The ICO is announcing that it is making grants available for research into privacy and data protection. It says this will fit perfectly into its long--term strategy to help it keep up to date with developments and their impacts.

Personalisation is the key to consumer engagement, Marketing Tech News reminds marketers. This can come in several forms, from more personalised offers to cart abandonment programmes and deals based on buying behaviour and location.

Mar Tech Advisor has some sage advice for email marketers who may be finding that they can generate a high volume of leads but little conversion. Focussing tactics on getting few people to sign up for your list, but who are more likely to buy, is the answer to high-volume leads that go nowhere.

Is personalisation in email campaigns really possible? That's the interesting question posed by Diginomica. If it is, surely marketers need more data and surely they need AI tech that understands the complexities of unpredictable human behaviour?

The University of East Anglia has apologised to a group of American Studies students over an email that inadvertently revealed which among them had had applications for extensions on projects approved, ITV reports.

The supermarket Morrisons has been fined GBP10,500 by the ICO for emailing thousands of people about a loyalty card scheme, even though they had opted out of receiving such emails.

Econsultancy is offering tips on how to turn Web site visitors in to sign-ups, such as sharpening up targeting and ensuring that calls to action are dynamically placed to gather the most attention.

The Astro email platform is now offering a service that can combine messages in Slack with email, TechCrunch reports. The platform is also allowing user to check emails via Alexa.

BizReport is quoting research from Yes Lifecycle Marketing that shows one in three email users now has a separate account for branded email marketing.

A 39 Web developer from Manchester, England has done it again. After duping a top bank official in the UK into believing he was a colleague, the same email prank has been used to embarrass three top bankers in America.