How to better manage and exploit your customer data with Customer Intelligence
The major developments in marketing over the last 15 years have led to a huge accumulation of customer data, but collecting data can be counter-productive if it's not done properly. When it is devoid of intelligence, raw data is of no value to the business.
To overcome this problem, B2B marketing experts have developed customer intelligence. This centralises and optimises all the customer data that is useful to the brand. As a result, advertising campaigns can be better targeted and generate more qualified leads.
The benefits of using customer intelligence don't stop there. This collection of useful data also makes it possible to respond better to consumer expectations and offer a much more efficient customer service. This customer-centric chain of events leads to greater customer loyalty, which is the end result synonymous with prosperity for all businesses.
How do you collect data? What tools should you use? And how do you incorporate this data into your digital strategy? Sélim Dahmani, Marketing Manager at HubSpot, answers these questions.
The importance of collecting data
Data collection is a vast and complex process that involves gathering as much useful information as possible about your customers and prospects.
It is carried out using tools that retrieve and centralise information from different sources. This information can provide precise indications of the company's success factors, as well as its inefficiencies. It is used in management to improve decision-making.
A CRM is a platform that centralises all your customer data in a single piece of software. In Hubspot CRM, for example, contact information sheets show recorded information such as pages visited, e-mails opened, products purchased or subscriptions in progress, and much more.
Customer opinion at the heart of the marketing strategy
With data collection, the consumer becomes a player. Gathering customer opinions makes them feel valued and shows them that their opinion counts.
The figures are clear: companies that implement a customer insight strategy achieve a 30-50% improvement in satisfaction.
By targeting the needs of increasingly demanding consumers, it is much easier to meet their expectations.
What data should you collect?
To find out more about your customers, you need to collect accurate data. The usefulness of this data varies from one business sector to another. So it's important to focus on the information that is most relevant to your business. Generally speaking, there are 4 main types of Customer Intelligence data:
- transactional data relating to customers' purchase history,
- Behavioural data, which shows what customers do on your website,
- Demographic data, which tells you more about individual customers,
- Psychographic data to understand why people make certain decisions by examining the customer's interests, opinions and activities.
While not all data carries the same weight, it's important to remember that the more you learn about your customers, the better you'll be able to meet their expectations.
Here are some typical data to collect about your contacts:
- Contact information: surname, first name, address, telephone number and e-mail address make it easy to communicate with the customer and personalise your exchanges.
- Information specific to your business: this depends on the nature of your business. A clothing shop will need to know the sizes of its customers, while a shoe retailer will need to investigate the shoe size of each of its customers.
- Customer history data: this information relates your customers' experience of your business. It includes, for example, their opinions, any problems they may have encountered and the reasons why they may have switched to a competitor.
- Personalisation data: to improve your customer relations in the long term, it's important to show that you're interested in them. Birthday, number of people in the household, favourite sports team.
- Usage data: depending on the sector of activity, it may be relevant to track a customer's expected pre- or post-purchase actions, such as the purchase of top-ups or the use of a maintenance or repair service.
In the case of a subscription, this could mean using the service offered; in the case of an application, it could mean downloading, frequency of use, downloads or even invitations to other users.
All this information makes it possible to further personalise your relationship with the customer and show them that you care.
While collecting this information requires the accumulation of a large amount of data, it is important not to collect it all at once.
Consumers are too busy to be inclined to respond to long, tedious questionnaires. The need for information is great, but it must be collected sparingly so as not to exert too much pressure.
As is often the case, it is necessary to prioritise quality over quantity.
Centralising data to improve customer service
To receive the rapid, personalised responses that customers demand, it is imperative to have access to all their data efficiently.
By centralising data and customer service channels, you will be able to optimise each of your exchanges. This efficiency enables you to meet the expectations of the most demanding consumers and build loyalty.
Customer service software that centralises data is therefore essential.
Hub Services offers numerous possibilities for personalising exchanges with customers. It also enables you to carry out satisfaction surveys and offers dashboards with comprehensive reports using the most important data.
CRM as a reference point
The acronym CRM stands for Customer Relationship Management. It is a customer relationship management tool that improves relations between a company and its customers.
It considerably improves customer follow-up by centralising data. A CRM also offers the possibility of personalising exchanges. It saves your sales teams time by automating certain tasks that can be time-consuming.
The automation process is risky. By trying too hard to save time and generate sales at all costs, the customer can suffer. CRM software makes it easy and effective not to neglect the personalised aspect of your dealings with your customers.
CRM at the heart of your marketing strategy
This tool provides companies with a 360° view of customer data and an overview of the relationship with each customer.
It facilitates the transfer of information between your company's various departments on the development of a customer relationship. Its use is therefore central to your marketing strategy, since it enables you to optimise your business and respond precisely to customer expectations.
The role of CRM software therefore focuses as much on acquiring new leads as it does on making sales and monitoring the customer relationship, leading to customer loyalty.
But you still need to choose the right software. It is essential to opt for a comprehensive tool that will enable you to manage all your data and use it intelligently. Choosing the CRM best suited to your needs is therefore an important step in implementing this type of software within your organisation.
Marketing software: the key to converting customers
As many as 30% of marketing departments fail to understand their prospects because of the number of sources of information, according to Cyber Sphere.
Attracting qualified leads is one thing, converting them into customers is quite another. The use of CRM software also has its place in the way a marketing team establishes its strategy and vision.
The benefits of such a tool are not limited to customer knowledge. They also affect the finances of marketing departments. Those who use CRM software reduce their budget costs by 23% while increasing efficiency (source: Cloudswave).
As a complement to a good CRM, the use of marketing software enables you to take advantage of all the information stored specifically for your marketing department. This centralisation of tools and data in a single platform allows marketers to save time and better target their campaigns thanks to more intelligent use of customer data.
Software for sales
To improve the structure of your sales managers' approaches, you need to free up more of their time.
This improved sales strategy gives them greater efficiency and a better conversion rate. Sales CRM software gives your sales people a 360° view of the status of each prospect on a daily basis.
This enables them to focus their efforts on those most likely to be converted into customers. While 22% of salespeople still don't know what CRM software is (source: Hubspot), those who do use it exceed their annual sales target by more than 24% (source: Aberdeen Group).
Customer data as a source of information
To ensure maximum efficiency, your CRM software must be able to access certain data sources. These sources offer a rich array of information about your customers.
Three of these are essential for gathering intelligent data that will help you to better interact and target your customers' needs.
Social networks
In 2021, France will have 49.6 million active users of social networks. This represents 75.9% of the population, or 3 out of 4 French people. Smartphones have truly become democratised, with 95.7% of French people aged 26 to 64 owning one.
French internet users spend an average of 5 hours 37 minutes a day surfing the web, including 1 hour 41 minutes on social networks. These figures show just how attached your customers are to social platforms. Whether it's Facebook, WhatsApp, Instagram or Tweeter, to name but a few, they deliver valuable information.
It therefore seems logical that a connection between social networks and your platform should provide intelligent data on the decisions you need to make to satisfy your customers. This relevant data can also be used to better target your prospects and more easily convert them into customers.
Open data
Sites such as data.gouv.fr and INSEE represent huge open databases.
Your customer's postal address will give you access to a vast amount of information about their neighbourhood and the potential customers around them.
It is possible, for example, to obtain an overview of the socio-demographic profiles of the inhabitants of this district or the region, and to extrapolate an estimate of their income and tastes. This data can be used to fine-tune marketing targeting and predict buying behaviour.
The Look-alike
The Look-alike data source is a household name.
After importing a list of your existing customers, it offers you a selection of other similar individuals on a specific point that you define. You can then integrate them into your CRM to include them in your next marketing campaigns.
Enrich the customer experience with data
86% of consumers recognise that personalisation influences their purchasing decision, and personalised messages are said to be responsible for a 125% increase in the likelihood of purchase (source: Infosys). These figures seem staggering, but what could be more logical at a time when customers are becoming increasingly demanding?
Personalised, consistent and contextualised interactions with the brand have become the norm. CRM software allows you to collect and analyse intelligent customer data from a variety of sources. Using this data, your marketers and sales people can unearth more leads and sell more products or services.
But all this data doesn't just have a role to play upstream of the customer. It's part of an inbound cycle that also involves building customer loyalty.
The three phases of the cycle are: Attract, Interact and Retain. CRM software and intelligent data collection enable you to increase your efficiency in each phase of the cycle.
As far as loyalty is concerned, this will be handled by the company's customer service department. If your customer service is effective, there's no reason why the customer shouldn't use your services again. And that means knowing exactly what your customers want, need and feel after they have made a purchase.
Of course, for data to play its decisive role in the customer experience, it is essential to put the customer at the centre of the business. Good internal communication and the correct transmission of information are therefore essential. To facilitate exchanges, a common platform such as CRM is a major asset.
Article translated from French