Customer Analytics – Win Your Customers and Increase Revenue
Corporations across the globe are trying their best to look at the business from a customer-centric view. This exercise opens for them a window to peek into the interests of their clientele and create policies accordingly. But in today’s volatile business environment judgments built simply from past experience or intuition is increasingly unreliable. Customers today are more connected and empowered. Access to the internet all the time has allowed them to become more specific about their needs. They are aware of everything that is trending in the market. In such a scenario it becomes important for a business owner to predict a customer’s response with respect to his organization. The deeper businesses understand their customers’ preferences and lifestyle habits, the more they are able to attract potential buyers. However, it is not as simple as it seems. It is a big challenge for organizations to understand customer feedback, behavior and needs, well enough so as to make data-driven decisions about what customers are likely to respond to or what they are likely to purchase. Customer analytics or customer data analytics is that significant insight gained with the help of data science, that allows businesses to use customer data in order to make key business decisions. The information obtained from the process is used for designing effective marketing campaigns, site selection, customer relationship management, and secure decisions for the future. Insights pertaining to the customer’s feedbacks and responses drive the organizations to directions that help them outperform their competitors. Strategizing everything beginning from their production to their supply far before the demand arises, helps them improve their key performing metrics. Why Do We Need Customer Analysis? We already know how important customers are to any business. But knowing how to attract more customers and retaining existing ones is easier said than done. Using customer analysis helps get a better insight into what a customer wants and how we can keep them happy. Increase Customer Retention Rate Around 82% of businesses said that retaining customers is cheaper than acquiring new ones. Moreover, 65% of sales come from existing customers. Having repeat customers is good for the business. But, for this to happen, providing the customers with what they want is important. You have to understand their product preferences, their expectations from your business and find ways to prevent them from going to your competitors. Customer analysis helps answer these questions and increase the retention rate. The more you know your customers, the better you can meet their expectations. Better Customer Segmentation Segmenting customers and grouping them into different categories helps in targeted campaigning. There are different ways to segment customers- Segmenting customers into neat categories is possible only when you know enough about them and their preferences. Consumer data points are vital metrics that provide insights into customer preferences and behavior. The data points give enterprises a picture of the products preferred by customers, the frequency of purchase/ usage, and most used features/ functionalities, and so on. Customer analysis gives you the insights needed to know your customers. Develop Personalized Marketing Strategies Once you segment customers and prospective leads, you can plan a comprehensive marketing campaign for each segment. For example, sending emails to a customer who is old-fashioned and doesn’t check emails every day is not an effective marketing strategy. From choosing the marketing channel to determining the type of approach, customer analysis can help your sales and marketing teams fine-tune promotional tactics to increase market reach, sales, and returns. It also helps in understanding the market trends in relation to customer preferences. Accurately Predict Customer Behavior Customer behavior is hard to predict without using historical and real-time data. Customers decide whether or not to buy a product based on several factors. Customer behavior is broadly classified into the following- Reduce Customer Acquisition Costs As already discussed, acquiring a new customer is an expensive affair. However, knowing what the target audiences want can help reduce the acquisition costs. This is very useful for SMEs as they tend to have limited budgets for marketing and promotions. Acquiring customers means you need to spend on building a brand image that aligns with the preferences of your target audiences. Customer analysis provides you with the necessary information. For example, sustainability and eco-friendliness are being given more importance by some customers. If the target customer base is eco-conscious, emphasizing transparency in the supply chain and highlighting the use of sustainable resources will help build the brand image as an eco-friendly business. Enhance Customer Services Almost 90% of companies say that customer experience is the key to customer retention. Contented customers are more likely to stay with the business or come back even if they exhibit variety-seeking behavior. Even if your products are of good quality and match customers’ tastes, but your customer service doesn’t meet their expectations, you are at a high risk of losing your consumer base. Customer analysis allows you to streamline your customer service department and empower the agents to be more efficient at work. The insights derived from customer feedback will tell you exactly what is annoying them or what they expect for your customer service agents. You can use this information to hire more agents or train them to effectively deal with customers’ queries and complaints. Accurate Sales Forecasting When you acquaint yourself with your customers thoroughly, you can accurately predict the percentage of sales a product will generate. This helps in manufacturing, maintaining inventory levels, and calculating profits. Sales forecasting usually uses data from CRM systems, sales teams, and finance departments to get the complete picture. Moreover, enterprises can save money when making large investments in a product or service. Revamped Product Portfolio What if your customers want more features from your products? Could that be the reason they aren’t buying your products? Maybe your competitor offers more choices in terms of color, sizes, designs, etc. Customer analysis also helps in making changes to your products and revamping your product portfolio. The customer analysis reports can aid your R&D teams
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