Customer Data Collection is Crucial... Here's Why

Collecting customer data is the single most important key to your marketing strategy. Without data, you’re marketing blindly, hoping to reach your target audience or persona. Many businesses that collect data don’t know what to do with it and end up only pulling it from a single source. Social media, email sign-ups, site usage, purchases, and feedback forms all offer valuable insight into whom you’re marketing to. If data collection isn’t a priority, it’s time to switch gears. Why base your marketing on what you think customers want when you could give them exactly what they want?

Customers Crave Personalization

Customer data collection might seem counter-intuitive in an era where privacy is a major issue. The truth is, customers crave personalization when it comes to marketing.

According to a study by Digitalist Magazine, 65% of customers were happy to share their information in exchange for more targeted marketing. Almost 67% were willing to share their data if they receive some form of benefit, such as discounts. When customers are willing to provide personal data for marketing purposes, why not collect it and use it for more targeted, strategic marketing?

Discover How To Improve

Consumer data collection gives you the opportunity to improve your marketing along with your products and services. For instance, sending out a survey to the most frequent buyers to ask about marketing preferences gives you valuable insight on how to improve, and customer data analysis can clue you into which channels work best. It also allows you to determine which channels are best when working together. Use the data you collect to fine-tune your marketing. 

Reach Your Audience On Their Terms

Do you know where the majority of your customers come from? If your marketing efforts are scattered across dozens of different channels, it’s not as effective as it could be. Your target audience isn’t on every channel. You might already know that a younger audience would be easier to reach on social media or streaming media. And that you're more likely to attract an older audience via email, traditional ads, and maybe one or two social networks. But consumer data collection can get you much further than this. Collect data about where your customers are coming from and analyze it. The more you know your customers, the easier it is to reach them.  

Without IT, The Competition Wins

Some marketers see big data as an obstacle instead of a valuable tool. But let me tell you, their opinion is your advantage. If you’re still on the fence, think of it this way - some of your biggest competitors are collecting data and using it for more targeted marketing, making their marketing budgets far more effective. They’re reaching more customers while you’re still busy trying to figure out why your marketing isn’t yielding the results you need.

Your Customers Are Ever-Changing

What your customers loved five years ago isn’t what they want today. Customers are constantly changing. For instance, 10 years ago, mobile marketing was barely a blip on the radar, but now, mobile’s overtaking desktops and turning into a massive marketing channel. If you’re using data collected years ago, you’re going to be out of touch with your customers. It’s 6-7 times more expensive to gain new customers than retain existing ones. To stay in touch, you need to constantly collect data to continue marketing to your existing customers.

Put Your Data To Use

You likely already have numerous data sources and all that's left to do is bring them all together. After all, data collection is all just preparation for analysis. And once you crunch the numbers? You use that data to build out a strategy and a website that speaks directly to your customers in the way they want to be spoken to.