Data is the lifeblood of modern business operations. It is
used to maximize customer insights, optimize performance through revenue flow,
and manage operational cost savings. However, to achieve these goals,
businesses need their data to reflect a complete, accurate, precise view of
customers across online, offline, devices, and organizational boundaries.
Adobe Professional Services and Customer Success Global
Leader, Eric Hall, spoke about these challenges during a recent industry event,
highlighting three common roadblocks in leveraging data to drive customer
experiences.
Data Silos
Critical customer data is often captured in different systems
with different data hierarchies, customer IDs, and no common taxonomy. Online,
offline, marketing, sales, call center, retail – different business units that
serve the same customer, but with no way to connect that data. This results in
a lack of a comprehensive, accurate, and real-time customer profile that
incorporates all these data silos.
Data Complexity
The decreasing economics of data capture and storage have
led most organizations to capture terabytes or petabytes of data. However, most
of this data is poorly understood and, therefore, difficult to use. More data
is not always better, as it can create data overload, making it harder to
analyze and use effectively.
Unlocking New Data Sources
Brands have many different data sources – stores, websites,
mobile, survey, kiosks, and more. However, bringing all of these disparate data
sources together at a profile level can be a challenge. One common example is
connecting call center data to web traffic data to understand where self-help
is failing and improve call center deflection.
Hall also discussed some common aspirations among businesses
that want to leverage data effectively, such as resolving abandonment issues,
moving beyond customer profiles and looking to signals, and unlocking new data
sources.
Overall, the goal of leveraging data is to achieve
experience-led growth. This requires combining data and analytics elements to
provide a complete and accurate view of customer behavior, preferences, and
patterns. However, achieving this goal can be challenging, and businesses need
to overcome these roadblocks to create a data-driven culture that enables them
to create better experiences for their customers.
