Big Data is big for business strategy and outcome. At a time when the overpouring volume of data is helping us to come with more data-driven decisions and mobility is playing the key role in the data revolution, Big Data analytics is very likely to remain in the center stage of mobile marketing. Any business knows the invincible role of mobile apps in marketing their products and establishing a brand image. But to make their app more discoverable, they need to take help from the latest data resources, presumably Big Data analytics.
An overview of the role of Big Data in sales and marketing
Which are the key areas of sales and marketing that are getting help from Big Data analytics most? As per the Forbes report on the same, there are 48% of Big Data use cases for Customer Analytics while there are only 21% of Big Data use cases in Operational Analytics. The same report also maintains that the Big Data use cases for Fraud and Compliance are 12%, New Product & Service Innovation is 10%, and for Enterprise Data Warehouse Optimization is 10%. According to this study increasing number of businesses are keen on using Big Data for customer value analytics. It is needless to say that mobile apps are playing a key role in leveraging Big Data to drive sales and marketing.
Mobility and Big Data: an intertwined relationship
The relationship between mobility and Big Data is reciprocal and mutually growth proponent in more ways than one. To understand the length of this relationship one needs, to begin with, the basic first. The rise of mobile apps helped to foster the exponential growth of digital data both in volume and variety and this, in turn, helped mobile app analytics to know customers and users deeper. The same user data derived from device sensors and analytics are feeding the analytics and strategic decision making with more actionable insights. This is precisely why mobile is so well suited for the entire Big Data trajectory.
The anytime-anywhere nature of mobility helped businesses gain deeper insights on user behavior, usage patterns, and input based user data. Moreover, besides allowing direct access to user data, the background running apps also grab a whole array of user data and usage patterns that further allows further value for analytics when it comes to marketing. This trail of diversified data consisting of user behavior and actions provide mobile apps all the materials for most actionable insights to drive marketing initiatives. When users are not using any mobile app and remaining inactive, the device is continuing to grab valuable user data.
This vast reserve of mobile user data can further be utilized for optimizing the mobile user experiences, to build and drive mobile traffic, to push business conversion and to drive more engagement and user interaction. The emergence of sophisticated user analytics like Flurry’s analytics is a good example of how app developers can actually grab help from this data to drive user retention and engagement. Mobile app marketing is increasingly becoming dependent on actionable analytics provided by user data and insights and in this respect, the value of Big Data analytics is continuing to loom large.
As for mobile advertising and marketing, this plethora of data-driven insights has more significant role to play. These days, every mobile app comes equipped with location sensors and location-based notifications. Grabbing location data of the user is invariably a crucial and big component of mobile big data which allows further well targeted and contextual marketing approach. The specifically targeted, real-time, hyper-local messages and notifications can enjoy far better traction than so called ‘one size fits all’ kind of marketing messages that do not consider ‘when’ and ‘where’ element of the user situation in its purview. Location data coupled up with specific user data can drive more personalisation in marketing through mobile apps.
Getting the edge with real-time analytics through Big Data
In the recent times, the so-called actionable analytics is more about making things happen in real time. Today’s mobile marketers are predisposed to the value of real time. With the overwhelming volume of insight-rich data allowing analytics more control than ever before, the real-time analytics can give businesses more advantages. The capability of latest Big Data technology in this respect can play a decisive role. The Hadoop reporting allows analyzing the data in real time. With the real-time analytics, the businesses can now be able to deliver quick decisions and respond to changes in immediate marketing initiatives. Thanks to this real-time advantage a business now can adjust to the changes in the midway of any campaign.
Critical elements in a successful data-driven marketing strategy
Now as the importance of data-driven marketing started pushing most businesses to adopt to Big Data tools and analytics, there are few critical aspects that organizations need to keep in mind.
First of all, a data-driven approach to marketing needs to be cross-disciplinary, and so you need to boost collaboration among different teams and team members. Secondly, focus on the right KPIs and give more importance to the insights between the lines than mere numbers. Numerical values may not always guide you properly. Evaluate your buyer personas from time to time on the basis of the data-driven insights. The buyer persona your business focuses on must be assessed and if required more characteristic details should be added to it.
Do you know a vast majority of businesses are using data-driven marketing approach to reach their customers in one way or the other? Do you know a whopping 44 percent of businesses and consumer marketing companies are already using big data to make their marketing more responsive and customer-focused? All these data and statistics invariably tell us about the immense importance of Big Data in marketing and sales. While mobility is at the center of a digital strategy for any business now, Big Data is likely to push the advantages of mobility with more real-time, hyper-local and personalized marketing approaches.