time to upsell a product.
For example, if you get a notification about a sudden spike in usage from one of your users, such as a high number of emails sent or inviting additional users, that would be the optimal time to reach out for upsell.
This signal-based data-driven upselling eliminates the needs for randomly triggered upsell messages that annoys your customers.
Conclusion
First-party signals (1P signals) are one of the most accurate signals that will help you target the right leads and customers.
The sooner you start embracing this inbound-led outbound strategy, the more deals you can close even in this crowded marketplace.
You can capture the 1P signals right away with GoZen HyperReach for FREE.
FAQs
- Is collecting and using first-party signals (1P signals) legal?
Yes, collecting and using first-party signals is both legal and accurate, as they are obtained from users who have given their consent.
First-party signals (1P signals) are a specific type of first-party data (1P data). Therefore, just like first-party data, first-party signals are also legal to use.
- What are the first-party signals?
First-party signals (1P signals) are time-sensitive user behavior analytics that reveal buyer intent across the buyers’ journey. These 1P signals are a part of first-party data.