It’s probably not a surprise, but customer data is the foundation of any business. It’s necessary for customer interaction, analytics, operations and marketing. However, despite the importance of customer data, we continuously see businesses struggle to acquire, maintain and update customer information.
A recent Experian Data Quality research study revealed that the size of an organization correlates to why businesses are motivated to manage customer data quality. For example, a smaller business will focus on business performance as a key reason to manage data quality, whereas a larger organization will focus more on initiatives that drive understanding on individual customers and enable more personalized efforts that can exponentially improve the business’ footprint.
As the scale illustrates, there is a clear correlation between data quality motivators and business size. Without accurate customer information, small businesses cannot manage the operations and basic communications that lead to product sales and business revenue. It’s likely not a surprise that revenue is the core motivator here.
What may be surprising, though, is that revenue is not a core motivator within larger organizations. Larger organizations juggle a multitude of initiatives that all require accurate customer data as a prerequisite for success.
Increased marketing conversion rates, business intelligence, customer service and customer engagement rank among the top motivators. And while these ultimately impact revenue, they speak to more strategic, higher value efforts that cannot be tracked as linearly.
No matter the business size or the motivation, it is important that businesses of all sizes recognize and navigate data quality obstacles. Beyond the tools that drive your data quality strategy, the ultimate process of data management should not change. The concept of analyzing, improving and controlling data assets is critical. Without it, organizations will be unable to meet objectives in today’s data-centric environment.
To learn more about how organizations of all sizes manage their data quality challenges, join this webinar. The group will discuss findings from a recent Experian Data Quality survey, ways for businesses to navigate data quality obstacles and expectations for data quality tools required as business needs evolve.