Big data has been getting a lot of press lately. There’s a whole treasure trove of information you can use for your email marketing campaigns. You can look at everything from customer purchase history, to what similar customers bought, to a customer’s behavior on your site.
But it would seem that this data is a big mess because most of it is unrefined and un-actionable. Forth-five percent of marketers said they lacked the capacity to analyze big data, in a survey by the Economist’s Intelligence Unit. Even fewer marketers are able to take action on those insights.
If you do want to get insights into this data and segment your customers, you need to do large data aggregation. This is costly, time-consuming and difficult to see results from.
But does data have to be big? Or is there a different way of using ecommmerce data to get better marketing results?
“Why should marketers use big data to look in the rear-view mirror?” asks Eddy Swindell, Head of Sales and Marketing at UK-based Triggered Messaging. “We should look at what consumers are doing now.”
The power of real-time data
Real-time data can be used to segments your audience based on their previous behavior.
Have a new customer who just made their first purchase? Offer them a discount code to come back, increasing their Lifetime Value. Are they a highly loyal customer? You could invite them to an exclusive event. What have your customers been browsing? You can include these product details in your bulk emails.
