Ways to Transform Data Into a Revenue-Generating Asset5

Disconnected data leads to disjointed marketing. Here are five actions marketers should take to create a holistic customer view that facilitates cohesive, agile marketing.

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4. Introduction 5. Five Steps for Transforming Data Into an Asset: > Clean data thoroughly > Integrate data across channels > Match consumer records > Enrich data with third-party details > Make data actionable 10. Closing Thoughts

Contents

DELIVER MARKETING ROI AND DEEPER CUSTOMER INSIGHT FROM INDIRECT CHANNELS Industry leading data quality solutions which provide a rapid and sustained return on Marketing investments Drive campaign, analytics and customer experience improvements with accurate data Implemented in less than 90 days with minimal resource Provides Marketing with visibility and control of customer data

Over 900 organisations worldwide rely on Trillium So�ware’s data quality solutions, including leading global brands such as Barclays Bank, British Airways, British Telecom, Canon Europe, Fedex, HMRC, HSBC, Marriott, Microso�, Porsche and Volvo.

www.trilliumso�ware.com | trlinfo@trilliumso�ware.com

Marketers have more customer data than ever and that treasure trove of information is growing exponentially. But bits and bytes alone can’t improve customer relationships, drive world-class service, or ensure greater share of wallet. And often this data is out of reach. Rather, marketers need access to clean, integrated, and enriched data to develop a detailed understanding of cus-tomers to successfully execute targeted marketing campaigns.

Part of the challenge is that many marketers, especially those in B2B2C companies, work within a multichannel world in which intermediaries such as resellers manage the primary relationship with the end customer. As a result, customer data is often scattered across multiple systems, in varying formats, and with differing degrees of completeness and accuracy.

Worse yet, this bounty of data might be parsed in silos or owned outright by third parties. Indeed, a study by Forbes In-sights found that, on average, organizations use 36 different systems and vendors for data gathering related to marketing with some companies taking up to 200 feeds from channel in-termediaries. Consequently, integrating these silos should be a top priority for any marketer looking to drive revenue growth.

After all, the existence of behavioral, service, shipping, transactional, and warranty data on an organization’s custom-ers is of little value if its marketers can’t easily access that data. A lack of access to that valuable customer data can limit mar-keters’ efforts to non-targeted, above-the-line advertising. And, if this data resides in multiple systems across the organization, or in partners’ systems, marketers could be prevented from extracting value—and revenue—from it.

Take Oki Data Americas, for example. The manufacturer of printers relies on a vast, multi-tier distribution network composed of direct partners, resellers, and end users. In fact, a whopping 80% of Oki Data’s distribution chain consists of indirect partners, mak-ing it challenging to personalize marketing directly to end clients.

“Most of our business comes through our wholesale distrib-utors, so we don’t have a lot of direct visibility into our end us-ers,” says Carl Taylor, Oki Data’s vice president of marketing. “For us, it’s not as simple as extracting data from a database.”

So, Oki Data implemented an automated data quality solu-tion, which cleanses the data it receives from both direct and in-direct distributors on the products and services being sold. By eliminating duplicate accounts, and vetting data for errors, the solution has helped improve accuracy in responding to service situations, enhanced the sales team’s ability to record sales-out history, and simplified sales tracking information, Taylor says.

One view, many opportunitiesIn fact, by creating a comprehensive, integrated view of customers,

marketing teams such as Oki Data’s are not only better able to execute engaging campaigns, but also to increase the precision of analytics and provide more personalized customer experiences, as well as better support for channel partners. Marketers can accomplish this by cleaning, matching, and enriching informa-tion from a wide range of internal and external systems. The resulting single, complete, accurate, and duplicate-free customer view can then be linked to identify related records, such as those belonging to the same household. Suddenly, a hodgepodge of data is transformed into a customer view that is unique to that marketing team—a careful blend of information, context, and in-sight that’s not only actionable, but more important, profitable.

Another benefit of a connected customer view is that it allows marketers to be innovative. For instance, consider Red Roof Inn. The hotel operator is able to connect the data dots to pinpoint loyal customers whose canceled flights leave them stranded in cities it serves. Within seconds, the hotel chain can deliver a dig-ital alert to those customers’ smartphones, encouraging them to book a room for the night at the precise moment of truth.

The good news is that a growing number of marketers are recognizing the value of a single customer view for B2B2C marketing and are ready and willing to make the necessary changes to achieve it. In fact, according to Forbes Insights, 53% of executives surveyed consider gaining a single view of the customer a top priority.

So, how can marketers unite disparate data sources to cre-ate a holistic view of their customers and, in doing so, improve campaign performance, increase customer engagement, and drive revenue growth? The reality is that achieving this ho-listic view is easier and less costly than most marketers think. Indeed, organizations need not invest in expensive tools and technologies or allocate months, even years, to deploy them. And marketers need not rely on IT to solve their data-related problems; marketers can and should take control of their data to ensure that they can get the most from it at the exact mo-ment they need it.

Here are five actions marketers need to take to transform dirty, disjointed data into actionable information in a matter of weeks—resulting in deep insights that are at the core of de-livering connected, consistent customer communications that increase response and revenue.

1. Clean data thoroughly2. Integrate data across channels3. Match consumer records4. Enrich data with third-party details5. Make data actionable

Introduction

STEP 1:

Dirty data is more than just a nuisance; it’s a threat to even the most sophisticated marketing campaigns. That’s be-cause inaccurate, incomplete, and redundant data can skew a marketer’s perception of a customer, resulting in poorly targeted and misinformed communications.

For instance, the name Robert Smith can be represent-ed in many different ways – Rob, Bob, R. and B.Smith are all possible permutations. These names could also be contained in the wrong fields, and when you consider the additional challenges with address, telephone, email, and date-of-birth information, it’s clear that confidently identifying an individual is not a trivial exercise. Without context-sensitive data quality, these challenges can wreak havoc on a marketing team’s customer profiles and tar-geted campaigns and result in poorly targeted or dupli-cated communications.

Unfortunately, there are countless culprits of muddled data, from incomplete consumer records and sales agent ty-pos to poorly integrated contact information and contradic-tory inputs from CRM, ERP, and other systems. As a result, a marketing team may find itself saddled with many instanc-es of one profile, gender conflicts, and other inconsistencies. This is especially true in the case of B2B2C marketers where

third parties typically don’t validate the quality of their data before passing it along.

Consider, for example, Canon Europe, a subsidiary of Canon Inc. of Japan, a global provider of imaging and infor-mation technology solutions. Canon Europe needed a clear and consistent snapshot of its customers and distributors to set optimal sales targets and devise targeting strategies.

To improve data quality, the company turned to an au-tomated data quality solution. Boasting an extensive set of built-in data quality rules, the tool enabled Canon Europe to clean and standardise their customer data, locate dupli-cate customer records and quickly identify relationships between customers. As a result, Canon Europe can now create a link between a parent company retail customer and its subsidiaries. That link ensures that ship-to, bill-to, and ordered-by data are not held as separate records, but are matched to provide different views of the same record.

Cleansed and externally validated customer data has also helped Canon Europe learn the exact volume of prod-ucts each customer buys via which source, as well as which areas of the market its distribution partners service. This has led to improved channel coverage and has enhanced customer service.

Clean Data Thoroughly

Integrate Data Across Channels

STEP 2:

The next step in achieving a single customer view involves integrating data. As the volume of data grows, organizations need to consolidate this information across multiple platforms, third-party applications, operational systems, and geographies.

But folding all of an enterprise’s data into a single consis-tent record can seem daunting. After all, differences in the way things like salutations, names, and phone numbers are captured, coupled with inconsistencies across systems, can complicate the integration process. Fortunately, an automat-ed data quality solution can help.

Once data has been cleansed and standardized, it’s ready to be integrated so that it’s relevant and consistent across an entire enterprise. The right data quality tool can

quickly integrate a company’s myriad data types—from transactional and product, to warranty and customer ser-vice, to e-commerce data. Next, the solution can retrieve data from each of these channels, and then carefully as-semble it for a fully integrated view. From this, market-ers can begin to extract actionable customer insights and move one step closer to driving greater campaign ROI.

One benefit, for example, is to more easily identify your best customers. By attributing data from multiple customer touchpoints to master customer records in real time, mar-keters can quickly identify their best customers and contact them with unique communications, messaging, and oppor-tunities to maximize revenue.

Match Consumer Records

STEP 3:

Once data has been cleansed and integrated, there’s no guarantee of a single customer view. Matching customer data is the next, essential step. More than simply an im-pediment to deep customer insights, the failure to match data can result in unrecognized relationships, unnecessary inventory expenses, missed sales opportunities, and off-tar-get customer communications.

Luckily, there are ways to match, link, and merge data for optimized records. Take Porsche, for instance. The lux-ury sports car manufacturer recognized that its data formats and data quality varied across multiple systems. To gain a single customer view and receive the best return on its investment in a sophisticated CRM system, Porsche’s mar-keters knew that they would have to match its customers’ multiple records.

So, the Porsche team selected a data quality solution that automatically validates, updates, and qualifies customer re-cords with the correct name and address information, in the right language, across countries. This is especially im-portant since the United States, Canada, and Germany all represent strong markets for the car manufacturer.

By using a data quality tool to match consumer records across all systems, Porsche and its dealerships have achieved numerous benefits. For one, marketers across the globe can search for a customer in its CRM system with the certainty that they will access a full and accurate record. In fact, they can search millions of records in less than a second. And because data quality is being managed successfully, Porsche is now able to roll out its CRM system to other countries in a more timely and efficient manner.

Enrich Data With Third-Party Details

STEP 4:

Once data is cleansed, integrated, and matched, marketers can begin to connect more dots to gain a deeper under-standing of their customers. For example, a marketer may choose to link product data to particular customer segments to better identify which are more likely to make certain ad-ditional purchases.

Enriching their data allows marketers to bolster these ef-forts. Geolocation applications, social media channels, data brokers—they’re all excellent sources of third-party data that can immediately broaden a marketer’s view of a custom-er. Even basic information such as contact or demographic

details—including email address, age, or location—can help paint a more defined picture of a customer’s potential pur-chasing patterns and preferences. In turn, marketers can leverage this enriched data to create more relevant cam-paigns that promise a greater ROI.

Creating a single record for each customer has yet an-other benefit: It maximizes match rates to third-party data. This includes suppression files, which improves efficiency and compliance. For example, the ability to match custom-ers and prospects to do-not-call lists and deceased registers will reduce the risk of brand damage and fines.

STEP 5:

Now that data has been transformed from scattered bits and bytes into a platform to gain deep customer intelligence, it’s time for marketers to take action. There are a number of ways to leverage this actionable customer information, including:

Customer and distributor loyalty: By better under-standing buyer behavior, marketers can create more effec-tive customer and channel strategies among their most loyal customers and distributors.

Campaign success: Reduce the costs and improve the results of marketing campaigns with more accurate infor-mation. Is a particular customer segment more likely to respond to a direct email or one from a partner? How is Facebook driving traffic to your mobile app? Consolidated data can answer these questions and ensure that marketers meet customers where they are at the right time.

Customer experience: Slash the cost of site visits, war-ranty claims, and recalls while enhancing customer service. Additionally, clean and accurate data can help construct a single, comprehensive view of a customer that allows for data-driven personalization across all touchpoints.

Customer insights: Extract more actionable information about customer buying behavior and channel preference. Plus, stay up-to-date on those behaviors and preferences. Buying behavior and channel preferences can change over time. Failure to notice these fluctuations can lead to off-target customer communications. Fortunately, marketers can use rich customer data to spot a switch in channel preferences and changes in behavior.

Measurement and reporting: Improve visibility of cus-tomer data quality and enhance outputs without the need for high-priced, hard-to-use reporting tools.

Compliance and brand reputation: Keep customers, partners, and governing bodies happy by better complying with data privacy laws, partner expectations, and custom-er communication preferences. Additionally, better manage brand reputation by mining social data for actionable insight.

Create cross-selling and upselling opportunities: Sending customers personalized communications and of-fers related to their recent purchases can drive even great-er revenue.

Make Data Actionable

With actionable information at the ready, marketers can make better decisions on how to target customers, craft campaigns, and serve customers and partners better. It’s important for marketers to remember, though, that the right data quality solution shouldn’t require a steep learning curve or a lengthy deployment period. “Every enterprise is data-driven,” says Len Dubois, CMO of Tril-lium Software. “But organizations also need the proper expertise and resources to manage data effectively.” In fact, organizations should be able to get up and running within a matter of weeks and without a heavy reliance on IT for deployment and training. Such ease-of-use is especially critical as more and more business leaders take an interest in deriving greater value from customer data.

The right data quality tools and technologies, enable mar-keters to create a holistic customer view via the following steps.

1. Clean data thoroughly2. Integrate data across channels3. Match consumer records4. Enrich data with third-party details5. Make data actionable

Achieving a holistic view of customers is not only doable, it’s possible without investing in expensive technologies. With these five simple steps, an organization’s marketers can achieve a deep enough understanding of its customers’ needs, channel preferences, and even expectations to generate reve-nue, while providing marketing with the control of their client data and a solid foundation to support future big data sources as they arise.

Closing Thoughts

Trillium Software, a Harte Hanks company, is a leading provider of global enterprise data quality solutions. Our data quality spe-cialists help organizations achieve increased business from data management initiatives and business-critical processes by provid-ing innovative enterprise data profiling and cleansing software and services. Trillium offers industry-specific business solutions that help solve data problems experienced by marketing profession-als in all industries, including retail, consumer products, financial services, and telecommunications. Trillium’s full complement of technologies and services includes global data profiling, cleansing, enrichment, and linking for e-commerce, customer relationship management, Big Data, data governance, supply chain manage-ment, data warehousing, and other enterprise data initiatives.