Lyris just came out with a new campaign promoting the need to have a single, 360-degree, view of the customer.
Granted there is a lot of data available:
- Declared, or self-reported data
- Past purchase, or transaction data
- Behavioral data
While all of this data is wonderful to have and you can run all sorts of models and regression analysis to predict behavior, you cannot know what the customer is thinking.
Use the data that you have to start a dialogue with the customer, it is during this dialogue that you will gather insights that data alone cannot provide.
You’ll find out:
- Why customers are really buying your product or service
- What you provide that makes you different and better than your competitors
- Who your competitors are in the mind of your customer
- What you can do better to earn more of their business
- If they have told others about you — if not why, if so, what they said
- What can you do to lose them
When is the last time you talked to one of your customers?
Did you learn something the data wasn’t telling you?
