Marketing Governance

Big Data is the magic word now-a-days in marketing and sales. Gather everything you can and benefit from all the knowledge we gain about our customers. But do we? How do we manage the avalanche of information we gather? According to a recent survey by SAS and SourceMedia 21 percent of the respondents say they didn’t know enough about it, 15 percent don’t understand the benefits of big data and 9 percent say they lack data quality in existing systems. Some believe that the more intel you gather the greater the benefits, but it’s not how much you gather, but it matters what you gather, says MultiChannel Merchant (MCM)  in their executive summary about Big Data and Database marketing.

The meaning of big data can be tough to decipher. You need to start to remember that data is not about numbers but about customers, says MCM. Your customer is supplying you with huge amounts of very useful information, so called first grade information. Think of email addresses order histories, click rates etc.

When this information is integrated with inventory information, revenue management systems and buying history, you will be able to create  customer-specific offers that will not only create a personalized message that reflects shopping habits and preference, but can also help business goals and increase revenue.

The road to the big data success is not about shifting through piles and piles of data. The focus should be on returning customers, the frequency of their purchases and their behavior patterns.

Get to know your customer

Once that is set, look at that data to uncover new insights about these specific visitors. This can help you generate ideas that will increase engagement about your brand, the products you sell and your website as a whole.

The best thing to do with the enormous amount of data, is to figure out what matters most to your organization. With all that information, create an aggregate data source that is fed by your best analytics. Decide also whether it’s best to use technology or a person to compile all this data sets.

Another important thing is to store all the data in one place. So everyone has access to the same source and uses the most up-to-date data. It needs to become the one true data source.

Take a small piece

And look at just a small piece of the pie. When homing in on a specific aspect of big data it might produce it’s best results. For example: big data might reveal that for some reason visitors in a specific region could be more prone to abandon their cart. But by examining the data further, you could learn that it could be because they live in a closer proximity to a traditional brick-and-mortar store than the rest of your visitors, or they prefer different payment options or generally do not hit the free shipping threshold offered.

It’s also important to get data in real time, so quick decisions can be made. You can easily identify what is working and what not. It makes it easy to tweak your operations.

Big data is important for the entire organization. Not only can it be used to boost sales, but your marketing department can use it to identify and engage your customers on specific grounds. Big data makes it possible to personal address your customer.

Big data is not just about harnessing information to boost an online sales experience; it can be used for catalogs and in store. A detailed understanding of what’s going on in your company can help managers forecast staffing needs, address customer service issues and evaluate how things like merchandising, promotions and product placement impact sales conversions. This intelligence not only leads to better and more profitable decisions in individual stores; it can also help merchants measure brick-and-mortar performance within the context of broader multichannel strategies.

Marketing advantage

With big data technology, marketers now have the tools to identify every visitor to an ecommerce site, as well as the ability to see exactly which mouse click got them there. This new tactic is also allowing marketers to deploy their messages in a much more personalized manner.

And people like that. A recent survey has found that customer-centric marketing—the ability to  engage consumers in one-to-one conversations across the customer lifecycle and all touch points—increases buyer readiness, engagement and sales activity.

According to the research study of 1,100 consumers, 40% of respondents claim they buy more from retailers that comprehensively personalize the shopping experience across channels. Results revealed that consumers increasingly reward customer-obsessed retailers. Nearly 60% of  consumers indicated that personalized product recommendations make it easier to find the products they are most interested in and provide a valuable service. More than half of consumers state website recommendations and emails personalized based on their past browsing and  shopping behavior is desirable to receive.

Simply put, concludes MCM, when big data is implemented across the channels, retailers realize 100% increase in purchase frequency, a 50% increase in average order value and a 25% increase in conversion of cart abandoners to buyers.

This Executive Summary was published before on MultiChannel Merchant