There is rarely a rigid, black-and-white view of the world. True, 1+1 always equals 2, but in most of life’s experiences, there are typically many ways to go about things. Within the loyalty space, there are plenty of strategies that can be implemented to improve ROI, increase acquisition, or drive second transactions. However, the concept of cleansing data, creating unified profiles, and applying data requires the careful identification of when certain actions should take place, the rules that should be in place, the data that should be applied, and the relevance of the data points available. With that, let’s talk about the recipe for a successful data management strategy.
Using Salt Instead of Sugar
If you’re in the market for a data management platform, you may be looking at solutions like Informatica, Reltio, IBM, or Semarchy. At the same time, you may be seeking services to help identify the way forward using the selected platform, to better manage your business. In many cases, data management practices involve the destruction of data – cleansing too far downstream, customer-centric approaches, and utilization of low-confidence data. When you destroy original records, you limit opportunities to explore new data use cases and restrict data egress. When data management processes take place too far downstream in your architecture, the risk of issues increase as it relates to disparate data and customer experience challenges. When the approach is customer-centric, the other components of the loyalty program may flop if attention is not paid to quality product, offer, and rewards data. When data of uncertain accuracy is used, the success rate directly correlates with confidence in the data. With these strategic challenges considered, it’s like using salt in a recipe rather than sugar – it just won’t turn out right! So, grab your sugar from the cabinet and let’s talk about how to bake this cookie the right way.
Baking Our Top-Notch Cookies
If the end goal of a batch of cookies is my unified customer profile, what ingredients do I need to make it the crème de la crème of cookies? As much as it is the opposite of ‘what not to do’, the right ingredients involve defining a non-destructive approach that handles cleansing processes upstream, while the wholesome view of the loyalty program remains at the heart of the strategy. This will ground the customer profile in truth that will drive successful personalization by customizing their offers and communications based on valid attributes unique to the individual.
How Do the Cookies Taste?
When you take the first bite of that cookie that melts in your mouth, the hard work is finally paying off. Much like the cookie, you want to understand what you’ll get out of implementing data management processes the right way. You’ve merged and deduplicated records based on modeling and business rules. You’ve identified households, friends, and consolidated profiles. The result of these procedures is not only a profile to leverage for executing a loyalty strategy, but also cost savings, scalable opportunities, performance improvement, and customer experience improvements.
One Recipe Leads to the Next
By adopting a data management strategy that focuses on the core principles of non-destructive, upstream processes with high fidelity customer and program data, you’ll likely be able to consolidate your platforms and processes, resulting in marketing technology savings. It will also enable you to drive personalization and analytical initiatives at scale. The unified, detailed view of the customer will enable you to optimize customer offerings and communications, therein improving loyalty program performance. This performance advancement will extend to operational optimization, which will be reflected in the ability to refine customer experiences as it relates to frictionless journeys. Overall, the strategic implementation will unlock many opportunities for your business. There won’t be cookie crumbs left behind when it comes to the benefits of introducing a data management system… the right way.
Written By: Jenna Visconti, Sr. Manager, Innovation
As the Senior Manager of Innovation, Jenna is responsible for supporting the evolution of new concepts, products, and solutions for Kobie from inception. Jenna brings an expertise in performance analytics, marketing, and product strategy to the loyalty space.
