Our Value Proposition with RENDER includes providing a workspace to store, collaborate, and access both Value Propositions and customer feedback across the organization. As a SaaS platform, it then changes the way companies and customers work together. It allows users to work from anywhere, as long as they have high speed wireless internet and a tablet or smartphone. In a web environment, organizations also have the ability to connect various applications to allow data to flow across their systems. But what kind of data are we talking about here?
With all the talk of the Big Data opportunity for marketing in 2014, I would argue it’s not a big data opportunity but a “relevant, real-time data” opportunity.
John Slitz, CEO of Spacecurve, wrote an article in Wired.com about businesses creating value from data in real time:
The best business manager predicts the future, introducing products and services to exploit new opportunities, overcoming the challenges that restrict that execution, and out-thinking the competition.... Combining stored data with new, real-time information sources to create more complete and up-to-date views of opportunities and risks will change how predictions are made about businesses and markets, what products and services to offer, to whom, and when to change those products and services.
Slitz’s takeaway is that businesses that act quickly will reap the greatest rewards from data. Those businesses will assess opportunities faster to make decisions more quickly and drive greater value.
Data to Understand the Customer’s Business Challenges
With RENDER we have developed what companies like GE, Owens Corning, and Philips consider the best customer data approach for B2B. The reason is that the data is focused on growth solutions for the customers, not measuring customer satisfaction.
By turning a Value Proposition into a data object rather than a simple positioning statement, RENDER provides a structure to get direct, relevant intelligence on the things you invest in that help the customer’s bottom line vs. their alternatives. The customer data is not just about the historical relationship, but more importantly forward-looking and actionable to understand the customer’s challenges.
For companies using RENDER, this work is more than just data gathering. It is a customer engagement activity that provides a better approach for making decisions on the feedback. Sales reps can have a structured conversation with their customers and by gathering feedback on the Value Proposition, their organization will understand it better to act on it more quickly. The point here is, by framing these listening sessions around the Value Proposition, a company can make better decisions on what to invest in to improve the Value Proposition and help their customers make more money.
As Slitz points out: “Insights from data are going to the people who ask the best questions, have problems they want solved, look at the different areas of information they need, and come up with better ideas based on the clearer reality they are seeing.” RENDER is helping companies discover how their product/service offerings are working for customers and what their customers’ priorities are for better products and services. Combined with the data capture, aggregation, and analysis tools, RENDER as a SaaS platform then provides Marketers, Account Managers, Product Managers — any Value Proposition owner — easy access to customer feedback and insights on a Value Proposition. Doing so makes the data relevant in real-time so that companies can focus on acting quickly instead of just gathering it.
I may be dating myself, but when I think about what RENDER does with data, I can’t help but think of the Six Million Dollar Man....We have the technology. We have the capability to make it better than it was before. Better, Stronger, Faster.
How are you using Big Data today? Tell us what you think.
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