Are you speaking to an audience of one? Or are you creating blanket, overwhelming, confusing and “throw everything including the kitchen sink” customer experiences?
Are you using your integrated online digital platform to truly connect with the human beings within your audience and online communities? Or are you getting so lost in the data, shiny objects, tools and gadgets that you are losing sight of why you are doing what you do in the first place?
Answer these questions…
- Do you know what data you have available at your fingertips to help you make better decisions and better serve your customer?
- Are you tapping into the power of data analytics and knowledge to better know your customer?
- Are you tapping into available insights to better service your communities via Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn or even Instagram?
- Are you using data to bring people together in online and social private communities such as Facebook and LinkedIn groups?
- Are you creating delightful, inspiring and memorable experiences that leave the reader, listener or video viewer at the edge of their seat waiting for the next segment?
- Do you have a plan for your ideal customers journey as they experience your brand real-time?
- Do you know what your ideal customer wants and needs from you? What keeps them up at night?
- Do you know how to solve your customers greatest problems?
- Do you know how to establish thought leadership in your niche or industry based on real data?
- Are you making data driven decisions that empower your executives, marketing team, sales team, customer service, human resources and customers to achieve more?
- Are you empowering your employees to be your best brand advocates? Are you giving them what they need to live your brand promise?
- Are you using data to work smarter, not just harder?
To get help answering these questions, join me at the ONE: TeraData Marketing Festival in Las Vegas
One to one marketing is not a new concept. I can remember the late 1990's when I worked at Message Media, one of the very first email marketing companies. I was blessed to have the benefit of working with Seth Godin and learning from Peppers and Rogers, early pioneers of one to one marketing. One to one marketing has always been in my DNA and I help our agency, Marketing Nutz, put human beings at the center of everything we say and do.
Although one to one marketing reads easy and should be a simple mindset and approach to connecting with customers in a human way, the truth is most marketers make it more difficult than it needs to be. Instead of using the most powerful technology and data at our fingertips to empower us to make smart decisions, we often let the data take us down ratholes and further away from the relationship we so want and desire with our customers and other humans who come in contact with our brand. Because of this many marketers shy away from data analytics as they don't want to be distracted from their core business or feel it is too complicated or “only for the big guys.”
Instead, regardless of industry or size of the organization, our goal should be to understand who are customer is, then inspire them to connect with us and come closer into our circle of empowerment and success. Only then can we better serve and delight them.
According to Wikipedia, Big Data can be defined as follows:
Big data is a broad term for data sets so large or complex that traditional data processing applications are inadequate. Challenges include analysis, capture, curation, search, sharing, storage, transfer, visualization, and information privacy. The term often refers simply to the use of predictive analytics or other certain advanced methods to extract value from data, and seldom to a particular size of data set. Source: Wikipedia
If you know me, you know I like to break things down, simplify the complex and put things in a nutshell for you.
Here are 10 easy ways you can use data and analysis to power up your brand.
If you are not already thinking about these things, you should be!
- Know your customer. Don't over complicate this. Get in the head of your customer. Know what keeps them up at night, what makes them happy at sunrise and everything in between.
- Design delightful customer experiences. One of your top goals as a digital marketer should be to create the most memorable customer experience possible. Customer experience is your brand.
- Competitive differentiation. When you better know your customer, better serve them and create amazing customer experiences you are immediately gaining an advantage because you are putting the customer first and going a big step beyond the status quo.
- Create new business models. By digging into the how, why and when of your market, customers and ecosystem you can better understand how you can serve them in unique, compelling and efficient ways.
- Improve customer service and communication. The more you understand your customer by diving deep into the data the better you can serve and communicate with them, period. This can help you increase customer satisfaction as well as the cost required to deliver an even better customer experience.
- Nail your product roadmap. Use customer insights to design a product roadmap your customers will be standing in line to devour.
- Speed time to market. By using insights early on in the product development and marketing planning process you can improve time to market by weeks, months or even years.
- Better prioritize everything. Data driven decisions bring me a peace of mind I can get from no other decision making source. If it's not a “heck ya, the data tells us we must do this,” then it's a no go for most major decisions.
- Monetize and maximize. By knowing what your customer wants, designing amazing user experiences and building on positive customers experiences, you can better leverage your entire digital and marketing platform to increase ROI and maximize investments already made in content, platform and the list goes on.
- Stomp the Random Acts of Marketing (RAMs). Random Acts of Marketing may feel good, but they will destruct any chance you have for a positive ROI of your digital marketing as you'll likely wind up spending too much time on things that aren't going to help you achieve your goals and objectives. Use the data to help you prioritize, maximize and stop the randomness in your business.
Bottom line, our businesses should be about serving our customers. Our focus should be on inspiring, connecting, innovating and designing experiences that help us connect one to one with anyone and everyone who comes in contact with our brand and the people within it.
Take your marketing to the next level!
Consider joining me at the One: Teradata Marketing Festival to dig deeper into these concepts. Isn't it time you reflect on every action and decision you are taking and make sure it is the right one?
Important Disclosure: I am partnering with Teradata for this post in support of the ONE: Teradata Marketing Festival in Las Vegas. All thoughts and opinions are my own.
