Predictive analytics uses data about customers to help brands better understand their customers and build stronger relationships with them. This allows brands to personalize their marketing, improve customer retention, and gain insights for new product development. The document discusses how predictive analytics provides benefits such as increasing brand awareness, shaping brand preference, cultivating brand influencers, and collaborating on product development. It also outlines four steps for brands to start adopting predictive analytics, such as promoting a cultural shift to more individual customer relationships and acquiring a better understanding of customer behavior through data analytics.
Power to the People: Customer Care and Social MediaCognizant
The growth of social media, including Facebook and Twitter, offers many opportunities for businesses to connect with customers. Nonetheless, most companies still view social media as an extension of their traditional sales and marketing efforts; few are using social media to strengthen customer care and offer customers consistent, seamless and satisfying experiences.
The benefits of a predictive online reputation management process, including a robust response mechanism, pay off in averting or smoothing any brand reputation crises. This whitepaper explains how to set up such a reputation management process.
Apps for the Connected World: Supercharge Customer Data with Code HalosCognizant
By making meaning from the data that swirls around every digital interaction, companies can gain unprecedented insight into what customer and prospects want and value, essentially what makes them "tick."
The Robot and I: How New Digital Technologies Are Making Smart People and Bus...Cognizant
Our latest study shows that when enterprise robots are applied to automating core business processes, they can extend the creative problem-solving capabilities and productivity of human beings and deliver superior business results.
Digital Marketing in Banking: Evolution and RevolutionCognizant
Proving the effectiveness of bank marketing strategies beyond brand-building has always been a challenge. Now, several converging forces may help propel marketing forward as a revenue source rather than a cost center.
Power to the People: Customer Care and Social MediaCognizant
The growth of social media, including Facebook and Twitter, offers many opportunities for businesses to connect with customers. Nonetheless, most companies still view social media as an extension of their traditional sales and marketing efforts; few are using social media to strengthen customer care and offer customers consistent, seamless and satisfying experiences.
The benefits of a predictive online reputation management process, including a robust response mechanism, pay off in averting or smoothing any brand reputation crises. This whitepaper explains how to set up such a reputation management process.
Apps for the Connected World: Supercharge Customer Data with Code HalosCognizant
By making meaning from the data that swirls around every digital interaction, companies can gain unprecedented insight into what customer and prospects want and value, essentially what makes them "tick."
The Robot and I: How New Digital Technologies Are Making Smart People and Bus...Cognizant
Our latest study shows that when enterprise robots are applied to automating core business processes, they can extend the creative problem-solving capabilities and productivity of human beings and deliver superior business results.
Digital Marketing in Banking: Evolution and RevolutionCognizant
Proving the effectiveness of bank marketing strategies beyond brand-building has always been a challenge. Now, several converging forces may help propel marketing forward as a revenue source rather than a cost center.
Putting the Experience in Digital Customer ExperienceCognizant
As the digital revolution has gained momentum, it has become widely understood that the “digital customer experience” is the key to engage with, delight and monetize customers in the modern world. However, only a miniscule number of companies believe their customers’ current digital experience qualifies as “excellent,” our primary research reveals.
Consumer trust has become the new battleground for digital success. To win, organizations need to master the fundamentals of data ethics, manage the "give-to-get" ratio and solve the customer trust equation, our recent research reveals.
How Digital Is Quickly Reshaping Customer Experience ProcessesCognizant
By invoking six strategies that reimagine the power of customer support processes, digitally-savvy companies can create unprecedented levels of new business value and significantly elevate customer experience.
Based on a survey of Dutch banking executives, we identify the strengths and weaknesses of payments operating models (including selective outsourcing) in a demanding, highly regulated business sector and recommend a customer-centric model.
Digital Process Acupuncture: How Small Changes Can Heal Business, and Spark B...Cognizant
Our latest research reveals that by applying digital remedies to precisely targeted process areas, organizations can relieve operational stress and generate improvements, yielding outsized results that ripple across the process value chain.
Digital River Whitepaper Series: B2B E-Commerce ChallengeMike Chuma
Readers of this paper will gain an understanding of how
business-to-business (B2B) e-commerce is evolving because
of the changing nature of buyers and because of the pervasive impact of the global online ecosystem. Even though analysts are closely watching B2B e-commerce and believe the potential market is significantly larger than the B2C economy, B2B e-commerce has been slower to evolve, in large measure because of fears concerning the disruption or cannibalization of traditional sales channels.
Included is a discussion of current best practices in B2B e-commerce, techniques for managing channel conflict as
well as key considerations for any business looking to add a “direct-to-business buyer” sales channel. The critical question for most businesses should be how to effectively manage the change in a complex, multi-channel sales and marketing distribution model.
How Automakers Can Enhance Customer Experience in the New NormalCognizant
While other industries have built highly engaging and hyper-personal customer experiences, the automotive industry, comparatively speaking, has fallen short. The accelerating convergence of automotive-specific and generic consumer technologies presents a huge untapped opportunity for automakers to build tomorrow’s car-as-an-experience value proposition, even as the pandemic accelerates full-speed digitization across the board.
Future-Proofing Insurance: Deepening Insights, Reinventing Processes and Resh...Cognizant
Insurance carriers face an imminent sea change in how their mission-critical processes remain efficient, agile and innovative. Ensuring relevance in the future requires redefined business models fueled by heightened productivity across fibusiness as usualfl activities.
APAC's Digital Insurance Transformers: Illuminating the Way ForwardCognizant
Our research shows that insurers throughout the extremely diverse APAC region are placing their bets on digital transformation strategies to enhance customer experience and optimize operations. We take a deep-dive look into the particulars of what is currently happening and what lies ahead for the Asia-Pacific insurance industry's digital evolution.
People — Not Just Machines — Will Power Digital InnovationCognizant
As new technologies cause value chains to rapidly evolve and organizational boundaries to blur, human roles and tasks are also digitizing, as machines alter how knowledge work is performed.
The big story behind your big data: Six Practices for Making an Impact with T...Joachim B. Lyon
Text analytics is a powerful technology for drawing out compelling stories and deep insights from millions of customer comments. This study of strategic practices in 12 innovative companies show how customer experience (CX) professionals are using text analytics to change the way they work -- leveraging the customer’s voice to drive innovation and change, and becoming strategic business partners within their organizations.
Conversational Commerce: Why Consumers Are Embracing Voice AssistantsCapgemini
The Digital Transformation Institute has launched its latest research report titled “Conversational Commerce: Why Consumers Are Embracing Voice Assistants in Their Lives”. The report helps answer why voice assistants provide a significant platform to brands and retailers to engage with their consumers through new and innovative mediums like Google Assistant, Amazon’s Alexa, and Apple’s Siri.
The Future of Retail - Marketing and Merchandising Trend ReportNurun
Nurun's Toronto office has created a Marketing and Merchandising report that offers a thought-provoking look at six key trends:
Social Product Discovery, Consideration and Evaluation
Product Placement Morphs into Content + Commerce
The Integrated Expansion of the Omni-Channel Storefront
The New Geography of Merchandising
I’ll Trade My Privacy for a $5 Coupon
Sophisticated Frugality
This is the first of five trend reports. The culmination of trend scanning and subsequent phases will inform future scenarios in our final strategic foresight report, to be released in 2013.
This article written by Diarmaid Byrne, Editor, STQ, was published in issue 07 of Social Technology Quarterly.
Summary: In a data driven economy Programmatic Buying is the approach marketers are shifting to in order to best utilize data and examine their selling strategies better.
Putting the Experience in Digital Customer ExperienceCognizant
As the digital revolution has gained momentum, it has become widely understood that the “digital customer experience” is the key to engage with, delight and monetize customers in the modern world. However, only a miniscule number of companies believe their customers’ current digital experience qualifies as “excellent,” our primary research reveals.
Consumer trust has become the new battleground for digital success. To win, organizations need to master the fundamentals of data ethics, manage the "give-to-get" ratio and solve the customer trust equation, our recent research reveals.
How Digital Is Quickly Reshaping Customer Experience ProcessesCognizant
By invoking six strategies that reimagine the power of customer support processes, digitally-savvy companies can create unprecedented levels of new business value and significantly elevate customer experience.
Based on a survey of Dutch banking executives, we identify the strengths and weaknesses of payments operating models (including selective outsourcing) in a demanding, highly regulated business sector and recommend a customer-centric model.
Digital Process Acupuncture: How Small Changes Can Heal Business, and Spark B...Cognizant
Our latest research reveals that by applying digital remedies to precisely targeted process areas, organizations can relieve operational stress and generate improvements, yielding outsized results that ripple across the process value chain.
Digital River Whitepaper Series: B2B E-Commerce ChallengeMike Chuma
Readers of this paper will gain an understanding of how
business-to-business (B2B) e-commerce is evolving because
of the changing nature of buyers and because of the pervasive impact of the global online ecosystem. Even though analysts are closely watching B2B e-commerce and believe the potential market is significantly larger than the B2C economy, B2B e-commerce has been slower to evolve, in large measure because of fears concerning the disruption or cannibalization of traditional sales channels.
Included is a discussion of current best practices in B2B e-commerce, techniques for managing channel conflict as
well as key considerations for any business looking to add a “direct-to-business buyer” sales channel. The critical question for most businesses should be how to effectively manage the change in a complex, multi-channel sales and marketing distribution model.
How Automakers Can Enhance Customer Experience in the New NormalCognizant
While other industries have built highly engaging and hyper-personal customer experiences, the automotive industry, comparatively speaking, has fallen short. The accelerating convergence of automotive-specific and generic consumer technologies presents a huge untapped opportunity for automakers to build tomorrow’s car-as-an-experience value proposition, even as the pandemic accelerates full-speed digitization across the board.
Future-Proofing Insurance: Deepening Insights, Reinventing Processes and Resh...Cognizant
Insurance carriers face an imminent sea change in how their mission-critical processes remain efficient, agile and innovative. Ensuring relevance in the future requires redefined business models fueled by heightened productivity across fibusiness as usualfl activities.
APAC's Digital Insurance Transformers: Illuminating the Way ForwardCognizant
Our research shows that insurers throughout the extremely diverse APAC region are placing their bets on digital transformation strategies to enhance customer experience and optimize operations. We take a deep-dive look into the particulars of what is currently happening and what lies ahead for the Asia-Pacific insurance industry's digital evolution.
People — Not Just Machines — Will Power Digital InnovationCognizant
As new technologies cause value chains to rapidly evolve and organizational boundaries to blur, human roles and tasks are also digitizing, as machines alter how knowledge work is performed.
The big story behind your big data: Six Practices for Making an Impact with T...Joachim B. Lyon
Text analytics is a powerful technology for drawing out compelling stories and deep insights from millions of customer comments. This study of strategic practices in 12 innovative companies show how customer experience (CX) professionals are using text analytics to change the way they work -- leveraging the customer’s voice to drive innovation and change, and becoming strategic business partners within their organizations.
Conversational Commerce: Why Consumers Are Embracing Voice AssistantsCapgemini
The Digital Transformation Institute has launched its latest research report titled “Conversational Commerce: Why Consumers Are Embracing Voice Assistants in Their Lives”. The report helps answer why voice assistants provide a significant platform to brands and retailers to engage with their consumers through new and innovative mediums like Google Assistant, Amazon’s Alexa, and Apple’s Siri.
The Future of Retail - Marketing and Merchandising Trend ReportNurun
Nurun's Toronto office has created a Marketing and Merchandising report that offers a thought-provoking look at six key trends:
Social Product Discovery, Consideration and Evaluation
Product Placement Morphs into Content + Commerce
The Integrated Expansion of the Omni-Channel Storefront
The New Geography of Merchandising
I’ll Trade My Privacy for a $5 Coupon
Sophisticated Frugality
This is the first of five trend reports. The culmination of trend scanning and subsequent phases will inform future scenarios in our final strategic foresight report, to be released in 2013.
This article written by Diarmaid Byrne, Editor, STQ, was published in issue 07 of Social Technology Quarterly.
Summary: In a data driven economy Programmatic Buying is the approach marketers are shifting to in order to best utilize data and examine their selling strategies better.
Findings from a recent PwC Consumer Intelligence Series (CIS) survey of 15,000 global consumers confirm that technology will remain central to retailers' ability to understand and predict customer behavior. But none of these high-tech capabilities would be possible without people.
Retail Analytics Helps You Grow Your Sales (Everything You Should Know)Kavika Roy
With customers becoming increasingly flexible in their purchasing habits and switching seamlessly between in-store and online, knowledge and observations are becoming crucial to understanding essential business factors such as inventory, supply chain, demand for goods, customer behavior, etc. More than 35 percent of the top 5000 retail firms struggle to do so, according to some reports.
Retail analytics plays a vital role in this.
https://www.datatobiz.com/blog/ecommerce-retail-analytics-benefits-case-studies/
ALIRESEARCH | 2018 | EMBRACING CHINA'S "NEW RETAIL"BTO Educational
EMBRACING CHINA’S “NEW RETAIL”
As online, offline and logistics merge, some brands are pulling ahead by redefining consumers, merchandise and stores.
ALIRESEARCH and BAIN & COMPANY
2018
The era of “New Retail” that Alibaba founder Jack Ma envisioned is starting to emerge across China in ways that
promise big gains for consumer products companies that act decisively and systematically while causing others to
lag behind.
In 2016, Ma predicted a seamless merger of offline, online and logistics for a dynamic new world of retailing.
His vision now can be seen in the millions of mom-and-pop stores throughout China that are taking on new life as order-and-delivery stations for e-commerce.
It is there in the booming food delivery platforms such as
Hema, which fulfills more than half of its orders online.
And you can glimpse it in China’s ubiquitous mobile
payments. Chinese consumers use their phones for 60 times more mobile payments than consumers in the US do.
3 Ways to Drive Growth Using Your Big DataJim Nichols
Most marketers believe that programs powered by big data have the potential to radically improve business and drive
growth. But understanding the potential value of big data – and actually realizing it – are two very different things.
While many brands have invested millions to collect this
valuable marketing intelligence, few CMOs claim to be
maximizing their results with it. While leveraging your
big data to drive sales isn’t necessarily an easy thing, it is
possible – and it doesn’t require years to develop big data
strategies and tactics you can count on to deliver higher
return. In fact, many can reap the benefits in weeks.
A Framework for Digital Business TransformationCognizant
By embracing Code Halo thinking and a programmatic approach to business process change, organizations can better engage with customers and deliver mass-customized products and services that drive differentiation and outperformance.
5 ways to boost customer loyalty using data analyticsgroupfio1
Great customer experiences lead to higher retention rates, increased brand loyalty, and bigger customer lifetime value (CLV). Improving customer experiences can seem like a straightforward task, but unless you base new tactics and strategies on tools like zero-party data, you might be putting in effort and resources in the wrong places.
So, what are some RIGHT ways to use data analytics to improve customer loyalty? Here’s 5 ideas to help you get started building that data-driven competitive edge.
https://www.groupfio.com/5-ways-to-boostcustomer-loyalty-using-data-analytics/
The ultimate guide to the new buyers journeyMarketBridge
At MarketBridge we have the privilege of working with hundreds of marketing and sales leaders every month. In those discussions one thing is abundantly clear: the customer buying journey is rapidly changing and organizations are struggling to keep up.
These dramatic shifts in buying behavior are well documented; independent research by Gartner and Forrester suggests that by 2020,
Through precise location analytics, retailers now can monitor the entire path to purchase. With this data, marketers better understand what led to the purchase providing the ability to move beyond the traditional blanketed “campaign” to a year-round interaction based on consumer behavior. Customers “opt-in” by mobile app to receive highly-targeted promotions, information about merchandise they may have “visited” but didn’t purchase, and discounts for major events – based on correlations like visits, dwell and intent – to drive sales like never before.
RIS November tech solutions guide - analyticsiinside
Through precise location analytics, retailers now can monitor the entire path to purchase. With this data, marketers better understand what led to the purchase providing the ability to move beyond the traditional blanketed “campaign” to a year-round interaction based on consumer behavior. Customers “opt-in” by mobile app to receive highly-targeted promotions, information about merchandise they may have “visited” but didn’t purchase, and discounts for major events – based on correlations like visits, dwell and intent – to drive sales like never before.
Find out why and how physical retails are still important, types of search solutions to leverage on to ensure that your brands can be discovered seamlessly, and more.
Wavemaker attended the inaugural WPP Stream Commerce to discuss the challenging and changing world of commerce. This event brought together leaders from Adobe, Amazon, Google, Microsoft, Target, Colgate etc.
Using Adaptive Scrum to Tame Process Reverse Engineering in Data Analytics Pr...Cognizant
Organizations rely on analytics to make intelligent decisions and improve business performance, which sometimes requires reproducing business processes from a legacy application to a digital-native state to reduce the functional, technical and operational debts. Adaptive Scrum can reduce the complexity of the reproduction process iteratively as well as provide transparency in data analytics porojects.
It Takes an Ecosystem: How Technology Companies Deliver Exceptional ExperiencesCognizant
Experience is evolving into a strategy that reaches across technology companies. We offer guidance on the rise of experience and its role in business modernization, with details on how orgnizations can build the ecosystem to support it.
The Work Ahead: Transportation and Logistics Delivering on the Digital-Physic...Cognizant
The T&L industry appears poised to accelerate its long-overdue modernization drive, as the pandemic spurs an increased need for agility and resilience, according to our study.
Enhancing Desirability: Five Considerations for Winning Digital InitiativesCognizant
To be a modern digital business in the post-COVID era, organizations must be fanatical about the experiences they deliver to an increasingly savvy and expectant user community. Getting there requires a mastery of human-design thinking, compelling user interface and interaction design, and a focus on functional and nonfunctional capabilities that drive business differentiation and results.
The Work Ahead in Manufacturing: Fulfilling the Agility MandateCognizant
According to our research, manufacturers are well ahead of other industries in their IoT deployments but need to marshal the investment required to meet today’s intensified demands for business resilience.
The Work Ahead in Higher Education: Repaving the Road for the Employees of To...Cognizant
Higher-ed institutions expect pandemic-driven disruption to continue, especially as hyperconnectivity, analytics and AI drive personalized education models over the lifetime of the learner, according to our recent research.
Engineering the Next-Gen Digital Claims Organisation for Australian General I...Cognizant
In recent years, insurers have invested in technology platforms and process improvements to improve
claims outcomes. Leaders will build on this foundation across the claims landscape, spanning experience,
operations, customer service and the overall supply chain with market-differentiating capabilities to
achieve sustainable results.
Profitability in the Direct-to-Consumer Marketplace: A Playbook for Media and...Cognizant
Amid constant change, industry leaders need an upgraded IT infrastructure capable of adapting to audience expectations while proactively anticipating ever-evolving business requirements.
Green Rush: The Economic Imperative for SustainabilityCognizant
Green business is good business, according to our recent research, whether for companies monetizing tech tools used for sustainability or for those that see the impact of these initiatives on business goals.
Policy Administration Modernization: Four Paths for InsurersCognizant
The pivot to digital is fraught with numerous obstacles but with proper planning and execution, legacy carriers can update their core systems and keep pace with the competition, while proactively addressing customer needs.
The Work Ahead in Utilities: Powering a Sustainable Future with DigitalCognizant
Utilities are starting to adopt digital technologies to eliminate slow processes, elevate customer experience and boost sustainability, according to our recent study.
AI in Media & Entertainment: Starting the Journey to ValueCognizant
Up to now, the global media & entertainment industry (M&E) has been lagging most other sectors in its adoption of artificial intelligence (AI). But our research shows that M&E companies are set to close the gap over the coming three years, as they ramp up their investments in AI and reap rising returns. The first steps? Getting a firm grip on data – the foundation of any successful AI strategy – and balancing technology spend with investments in AI skills.
Operations Workforce Management: A Data-Informed, Digital-First ApproachCognizant
As #WorkFromAnywhere becomes the rule rather than the exception, organizations face an important question: How can they increase their digital quotient to engage and enable a remote operations workforce to work collaboratively to deliver onclient requirements and contractual commitments?
Five Priorities for Quality Engineering When Taking Banking to the CloudCognizant
As banks move to cloud-based banking platforms for lower costs and greater agility, they must seamlessly integrate technologies and workflows while ensuring security, performance and an enhanced user experience. Here are five ways cloud-focused quality assurance helps banks maximize the benefits.
Getting Ahead With AI: How APAC Companies Replicate Success by Remaining FocusedCognizant
Changing market dynamics are propelling Asia-Pacific businesses to take a highly disciplined and focused approach to ensuring that their AI initiatives rapidly scale and quickly generate heightened business impact.
The Work Ahead in Intelligent Automation: Coping with Complexity in a Post-Pa...Cognizant
Intelligent automation continues to be a top driver of the future of work, according to our recent study. To reap the full advantages, businesses need to move from isolated to widespread deployment.
The Work Ahead in Intelligent Automation: Coping with Complexity in a Post-Pa...
Exactly Who Are Your Customers?
1. Exactly Who Are Your
Customers?
Predictive analytics provides the answers, enabling
marketers to create value with consumers — and drive
growth for brand owners.
2. 2 KEEP CHALLENGING October 2014
Executive Summary
Predictive analytics opens a direct, immediate path to consumers,
enabling businesses to nurture relationships with customers and even
with those who may influence others to purchase their products. The
more that brand owners know about their customers, the more relevant
— and profitable — the relationships will be.
Code Halos help brands sharpen their relevance.1 A Code Halo™ is the
swirl of digitally generated data that surrounds each of us as individual
consumers, and when brands apply predictive analytics to make
meaning from these rich sources of information, they can improve
marketing effectiveness in four important areas:
• Market awareness
• Brand preference
• Brand influence
• Product development
Decoding Code Halos and developing insights for mutually valuable
relationships, however, requires brand owners to look beyond the often
sporadic view of the consumer that current methodologies and tools
provide. Brand-building through one-to-one relationships requires new
analytics tools and fundamental changes to marketing.
This white paper reveals how innovative brand owners are embracing
Code Halo thinking by pairing big data and predictive analytics. With
predictive analytics solutions like our Consumer Insights Command
Center to analyze consumer activity and behavior, marketers can begin
to create one-to-one relationships — and put their companies on the road
to continued prosperity.
4. 4 KEEP CHALLENGING October 2014
Creating One-to-One Relationships with Consumers
In a world gone social, predictive analytics lets brands in on the conversation. With analytics, businesses
can get to know and communicate with their customers as individuals and discover their likes, dislikes,
preferences and habits. The connection is a powerful marketing opportunity, and analytics gives it
immediacy. Brands can communicate with consumers even as they shop.
That immediacy dramatically alters the conversation, changing the quantity and quality of brand
messaging. The more marketers know about consumers, the more they can effectively communicate
with them — and the more personalized the messaging can be.
One-to-one relationships, however, are a marathon, not a sprint. What’s more, the most compelling
narrative to advance relationships isn’t always a “buy” message; it’s often a value exchange. Brand
owners need to shift away from traditional campaigns and 15- or 30-second spots and move toward
a fluid application of insights from today’s 24x7 streams of information. An example is the free
smartphone app from Procter & Gamble’s Charmin brand, which promises to help consumers locate
clean public restrooms.2 Rather than directly selling a product, the app serves a need. For consumers,
the value is clear — and increases their affinity toward the brand.
By embracing consumers’ Code Halos, brand owners can create and sustain this new type of brand
value. By generating a unique virtual identity for each consumer through their clicks, swipes, comments
and posts, brands can add context and value. They can launch conversations and begin to foster rela-tionships.
Managing and Making Sense of the Data Deluge
Data has long been at the heart of brand owners’ new market opportunities. Direct marketing, after all,
has traditionally relied on reams of consumer data, such as addresses, household income and credit
scores. Marketers knew how many kids consumers had, and the make and model of the cars they
drove. But such information is a droplet compared with the tsunami of data points that swell up daily
for modern marketers today. And compared with the weeks and months it used to take for consumer
input to flow in, analytics now empowers marketers by surfacing patterns and correlations on an up-to-
the-second basis. Through analytics, marketers can now understand not just which cars consumers
drive, for example, but also when and where they last bought gas and the snacks they purchased while
refueling.
Analytics distills the structured data that marketers have traditionally relied on, such as databases,
spreadsheets, CRM systems and third-party information, and it brings order to the burgeoning — some
might say chaotic — sources of unstructured data, from social media posts, tweets and “pins,” to call-center
recordings, images and feedback from wearable technology like Fitbits®. With analytics, data
has met its match. And for marketers, the result is new consumer intimacy and immediacy.
5. Manufacturers, Meet Your Consumers
Putting analytics to work in brand-building and one-to-one relationships in this more intimate, immediate environment, however, requires new tools and fundamental changes to marketing (see sidebar, page 9). Many marketing budgets fail to reflect the shift and remain weighted toward traditional media. But to make use of consumer Code Halos, brand owners need to develop a more holistic view of consumers that continues to sharpen over time.
Take product sampling, for example. Distributing samples used to be as close as brand owners got to shoppers. Companies traditionally spent millions of dollars on mass-mailing samples or handing them out at retail locations. Doing so can be an expensive leap of faith — and typically the end of a potentially profitable relationship with consumers.
With analytics, it is the beginning of the relationship. In a departure from traditional blind sampling,
brand owners are drawing on more refined data to get their product samples into targeted hands.
TaylorMade-Adidas Golf, for example, built up a wealth of new details on prospective customers — right down to their golf handicaps — when it blended e-mail marketing and social media to distribute samples of its newest golf ball.3
Some manufacturers are forging new partnerships to zero in on prospects. Unilever is venturing into so-called “smart sampling” by partnering with e-commerce clothing retailers Beyond the Rack and Coastal.com to tuck samples of its high-end hair products into shipments to buyers of higher end clothing.4
Once marketers get their samples to more qualified consumers, analytics can become a game-
changer. By choosing more receptive audiences for samples, marketers gain permission to engage with consumers, follow up with them and foster relationships. Would the individual recommend the product to friends and family? Would she post about it in social media? Would he buy it in stores?
By probing Code Halos for additional consumer information, marketers can identify their products’ relevance and begin to quickly determine a consumer’s lifetime value for the brand. They can evaluate how much individuals will contribute to the brand’s success, and whether they want to continue to invest in them. Analytics can also surface audiences that marketers had never considered.
Leveraging Smart Objects, New Partnerships
Mastering analytics is key for brand owners because new product ecosystems will soon churn out even more data-fed opportunities. “Smart shelves” that employ RFID tags are being developed to measure shoppers’ interest in products and tailored offers, and then relay the information in real-time to manufacturers. Global snack company Mondelez International is testing sensor-based shelves that can determine a shopper’s age and gender.5
In consumers’ homes, a wave of innovations is leading the way to the so-called “connected home.” The Amazon Dash electronic wand lets customers of Amazon’s grocery service create online shopping lists by scanning bar codes of items in their home.6 Google hopes that its recently acquired smart-home automation platform, Nest, will become the de facto standard among household data-sharing devices, and it recently launched a developer program for other companies to tie in with the device. Early signers include Whirlpool and Chamberlain, maker of garage-door openers.7
EXACTLY WHO ARE YOUR CUSTOMERS? 5
Once marketers get their samples to more qualified consumers, analytics can become a game-changer. By choosing more receptive audiences for samples, marketers gain permission to engage with consumers.
6. 6 KEEP CHALLENGING October 2014
By embracing Code Halo thinking, brand owners and retailers are undertaking new forms of collabora-tion
– and finding new ways to mutually benefit. Home improvement chain Lowe’s, for example, shares
its POS data with manufacturers to help them more quickly uncover inventory and merchandising
issues.8 And with its recently announced digital marketing platform called the Walmart Exchange, the
discount giant envisions generating relevant data for its suppliers that it hopes will result in savings
that they can pass along to shoppers.9
Putting Data to Work — and Monetizing It
Most brand owners are taking their first steps toward pairing big data with predictive analytics. To
engage and create value with consumers, they are mounting hashtag campaigns, running ads on
new-media sites like Instagram, and measuring impressions, click-through rates and conversions.
While this is a good start, analytics’ real benefit for brand owners is in using the metrics to predict future
behavior. With analytics, marketers can cross-tab participants in the hashtag campaign with product
purchases, for example, and then anticipate their shopping patterns to shape product marketing.
Or they might forecast growth in conversations related to current events and then experiment with
creative real-time marketing.
The goal is to convert metrics into better acquisition and retention rates. Viral hits produce a spike of
interest – who didn’t like the infamous Oreo SuperBowl tweet? However, if marketers place too much
emphasis on creating these events, they will be distracted from the bigger picture: Focusing on the
customers who want to interact with them. The mission is to create sustainable consumer relation-ships,
so rather than crafting splashy individual moments, marketers need to continue listening to
consumers, learn from them and optimize their efforts. When they do, the important moments occur
organically.
Four Ways for Marketers to Benefit
from Predictive Analytics
The more brand owners know about customers, the more productive — and profitable — their relation-ships
will be. Analytics introduces a more scientific approach to marketing, but successful marketing is
still about following the fundamentals: Be engaging and relevant, or customers will walk away.
Here are four important areas in which predictive analytics can improve marketers’ effectiveness and
help them create value with consumers:
Develop Brand Awareness
For most consumer-facing companies, the need to maintain a high profile for the brand never goes
away. Market share is always a priority.
For example, after Clorox discovered it could boost sales by mining Twitter chatter during the cold
and flu season, the company began delving into data in even more sophisticated ways.10 It identified
Zip codes with a high volume of flu-related tweets and mapped them to thousands of store locations
that carry its products. It then contacted the stores to ensure they had enough product on hand. As a
result, Clorox sold 30,000 additional cases of disinfecting wipes to six states most affected by the flu.
Warm weather is equally inspirational to marketers – and suited to analytics and real-time messaging.
Looking to quench more thirsts, Molson Coors Brewing Company built a digital advertising tool for two
brands that it markets heavily in the summer, Coors Light and Molson Canadian Cider.11 The tool linked
to Weather Underground, an online forecasting service, and used the service’s coding to check the
weather of eight Canadian cities every 15 minutes. When temperatures rose, the tool triggered delivery
of Facebook mobile ads that mentioned the balmy weather.
Molson Coor’s metrics found that in addition to supporting more refined consumer targeting, analytics
increased its media ROI. Its weather-targeted ads boosted engagement and click-through rates.
7. EXACTLY WHO ARE YOUR CUSTOMERS? 7
Because greater engagement with Facebook ads leads to lower cost-per-click, Molson Coor’s cost-per- click rate was 67% lower for the weather-related campaign than for generic ads.
•
The upshot: Predictive analytics gives marketers a powerful new tool for staying front and center in consumers’ minds. It also creates timely awareness in ways never before possible. Marketing tools have changed, and marketers’ thinking has to change accordingly.
Shape Brand Preference
How devoted are consumers to your company’s products? In today’s hypercompetitive marketplace, complacency is not an option. Case in point: Apple, long the gold standard for innovation, saw its brand preference rating fall significantly in 2013, according to a study by market research firm Strategy Analytics.12
Apple posted the steepest decline of the 21 technology brands in the survey, slipping markedly among the young and affluent consumers who make up its core customer base. Strategy Analytics attributes Apple’s fall to its lack of new products.
Predictive analytics is a key weapon in companies’ efforts to build demand. To re-energize sales of its flagging Vegemite brand in Australia, Kraft sought to make sense of social media conversations about the venerable spread for crackers and bread. It analyzed 1.5 million posts on social networking sites, blogs, message boards and online news and found Vegemite had notched 479,206 mentions in 38 languages.13
Digging more deeply, Kraft discovered that consumers were using its famous product in unexpected food combinations that reflected local culinary styles. It capitalized on the revelation with a highly successful campaign that featured the iconic product’s versatility – and lifted Vegemite sales 5% over the previous best year.
Zeroing in on shopper preferences is The Kroger Company’s mission. The Cincinnati-based supermarket chain turned to predictive analytics to drive traffic to its more than 2,400 stores – and to hone marketing messages for its own private-label brands, which drive 25% of the company’s sales dollars.14
Personalization is Kroger’s credo. It refers to the 11 million pieces of direct mail that it sends to consumers every quarter as “snowflakes” because the goal is to customize each offer so that no two are the same.15 Understanding customers as individuals and not just demographics has paid off: Within six weeks of a mailing, the company estimates that 71% of recipients will redeem one of the coupons.
•
The upshot: Strengthening brand preference and growing it into brand loyalty is a key advantage for marketers that adopt predictive analytics.
Cultivate Brand Influence
Social media’s rapid uptake opens laser-like opportunities for marketers to identify brand influencers. By reaching out to tastemakers, marketers tap into social networks that distribute their messages for them — and do it much more effectively. Ninety-two percent of consumers say they trust earned media, such as recommendations from friends and family, above all other forms of advertising — an increase of 18% since 2007, according to a Nielsen survey.16
Combing through social-media sentiment to find brand advocates is becoming an essential tactic for all consumer-facing businesses. Marketers of the Harry Potter film franchise, for example, used
Analytics introduces a more scientific approach to marketing, but successful marketing is still about following the fundamentals: Be engaging and relevant, or customers will walk away.
8. 8 KEEP CHALLENGING October 2014
predictive analytics to identify just 43 individuals who drive the majority of shared conversation about
the wizard fantasy.17
Hotel chain Ritz-Carlton regularly analyzes social media conversations to drive conversions: It reaches
out to people who have never stayed at its hotels and express concern about the cost.18
Upstart makeup company NYX Cosmetics is a role model for real-time, two-way interactions with
customers. Acquired in 2014 by L’Oreal, NYX (rhymes with “six”) considers its participation in online
cosmetics communities to be a key marketing strategy.19 It even created a high-profile vehicle, the
NYX Face Awards, to recognize and advance the efforts of the video bloggers who help promote its
products and reign as its most prized influencers.
Understanding the metrics behind the media is key, a former NYX executive told Web site
ReelSEO.com: “It’s your back-end analytics that you really need to pay attention to, and target that
right market and know your sweet spot.”20
• The upshot: By understandinging peer-to-peer influence, marketers can pinpoint the social movers
and shakers who help shape grassroots opinions. Then the real relationship-building begins.
Collaborate on Product Development
Analytics feeds brand owners with more accurate models of customer behavior. The result? Smarter
product development that delivers goods that the market wants.
Marketers are already leveraging social media and online focus groups to realize the potential of
communicating with consumers. Analytics takes that one step further. It empowers brand owners to
tease new product ideas out of streams of data, whether the goal is line extensions or innovative new
products.
It also paves the way for greater co-creation, enabling companies to collaborate with customers early
in the lifecycle and during product development. Co-creation is an opportunity for every consum-er-
facing company. Starbucks’ refillable cold cups, splash stick and various menu items all began as
customer suggestions to its My Starbucks Idea Web site. From 80,000 submissions in the first two
years, Starbucks implemented more than 100. That’s close to one new, customer-driven idea every
week.21
• The upshot: When it comes to creating value from insight, predictive analytics has the potential to
provide an important advantage for product development.
Looking Ahead: Four Steps to Adopting
Predictive Analytics
How can your marketing organization begin using predictive analytics to create more insightful
strategies? Here are four steps you can take to start joining the conversation and fostering relation-ships:
1. Promote a cultural shift in how your organization engages consumers. The “mass marketing
machine” continues to be an institution within most brand owners. But marketing has moved
from 15- and 30-second spots to a 24x7 communications cycle. To realize the business potential
of one-to-one consumer relationships, start making the cultural shifts necessary to evangelize the
power of individual consumer relationship. Examine how your company can respond in a relevant
way to always-on customers connected by multiple channels.
2. Begin acquiring an advanced understanding of consumer behavior via analytics and predictive
modeling of consumer data. Your company’s ability to analyze, generate insights and apply the
insights within marketing programs is the key to developing meaningful consumer relationships.
So is mastering new predictive analytics tools. Typical measures of marketing effectiveness are
backward-looking, while predictive analytics techniques look forward. This requires marketers to
move beyond traditional methodologies and aggregated tools for data and instead adopt formats
9. 1
1111111111000111110000000000000000Data Capture Listen.Analyze.Engage. Data Cleanse Marketers can tailor automated reports by brand, topic, issue and event. With the CICC’s custom analytic models, benchmarks and KPIs, clients can begin applying predictive analytics to their marketing efforts. Captured data is aggregated and cleansed. The CICC solution then classifies data, structures insights and creates sentiment measures. • Siloed • Structured • Unstructured • Social media • Internal sources Interactive Reporting Analytics and Run-Time Engine 1234 Quick Take
With predictive analytics, the art of marketing becomes personal and immediate. Our Consumer Insights Command Center (CICC) makes that possible. The CICC combines the power of the Clarabridge Intelligence Platform,22 which scans and scores millions of social media entries, with Cognizant’s Advanced Analytics Engine, which monitors KPIs and provides adaptive benchmarks determined in conjunction with the client’s marketing team.
As an integrated whole, the CICC platform decodes consumer and product Code Halos by analyzing all dimensions of consumer activity and behavior. Using natural language processing, it can process unstructured data as quickly and accurately as structured data (see our four-step approach to big data in Figure 1).
Applying CICC’s predictive analytics uncovers new insights and possibilities. The marketing team for a laptop maker, for example, could discover that while a particular customer loves the system’s graphics and CPU, she considers the vendor’s Web site difficult to navigate and its shipping costs excessive. In addition, during a store visit, she found the wait time for service too long and the staff uninformed.
As a result of those insights into the customer experience, the laptop maker might restructure its Web site to provide a more intuitive experience and collaborate with the retailer to schedule additional staff during high-traffic hours.
Marketers could also use the CICC data to predict whether others in this customer’s demographic similarly value the laptop’s graphics and CPU and whether prioritizing the features in future products will boost sales, or whether that is better done by reducing shipping prices.
(For more information, download our white paper, “Customer Insights Command Center Speeds ’Just-in- Time’ Marketing.”)
New Tools for the Art of Marketing
EXACTLY WHO ARE YOUR CUSTOMERS? 9
A Four-Step Approach to Convert Big Data into Insights
Figure 1
10. 10 KEEP CHALLENGING October 2014
Footnotes
1 For more on Code Halos and innovation, read “Code Rules: A Playbook for Managing at the
Crossroads,” Cognizant Technology Solutions, June 2013, http://www.cognizant.com/Future-ofwork/
Documents/code-rules.pdf, and the book, Code Halos: How the Digital Lives of People,
Things, and Organizations are Changing the Rules of Business, by Malcolm Frank, Paul Roehrig and
Ben Pring, published by John Wiley & Sons. April 2014, http://www.wiley.com/WileyCDA/WileyTitle/
productCd-1118862074.html.
2 Jay Baer, Youtility: Why Smart Marketing is About Help Not Hype, Portfolio Hardcover, 2013.
3 “Better Product Sampling with Social Media,” Chirpify, http://blog.chirpify.com/
post/83006610645/better-product-sampling-with-social-media.
4 Christopher Heine, “Unilever Looks to Marry In-Store Sampling with E-commerce,” AdWeek, Feb.
5, 2014, http://www.adweek.com/news/technology/unilever-looks-marry-store-sampling-e-com-merce-
155486.
5 Sebastian Joseph, “Mondelez Trialling Shelf Cameras to Analyze Shopper Habits In-Store,” Market-ingWeek,
Oct. 17, 2013, http://www.marketingweek.co.uk/news/mondelez-trialling-shelf-cameras-to-analyse-
shopper-habits-in-store/4008275.article.
6 Jon Swartz, “First Take: Lab126 Is the Big Amazon Winner,” USA Today, June 18, 2014,
http://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/columnist/2014/06/18/amazon-lab126-is-big-winner-3-d-phone-
is-latest-gadget/10689549/.
7 Matt Burns, “Google Makes Its Nest at the Center of the Smart Home,” TechCrunch, June 23, 2014,
http://techcrunch.com/2014/06/23/google-makes-its-nest-at-the-center-of-the-smart-home/.
8 “Big Data’s Big Meaning for Marketing,” Forrester, May 2014, http://www.forrester.com/Big+Datas+
Big+Meaning+For+Marketing/fulltext/-/E-RES114782.
9 Jack Neff, “Walmart’s New Cost-Cutting Target: The Ad World,” Ad Age, April 1, 2014,
http://adage.com/article/special-report-digital-conference/walmart-s-cost-cutting-target-advertis-ing-
world/292436/.
10 Serena Ng, “Marketers Track Flu Outbreaks Closely,” The Wall Street Journal, Dec. 22, 2013,
http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424052702303330204579248120374532590.
11 Susan Krashinsky, “Molson Taps into Weather-Related Cravings with Facebook Mobile Ads,” The
Globe and Mail, Oct. 24, 2013, http://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/industry-news/
marketing/brewer-taps-into-weather-related-cravings-with-facebook-mobile-ads/article15064886/.
12 “Apple Slips While Huawei Gains In Strategy Analytics Brand Preference Survey,” Strategy
Analytics, March 17, 2014, http://www.strategyanalytics.com/default.aspx?mod=pressreleaseviewer
&a0=5489.
13 Caitlin Fitzsimmons, “Big Data: Forget the ‘Big’ and Make Better Use of the Data You Already
Have,” Business Review Weekly, Oct. 10, 2013, http://www.brw.com.au/p/tech-gadgets/data_data_
forget_already_have_and_cY0C3L5M9N1dYkVrsOFeuK.
that allow them to be predictive and take action. Being familiar with the tools is only the start; using
them to build customer relationships is the next step.
3. Test, learn and optimize. Today’s influx of insights allows for more innovative methods of
engagement and high-impact creative. For example, how can you connect with in-store customers
through mobile channels? Be willing to test new outreach models like smart shelves and connected-home
devices. Keep in mind that success and failure provide equal insights and opportunities to
optimize your marketing program. Risk is inherent. Don’t fear it.
4. Plan beyond the initial consumer engagement. It’s a post-campaign world. Gone are the days
when marketers’ programs consisted of, say, planning five spots in advance. Marketers today need
to think about long-term engagement. Apply the steady stream of consumer insights to constantly
explore new methods of adding value to the relationship.
11. EXACTLY WHO ARE YOUR CUSTOMERS? 11
About the Author
Angus Burgess is a Senior Manager within Cognizant Business Consulting’s Marketing, Sales and Insights Practice. He is responsible for driving strategic client initiatives, focusing on digital marketing, social media strategy and analytics, eCRM and digital analytics. Angus has over 20 years of marketing experience and has for the last 18 years focused on digital marketing. He started his career in direct marketing, then progressed into digital marketing as the Internet was breaking new ground as a communication channel and evolving into a social and commercial platform. Applying his digital expertise, Angus has developed strategic digital ini tiatives that have become the foundation for an organization’s approach to digital marketing. He can be reached at Angus.Burgess@cognizant.com.
Acknowledgments
The author would like to thank Johan Sauer, a leader in Cognizant’s DigitalWorks Practice, for his insights and contributions to this white paper.
14
Steve Watkins, “Kroger Rolls Out Three New Store Brands,” Cincinnati Business Courier, June 26, 2014, http://www.bizjournals.com/cincinnati/news/2014/06/26/kroger-rolls-out-three-new-private- label-brands.html.
15
Tom Groenfeldt, “Kroger Knows Your Shopping Patterns Better Than You Do,” Forbes, Oct. 28, 2013, http://www.forbes.com/sites/tomgroenfeldt/2013/10/28/kroger-knows-your-shopping-patterns- better-than-you-do/.
16
“Consumer Trust in Online, Social and Mobile Advertising Grows,” Nielsen, April 2012, http://www. nielsen.com/us/en/insights/news/2012/consumer-trust-in-online-social-and-mobile-advertising- grows.html.
17
Mark Fidleman, “Eight of the Best Influencer Marketing Campaigns,” Forbes, Aug. 6, 2013,
http://www.forbes.com/sites/markfidelman/2013/08/06/8-of-the-best-influencer-marketing- campaigns-from-the-8-hottest-agencies/.
18
Jeff Elder, “Social Media Fail to Live Up to Early Marketing Hype,” The Wall Street Journal, June 14, 2014, http://online.wsj.com/articles/companies-alter-social-media-strategies-1403499658.
19
Alicia Fiorletta, “How NYX Ties User-Generated Content to Commerce,” Retail Touchpoints, Jan. 14, 2014, http://www.retailtouchpoints.com/shopper-engagement/3264-how-nyx-ties-user-generated- content-to-commerce-.
20
Thomas Owadenko, “How Cosmetics Brand NYX Became a YouTube Leader in User-Generated Video,” ReelSEO.com, July 8, 2014, http://www.reelseo.com/nyx-youtube-user-generated-videos/.
21
Dave Evans, “Driving Customer Innovation: It’s the Small Things that Count,” ClickZ, Feb. 13, 2013, http:// www.clickz.com/clickz/column/2243408/driving-customer-innovation-its-the-small-things-that-count.
22
Clarabridge is a leading provider of customer experience management and social analytics solutions. To learn more about the Clarabridge Intelligence Platform, see http://clarabridge.com/customer-experience- products/clarabridge-intelligence-platform/.