helping you master customer insight leadership

Using Database Marketing, are you at the rear of the pack?

Using database marketingEarlier this month we launched a quick poll, to find out how you were using Database Marketing.

Focussing on actual usage in your business, today, the poll asked about outbound & inbound marketing.

Two other questions also covered use of database marketing techniques to coordinate multi-channel interactions, as well as marketing effectiveness data capture.

The first point of interest is much lower participation in this poll, compared to previous ones covering analytics or customer insight.

Perhaps practical application of data & analytics to make your marketing more profitable is still less trendy that new words & shiny new apps.

Anyway, thanks to those of you who did participate, as the answers provided give an indicative warning. That warning is that DBM usage is still behind the best practice being preached. (more…)

How strong is your database marketing benchmark?

database marketing benchmarkFollowing the success of our latest ‘applications of analytics’ poll, this month it’s time to gather a database marketing benchmark.

How advanced is your use of database marketing techniques?

Do you have the basics in place? Are you targeting inbound & outbound contacts? Are you coordinating or optimising across all channels?

There are some very impressive technology solutions available today in this space. Vendors can easily bedazzle you with targeting, optimisation & real-time capabilities, often now positioned as how to manage the ongoing ‘conversations’ with your customers.

However, my consultancy work with a number of clients leads me to believe many firms still lack the basics or at least a minimum standard across all channels.

So, let’s see behind what today’s sophisticated CRM & Marketing Automation software can do, to what is happening in practice in businesses like yours. (more…)

Is your use more advanced than our analytics poll results?

Analytics PollThanks to everyone who has already completed our latest analytics poll, on real world usage.

If you haven’t yet recorded your scores, there’s still time (you can complete it here). But, with over 35 votes already in, I thought it worth sharing some interim results with you.

During the same week, I was reading a report from IBM as to the ‘real world use of big data in financial services‘. Although a number of sources in this report were from older surveys, circa 2012, their work with Said Business School in Oxford looks robust & relevant.

So, as an interesting backdrop to the results of our survey, here is a graph from IBM (comparing % of firms in Financial Markets using different analytics capabilities with a Global cross-industry selection): (more…)

How do you benchmark on our latest analytics poll?

analytics pollThis month we will focus more on analytics. Following last year’s analytics poll, concerning which software you use, this time we turn to the topic of what you do with it.

Akin to the different interpretations of what “Customer Insight” means, I find different leaders focus on different types of analytics to guide their businesses.

Even if we focus on analytics to inform marketing, there is a growing array of analytical approaches & statistical methods from which to choose. So, to help inform our content & hopefully pique your interest, today’s analytics poll will check who is using the methods I’ve seen prove effective. Are you ahead of the curve or missing a trick?

Time to take our latest analytics poll & benchmark yourself against other Customer Insight Leaders… (more…)

Your goals for 2016, keeping focussed on value & growth

goalsThanks to all of you who participated in this year’s annual survey of Customer Insight goals.

Looking at the results, the first thing that strikes me is the similarity of results to the ones you chose last year. So, there is definitely a theme of consistency. It seems many of you continue to be prioritising making a measurable commercial difference in your businesses and investing in your own leadership ability.

Alongside that consistency, there is also more variety in goals selected this year.

After the top two, a wider range of options have been chosen for joint third place. This perhaps reflects both the growing diversity of our readers and the greater breath and diversity in their roles.

Having talked to many insight leaders over the last year, especially across Financial Services, it seems no one preferred structure of resourcing model has emerged. There are leaders with a primarily database-marketing, analytics, data or research focus, fewer with combinations of those remits & many with other responsibilities in their ‘mix’ (like BI, reporting, risk, customer experience, strategy or operational efficiency). (more…)

How will you resource your insight team this year?

How will you resourceContinuing our January theme of goals & planning, how will you resource people to do the work?

Amidst the merry-go-round of new business objectives, targets & budget allocation that can keep many a leader busy in January, there is the question of who? Who will do the work? Probably accompanied by how many people will there be in my team and do they have the skills & motivation they need? At first this can all feel rather daunting. But it will be helped by first being clear on your goals. If you know what matters most & why, you’re in a better place to make those ever tricky people decisions.

Staffing your team up to do this has more potential options than in years past. With more data, analytics & research agencies, consultancies, contractors & sometimes difficulties with recruitment – which route to take requires some thought. Talking with leaders, it sounded like different businesses favoured different resourcing models, but it was unclear which was most popular.

For that reason, towards the end of 2015, we ran a survey amongst our readers about Customer Insight team resourcing models. Thanks to all of you who took part. The time has come to share those results. (more…)

What are your goals for Customer Insight success in 2016?

goals for customer insight successIt’s that time again, when we ask for your goals for Customer Insight success this year.

Last year, you voted fairly consistently for two priorities to deliver in 2015. First, was a measurable commercial difference in your business that could be attributed to Customer Insight, e.g. demonstrate value-add. Second, was to make time for your own leadership development, or as Stephen Covey would put it, “Sharpen the Saw”.

Both these made good sense & colloquially I’ve heard that a number of you made good progress on the former, but still struggled to protect time for the latter. Was that true for you in 2015? What are you going to do differently in 2016 to achieve more? (more…)