Effective Marketing Strategies with Big Data – There is no point in denying that every business runs around data. According to Forrester report, found that between 60% to 73% of information in an enterprise is left unused. From this, it is evident that the realization of the importance of data is just not enough. Organizations need to convert these realizations into practical applications and find ways to make the best use of the data they have.
We can list out thousands of ways by which an organization can benefit from data. One of the common areas where a lot of data can be put to use for multiple purposes is marketing.
Let’s face it. Marketing is the eyes, ears and mouth of an organization. It is one of the hotspots for the collection of data as well as one of the critical areas where data analytics can be applied practically. Just talking about data analysis in marketing brings to the mind numerous ways in which the results can be used for enriched marketing efforts.
In marketing, the applications of big data analytics are useful at every stage of the customer journey cycle. Further, when we take a look at the broader sense of the data analysis, you can come up with fascinating discoveries that can change the landscape of how you view your customers.
In this article, let’s see some of the best ways to use big data for marketing to get quick, assured and long-standing results and the right ways to handle the data for marketing.
Data Structuring for Easy Analysis
One of the major problems that marketers face with handling data is its structuring. When the data is unstructured, the analysis derived from it may not be trusted. A clutter of data, no matter how much ever valuable it is, cannot be used unless it is structured from its raw form to usable data.
Sometimes, there can also be inconclusive data that may not be all that reliable. For example, when you send out a brochure of your product to a prospect, you may not precisely know what the reaction is, or may not have any foolproof way to find that out. All you can do is speculate or think about formatting some plans to get the exact reliable data. Such kind of unstructured data should be dealt with to get a linear system of data processing.
· Creating Data Pool
The best way to deal with such unstructured data is to create a data pool. This data pool is formed by data points that are taken from the unstructured data. Creating such data pools will help you to approximately gauge the response from the unstructured data and use it as a part of the analysis.
However, you cannot use this data pool to find out emotional responses. During such cases, surveys can help.
· Using Surveys and Polls
How much ever you try, you can never know what runs in the mind of the people, especially their emotional responses. If you want to know how they felt after seeing your brochure, your email or any other similar online content, then you can only understand when they tell it to you directly.
Surveys and polls are a sure way to avoid the speculation and understand what the customers feel right from their mouth. The results of the pools will already be structured and can be used for data analysis.
· Leveraging Machine Learning
When you already have an ample amount of valuable unstructured data present, then machine learning is the best solution. As a part of the data preparation process, machine learning tools can be used to structure the data. By continually monitoring the data and learning from it, Artificial Intelligence combined with machine learning, can be the next step to structure the data as and when they come in.
Customer Segmentation for Maximizing Marketing Efforts
For any business, understanding who and where their ideal customers are is essential. Answering these two questions is just a start. Customer segmentation goes beyond the usual issues of who and where and knows more about the behaviour of the customers, how they operate, what they like and dislike, and so on.
Identifying all of this information is only possible through data analysis. When you have a clear idea of who your product or service caters to, half of your marketing work is already done! You can easily craft marketing campaigns that appeal to the ideal audience in the exact way they can be impressed. Considering to DMA, 77% of ROI gets from segmented, targeted and applied campaigns. When you have a precise customer segmentation, then your marketing campaigns are easily simplified and you can get high revenue for a little investment.
The customer segmentation can be made possible by:
· Integration
Customer segmentation requires complete information from all your customers. The first thing to do is to integrate all the platforms across the same medium. This will help to avoid redundant data and get a better grasp of the customer activities relating it from one platform to another.
If you are using any CRM software, then you can use it as the single point contact where all the data from multiple sources come in. You can analyze the gaps wherein you need data, set up systems to track the user behaviour to fill in the gap and understand the overall data collected.
· Analyzing User Behaviour
One thing we need to remember is that the customer segmentation doesn’t always stay constant. So you need to regularly keep analyzing the behaviour of the customers to see if your strategies still fit. Occasionally, you should also conduct an extensive analysis of users and see if any new customer segments are a match with your offerings.
You can analyze the user behaviour in the usual way you analyze the data. Just collect the data from social media, websites, emails and other platforms to get the whole picture of the user behaviour and find out any chances of including new prospects.
· Forecasting the Trends
This can seem like a stretch from the customer segmentation, but forecasting the changes in the customer taste can be a lot of help. You never know how your target customers can change and the influence it can have on your sales. It’s best to be wary of such changes before it hits you right in the face. Have awareness about the changes going on not only in your industry but also in other domains which are connected with yours.
Targeted Campaigns for Maximizing ROI
It’s an utter waste of time to keep hitting on random people with your marketing campaigns. When you know who your customers are and where most of them are present, then it is time to hit that place, be it online or offline marketing. For example, if you are a retail clothing company and has a lot of superhero garments, then having a stall in the Comic-Con is a great marketing move.
· Targeting Trends
Marketing is a time-constraint job and the major trend that the whole world was talking about yesterday will be long gone the next day. It’s vital to work faster and focus when it comes to getting ahead of the trends or, at the very least, ready to take advantage of the trends when it’s in the peak.
· Personalized Content
When you target the customers and create content just for them, it feels personalized, which is a turning point for the leads to convert. Instead of sending out some generic stuff to your targets or just copying the exact strategy of the competition, it’s important to work with the interests and behaviour of the targeted segment.
It’s one thing to learn from the actions of your competitors, but it’s another to mimic it. You can see a lot of online e-commerce websites showing recommendations but only a few can ace it as Netflix does. Therefore, make sure to keep yours in line with what the target audience wants to see, which may or may not be what your competition is doing.
Conclusion
When you want the marketing strategies to work, then you need to concentrate on three things – relevancy of time, content and people. All of these three are not simply obtained and require the help of data to maximize the results of the marketing campaigns.
Make sure to create data pools, segment the customers and target them with personalized content in every single one of your marketing moves. Keep collecting data for marketing, trying to find out new means to appeal to your target audience and keep an eye on the changing landscape of your industry.
The applications of big data in marketing are ever-changing and the more you try to include the data-driven approach, the better it will be for the ROI of the entire organization. With artificial intelligence and machine learning coming close up behind big data to help with marketing, take the most advantage of it before your competitors do.
