As marketers in the digital era, we have opportunities to engage with customers in ways we’ve never been able to before. Mobile apps, social media and online channels all provide avenues to reach customers where they are, physically and emotionally, often influencing them at the moment of decision. And as today’s technology gives us the ability to understand buying patterns, we can offer products and services that best serve our customers, strengthen brand affinity, and increase sales. What could possibly go wrong?
A great deal, actually. Even with all of the data collection, data mining and data analytics capabilities we have, we still don’t know who our customers really are, and this causes problems for brands and for the customers trying to engage with them.
At the root of this issue is the fact that we don’t have a single customer view. Every interaction point captures information about the customer separate from other ingress points. The result? Multiple profiles for a single person. And these profiles are often divided among separate data stores for different departments, apps and business units. In short, it’s messy.
These scattered, incomplete identities show only a glimpse of the whole individual, making it difficult to connect with your customers in meaningful ways. You miss opportunities to understand what your audience really wants and to gain loyalty by providing these products and services. Plus, decentralized data makes it hard to follow data security best practices creating risk for breaches—which could be irreparably damaging for a brand.
Customers feel the pain too. They experience frustrating, disjointed experiences with every transaction. A customer may have one set of login credentials for your mobile app, for example, and need a different login for your online services. Or perhaps a payment he or she made is showing as “posted” online, but they still receive a text alert that the payment is due. In today’s hyper-competitive market, it’s too easy for them to turn to a competitor, and you’ve lost their loyalty and revenue.
Having a single customer view in omnichannel environments is an increasingly important part of improving customer experience. Identity management, once considered only an IT concern, is becoming more and more of a marketing concern.
Marketers are realizing that collecting customer information from omnichannel sources is only part of enhancing customer experience. Being able to consolidate it into common, actionable customer identity profiles provides invaluable knowledge about who your customers really are. Additionally, a single customer view that spans multiple interaction points gives you contextual insight. It paints an even richer picture of your customers’ likes, dislikes and needs. With time, your customers’ profiles grow in detail and in value.
Learn the four key technology requirements to achieve a single view of each customer. Download the white paper: Identity Crisis? Why Common Consumer Identities are Crucial for Customer-Obsessed Brands
This article was originally published on the UnboundID Blog.
Omnichannel Marketing: Will The Real Customer Please Stand Up?
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