I just attended the BMA Chicago breakfast where Andrew Dorn of Acxiom presented “Using Data to be a Customer-Centric Company”. The presentation was focused on the B2B side of business rather than B2C. This point alone made the presentation interesting. Acxiom, a giant of data in B2C is now focusing on the B2B conversation. Here are my takeaways:
- Customer Centric equals Data: To be customer centric you need data about your customer. The data must be used in decision making and problem solving. If this is not happening, then any claim to be customer centric is suspect. The case examples of using data in B2C are well documented and the benefits compelling: Marketing ROI up 15% to 30%, Profitability up 10% to 15%, Pricing Power up 5% to 7%.
- Wallowing in B2B: It seems like we are still wallowing in B2B when it comes to customer data. I don’t know how else to say it. I think a growing population believes more customer data needs to be used in B2B decision making and problem solving. And I think that same population can see the opportunity new technology tools are creating to capture and use customer data. But in B2B, the concept of customer data is complicated by the number of participants in the value chain. In so many B2B value chains there are four to five companies represented between raw materials to product/service to consumer. If you are 2 steps away from the consumer, then having a big consumer database may not be very insightful unless you can connect that to data about the two companies between you and the consumer. If we have data about the problems and challenges of each of the value chain steps, together with a big consumer database we are set to solve problems. Getting that done is not so easy….but a fun challenge!
It's great to see Acxiom in the conversation. Thanks Andrew!
Comments