[{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org\/","@type":"BlogPosting","@id":"https:\/\/www.the-future-of-commerce.com\/2022\/04\/12\/business-agility-customer-data\/#BlogPosting","mainEntityOfPage":"https:\/\/www.the-future-of-commerce.com\/2022\/04\/12\/business-agility-customer-data\/","headline":"Turn on a dime: Business agility starts with customer data management","name":"Turn on a dime: Business agility starts with customer data management","description":"Business agility requires great customer data management. Understand customers with a single, enterprise-wide view of data to pivot on a dime.","datePublished":"2022-04-12","dateModified":"2022-07-11","author":{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.the-future-of-commerce.com\/contributor\/chris-ohara\/#Person","name":"Chris O'Hara","url":"https:\/\/www.the-future-of-commerce.com\/contributor\/chris-ohara\/","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","@id":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/bfd2dda75df1651f9c0834c2c6c5d3fd?s=96&d=mm&r=g","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/bfd2dda75df1651f9c0834c2c6c5d3fd?s=96&d=mm&r=g","height":96,"width":96}},"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"The Future of Customer Engagement and Experience","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","@id":"http:\/\/www.the-future-of-commerce.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/03\/logo-fcee-schema-app.png","url":"http:\/\/www.the-future-of-commerce.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/03\/logo-fcee-schema-app.png","width":278,"height":60}},"image":{"@type":"ImageObject","@id":"https:\/\/www.the-future-of-commerce.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/data-at-the-core-of-CX_1200x375.jpg","url":"https:\/\/www.the-future-of-commerce.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/data-at-the-core-of-CX_1200x375.jpg","height":375,"width":1200},"url":"https:\/\/www.the-future-of-commerce.com\/2022\/04\/12\/business-agility-customer-data\/","about":["CDP: Customer Data Platform","CDP: Customer Data Platform","Commerce","Consent data management","Customer Data","Customer Experience","Marketing"],"wordCount":1225,"keywords":["Business Innovation","CDM | Customer Data Management","Customer Engagement","Customer Experience | CX","First-party Data","Intelligent Enterprise"],"articleBody":"With all the rapid, abrupt changes we’ve seen around the world and their impact on business, the pressure to be agile is off the charts.\u00a0After a global pandemic drove up digital-only interactions 72%, humbling retailers that were slow to adopt adapt, the dramatic rise in inflation is forcing business to radically alter their pricing and delivery models. As input costs rise, global supply chains tighten, all while consumers cut back on their own spending due to rising prices.The framework for managing through this is broadly called enterprise agility— an organization\u2019s ability to quickly adapt to market changes. And the foundation for business agility is customer data management.      Agile CX: The holy grail of customer experience                With agile CX, brands can readily adapt to keep customers happy and grow business. Learn best practices for achieving CX agility.      Business agility: Marketing shows the wayAmid rapid change, marketing always seems to lead, whether it\u2019s communicating a price increase to customers, changing a product roll out based on regional market changes, or reacting to the sudden unavailability of a product due to a supply chain shortage.Companies need to account for how their customers will react to change, and manage customer experience delivery as appropriate. But marketing is the only part of an organization that can move fast enough to react immediately to crisis. Changing products and introducing new products is time consuming. Changing a sales organization with set targets can\u2019t happen overnight. What can change fast? Marketing budgets, campaigns, website messaging, webinar content, and search keywords.So, what does the agile marketing organization require?\u00a0      Benefits of first-party data: Spot-on marketing, fantastic results                With the rise of the privacy-first web, marketers need to focus on harnessing the power of first-party data for gaining competitive edge.      3 keys to agile business and better CXLet\u2019s use an example: A popular outdoor retailer runs a promotion for a new hiking shoe that is a \u201ccollab\u201d with a trendy brand — and it goes viral. Suddenly, sneakerheads worldwide go crazy and start buying. The retailer \u2013 who used to a steady and reliable seasonal buyer \u2013 is now flooded with orders, running out of stock, and adding a slew of new customers. While most brands beg for such a moment, it’s the ultimate test of business agility, and a critical moment in time. You can win lots of new loyalists \u2013 or quickly become a flash in the pan.Three elements of business agility needed for success are:Richer dataActionable intelligencePervasive automation      Real customers, engaged with your brand: Enter data authentication                In a cookieless future, data authentication is key to creating customer relationships and understanding the intent of collected data in downstream systems.      First things first: Customer data managementTo begin, you need the scaled ability to capture first-party data with consent. Every new sneakerhead coming to the website and mobile app must be encouraged to authenticate and engage.This involves offering a give-to-get for new customers (free shipping or a discount) and, more importantly, a scaled mechanism to capture that user\u2019s permission to message her in the future. The experience must be seamless as well as completely transparent. \u00a0For returning customers, you must have the ability to unify everything you know about them on the surface \u2013 SKUs viewed, loyalty points and status \u2013 but also go a level deeper. What’s the true value of a customer? How many times do they return an item, and by what method? How often are they willing to pay full price? This data is only accessible by connecting the backend (financial ledger and supply chain) data to the profile. With a limited supply of a new item, you want to sell out, but you also want to reward your most loyal and truly valuable customers. This is only possible by connecting the backend of business data to the front-end of customer engagement. Call it ERP to CDP.       Redefining customer identity for the cookie-less future                The way brands approach customer identity and marketing has changed dramatically as privacy rules take hold, making CDP and CIAM strategic priorities.      Business agility requires intelligence at scale\u00a0If you’ve created a unified data model across enterprise systems, and have models that can predict true customer value and react to changes in behavior and market conditions, you still need to scale intelligence.In other words, every customer cannot be evaluated individually, and every decision can’t live with a data science team.How strong is your ability to implement a machine learning framework that updates customer segments based on new information? ML models need to be continually tuned to changes in engagement across channels and understand how pricing and availability for specific products alter behavior. They need to overlap segments to understand how different buyers of the same product react to campaigns and different outlets for marketing and advertising. Lifetime value scores need to be calculated against ever-changing baselines. LTV can change based on product and customer mix over time, making yesterday\u2019s big spenders tomorrow\u2019s regular shoppers.Going beyond marketing and advertising, what type of intelligence is required to create success in the call center, or an e-commerce site, or a sales call? Models are only as valuable as their ability to create value in the endpoint of a specific application. \u00a0\u00a0      CDP trends: Customer data platforms enter a new era                When first-party data overtook cookies as the top currency for marketers, we entered the CDP era. Discover CDP trends like CIAM that are rising.      Automation: Putting data insights to work\u00a0Back to our sneaker example, you’ll need to suppress low-value customers from the campaign for the popular shoes. When a certain color or size becomes unavailable, customers with those preferences must also be suppressed \u2013 or encouraged to pre-order. Then encourage loyal customers to \u201cbuy now\u201d or use their loyalty status to get placed in the front of the line. They need to be put into the call center queue first and, when they visit the website, have a one-click option for putting the right shoes into their shopping cart, with their shipping preferences already pre-filled. When loyal customers come into a store and can\u2019t find what they’re looking for, the point-of-sale system must give the retail associate a next-best-offer or action that has a high probability of success. This is the new battleground in marketing \u2013 the ability to use intelligence at scale to render the right decision across both offline and online channels, in near-real time. Customer profiles need to get progressively richer, starting with marketing and advertising interactions, including cross-CRM data from sales, service, and commerce touchpoints. But they also must go deeper to leverage insights that can only be derived from the backend: ERP data. Intelligence must go beyond data science-provisioned models and scale with ML, such that the customer profiles can be frequently updated as lifetime value and propensity scores change based on real-time inputs. To adapt to a fast-moving market, driving that intelligence into action must be as automated as possible.This next phase of customer data management, which brings the backend of agile business process together with the front end of customer engagement, is not about the next-best action or offer. It\u2019s about finding the next-best dollar. \u00a0   Crush revenue + growth targets.Power up your competitive edge.Win customers.It all begins HERE. "},{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org\/","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"2022","item":"https:\/\/www.the-future-of-commerce.com\/2022\/#breadcrumbitem"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"04","item":"https:\/\/www.the-future-of-commerce.com\/2022\/\/04\/#breadcrumbitem"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"name":"12","item":"https:\/\/www.the-future-of-commerce.com\/2022\/\/04\/\/12\/#breadcrumbitem"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":4,"name":"Turn on a dime: Business agility starts with customer data management","item":"https:\/\/www.the-future-of-commerce.com\/2022\/04\/12\/business-agility-customer-data\/#breadcrumbitem"}]}]