6 questions to understand marketing data
When someone says "marketing data" to you, you don't really know what they're talking about? Are you using Excel to manage your customer data? You don't know how to collect, sort or analyze information about your prospects? This article on marketing data should interest you: we explain it all in 6 simple questions!
What is marketing data?
Marketing data refers to all the information collected on your prospects, customers, products or services.
You can collect "basic" data, such as surname, first name, postal address, telephone number or e-mail address. Some information is more qualified, such as household structure, interests, purchase frequency or Customer Lifetime Value (i.e. the estimated total profit generated by a consumer over the course of his or her commercial relationship with a company).
As you will have noticed, this data can be qualitative (consumer behavior and habits in relation to a product) or quantitative (average basket size, etc.). To be able to analyze this information, it needs to be grouped together in a single medium, the database.
Do I need a marketing database?
Are you wondering what action to propose, at the right time, to the right profile, using the right channel? It's by collecting, sorting and analyzing data that you'll be able to make more informed choices.
Data is used to better understand consumer behavior during the buying process, from acquisition to loyalty. This enables you to tailor your marketing and sales strategies to their habits and needs.
With the personalization of services and the increasing volume of data, data management has become essential to business development.
As you can see, having a marketing database is a considerable asset when it comes to communicating and selling more strategically.
How do you collect marketing data?
Generally speaking, you'll find two types of sources for collecting your marketing data:
- Direct sources: this is data directly provided by your target, prospect or customer. You can collect this data by setting up a newsletter or form on your site, creating a lead magnet (high value-added content obtained by a visitor in exchange for their contact details) or registering for a webinar.
- Indirect sources: these are the information you obtain through tracking. We're talking here about the famous "cookies" that collect data from visitors to your website, the pixels on Facebook or the statistics obtained from Google Analytics.
To collect data directly from the source, you can also ask for customer testimonials, carry out surveys on social networks, or conduct discovery calls with your prospects. Satisfaction surveys are another way of gathering information.
How do you sort your marketing data?
To be usable, marketing data must be centralized, hosted and structured on specific software: a marketing database, or marketing CRM. The reliability of a database depends on your ability to sort the data:
- Clean your data: depending on your marketing objectives, the challenge will be to take stock of complete or missing, correct or incorrect information. This will also enable you to avoid duplicates and eliminate anomalies.
- Reconcile data: the aim is to group together and homogenize data of an identical nature, but coming from different collection channels (direct or indirect sources, online or offline).
- Update the database: by its very nature, a database is dynamic, as new data is constantly being introduced. Some information already in your CRM may also change. You need to take the time to check the accuracy of your customer and prospect data.
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How to make the most of a marketing database?
Once you've created your database and collected the information you need, the next step is to make the most of it.
To make the right decisions, identify your marketing hypotheses upstream, then define your KPIs (Key Performance Indicators). Without these performance indicators, it will be difficult to properly analyze your data and make comparisons! Most software packages include a dashboard, essential for steering your decisions.
We recommend A/B testing your marketing hypotheses. The aim is to compare two versions of an experience (e.g. the texts of an advertising campaign), a product or a medium (e.g. a lead magnet) to identify the most effective.
How to produce a good marketing report?
The principle of data visualization encompasses all the techniques used to present your marketing data visually (and strategically).
The objectives are manifold:
- Make data easier to understand
- Refocus presentation on the essentials
- Eliminate superfluous data
Should you use a pie chart or a curve? A bar chart or a histogram? An infographic or a simple Excel table? You'll need to adapt the marketing reporting medium to your audience (management, sales or marketing teams), the type of data to be represented and the marketing objective set.
Beware: the wrong medium can distort understanding, and even lead to poor strategic decisions, as was the case with the Challenger space shuttle (a real textbook case of data reporting!). At the time, the disaster could have been avoided if NASA hadn't turned a blind eye to the numerous engineering reports warning of a possible crash...
IN FINE
As an essential component of a company's strategy, the database is the key to the success of your future marketing actions. It will enable you to better segment your contacts, target their profile and personalize your content to optimize your sales.
