Retailers of all kinds are becoming more focused on customer analytics, and for very good reasons. It is all about getting the right message, at the right time, to the right people. There should be an emphasis on that word “right” as well, as it is the one thing that is most often missing in a marketing equation.
These are not the very best of economic times. Budgets are shrinking, and so are workforces. Those in marketing are expected to answer for each and every dollar that is spent. That is just one reason why analytics are so important. Two of the more important benchmarks, return on investment (ROI ) and a positive customer experience are crucial for measuring success. Capturing this data, and then using it in the right way can take your business to the next level, and save your job.
Here are some pointers to help you recognize the right tools for your business, the vendors that have these products, and how to use them to make your business the choice for more customers. If you love your job, and you want to keep it, this is some information you need to know about. If you are not happy in your job, go ahead and skip this as you are probably in trouble already.
Data Can Show You The Way
Old adages sometimes hold true over time. The “customer is always right” is one of them. Today’s customers have more power than they ever have. They are the ones that decide what they want, and when they want it. They also decide where they want a product or service.
With the advent of the internet, today’s customers are no longer constrained by location. Products and services can be ordered from the comfort of their home, and delivered right to their door. This is why it is more important than ever for you, as a marketer of a product or service, to understand how they think and how they behave.
Analytics can not only tell you what has taken place in the past, they can also tell you what is most likely to happen next. It can provide you with detailed information on customer interactions and preferences. Over a period of time, data patterns emerge from information that has been collected that can be crucial in predicting future behavior.
With today’s more powerful analytic tools, you really have everything you need to vastly improve the customer experience, increase the number of conversions, and build loyalty with all of your customers. All of this drives better profits, and ROI, and can save your job.
To take steps in the right direction, you must capture and make use of marketing data, and not let it waste away in the company database.
Data Analytics and Sound Strategies Lead to Improved ROI
To properly tie together analytic data and ROI, you must build strategies that you can act on that are focused on information to create a user experience that will keep them satisfied. For example, if you have data on what makes an online shopper make a purchase, how can you make that experience happen multiple times?
If you put the right data strategies into place, you can create a marketing plan that works and gets the results you want. Here are three proven steps you can take to reach your goals:
Identify your ideal customers
It is common for businesses today to have customers who are ideal, and some who you do not have the best relationships with. If this is the case with your business, pick out some of the really good customer relationships you have and compare, contrast, and segregate this information within the database.
You may even want to trace back and find the information as to what inspired them to do business with you, what they love about your brand, and how, if any, their purchase patterns have changed over time. If you spend some time analyzing this data, you will get a clearer picture of what your ideal customer is all about.
Use this as a model to identify other ideal customers that behave like the ones you have analyzed. These are the people who have a high demand for the products and services you have to offer.
Do a periodic purge of your data analytics to keep them updated, accurate, and actionable
The quality of the information you have means everything. They have a direct result on your actions, and how successful those actions are. The challenge in keeping data accurate is that your customer data is always changing. A good deal of customer data changes every year as they move, change jobs, and undergo other life changes. Your company data must keep up with these changes, or it will no longer be useful to you.
Put a focus on key marketing performance indicators
Getting more customers is no longer the sole aim in marketing today. Since it costs six times more to replace a current customer than to retain them, today’s forward looking firms are investing money in doing a better job in satisfying the customers they already have.
For this reason, you need to put a strong focus on maintaining strong, long-term relations with the customers you already have. When you have a strategy to reduce customer attrition, your bottom line will benefit from it.
More and more businesses are now relying on analytics to predict the future in the business world. Their success will hinge on how well they capture, understand, and interpret data. The better you are at this task, the more secure your job will be.
Best Predictive Analytics Tools To Improve Your CRM
If you are selling products, chances are your company uses a CRM. Here are some of the things you should look for when choosing tools that are compatible with your CRM.
Because of the wide variety of analytic tools on the market today, there is often a disparity in the functions products perform. No matter what type of business you have, these tools should be able to support all channels that your business uses in marketing to your customer base.
This can include social media, email, and customer service. Tools that are effective with all three channels can give you a better prospective and help you to make better decisions with more accurate data in hand.
Analytic tools with real time alerts are very useful. These can be set up to alert a customer service representative when a customer needs help, or when a certain task needs to be performed. A quick response is crucial for making leads convert, and for building good relations with customers who may have problems that need an answer, or a problem they need resolution with.
You also need an effective cost management system to track each step of a sales process. You should also look for tools that have an intuitive interface, so employees can get up to speed quickly. Part of the interface should include a search feature, where an employee can find a customer in a variety of ways, such as location, company name, and product or service.
Make Sure It Is Scalable
As of now, your contact list may only have about 500 listings. But that could grow exponentially in the next few years. Most every business has the goal of growing and adding new customers. This is something you need to think about seriously when choosing analytic tools, as it could save your job one day down the line.
Professional Reporting Functions
Any analytic tool you choose must have the ability to create comprehensive reports that can be easily understood. The best analytic tools will have a number of metrics, so members of your team can choose the ones they need to do their jobs in a more effective manner.
If your sales force has a high dependence on mobile devices including smartphones and tablets, you need a tool that supports mobile reporting. You may also want to get an analytic tool with reports that can easily be integrated with software that you already have, such as Microsoft Excel, or Microsoft Word.
Many companies today offer free trials for their software, so you can get a good idea how it will work for you. This is an offer you want to take advantage of. Here are some of the top vendors out there today that you need to consider:
Salesforce
Salesforce is one of the most trusted names in the business today. It has been successfully used by all types of businesses. This is a good choice for your business if you value real time reports, and want easy collaboration between your team members. It has a host of features and those include:
web hosting
compatibility with social networks including Facebook and Twitter
email integration
mobile access
group categorization
With these powerful analytic tools, you have what you need to track customers, predict future trends, and hopefully, keep your job.
OnContact
This is a slightly cheaper option than Salesforce if you are on a tight budget. OnContact has a number of good things going for it. It provides you with a great deal of useful data. It covers multiple channels including marketing, sales, customer preferences, customer characteristics, and more. This package makes it easy to mine a great deal of data that is useful to your business.
OnContact also has an excellent contact management system, and it comes complete with a simple search function so you can quickly locate customers in a variety of ways. Some of the top features of this software package include:
calendar integration
cloud access
mobile access
activity tracking
real time data summarization
This is one area in which technology is evolving very quickly. As it does, you will have more and more tools to understand your customer base, and maintain the best possible relationships. Unfortunately, with more and more products, decisions on the right predictive analytic tools become more and more difficult.
The best analytic tools will help you to have a complete and full understanding of your customer base, so you can make adjustments. Your goal is to foster long term relationships and have a loyal customer base that will help you to maximize your sales.
The Bottom Line
If you enjoy your job in the marketing industry, and chances are you do, your survival hinges on performance, and selecting the right analytic tools goes a long way toward helping you get a get a raise. Making the wrong selection of analytic tools will help you to get shown the door.
It is in your best interest to go with a company that is established, and has a proven track record. Mobile access is a must, and if you are not using mobile devices to help your sales force today, you may be closer to being shown the door than you think.
Do take advantage of some of the top companies who offer free trials. By using the product without first making a financial commitment, you can get a good idea of whether or not it is right for your company. If your employees learn the software quickly, and can get results quickly, it is a winner.
If this software has glitches, is hard to use, crashes on your platform, you may want to think twice about investing with them. Marketing and sales is one tough business, and always has been. Think hard about analytic tools, and what they mean to your business, and you will have a better chance of making the right decision, and keeping your job in a volatile economy and job market.
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