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You already know the importance of using data to improve sales and marketing performance. Data about your actions — as well as about your competitors — give you relevant insights that help plan your future actions. However, the analytics game is changing, and it’s more than probable that your sales team could benefit from integrating new practices to get the upper hand against competitors.
The benefits of data analytics aren’t small change. According to Forbes, effective use of big data analytics boosts productivity and profitability up to 5-6 percent. Additionally, a McKinsey analysis shows that marketing return on investment can be increased up to 15-20 percent when companies make data a priority in their marketing and sales decisions.
It’s time to look at data analytics from a fresh perspective. As the saying goes, “Do what you’ve always done and you’ll get what you’ve always gotten.” Gone are the days when simply tracking team performance and revenue was enough to get you by — today, so much data is available that it’s inexcusable not to use it to your advantage.
First, get a grip on which metrics actually matter to you. No two companies are identical, and your goals will significantly impact which analytics you choose to prioritize. After you know what you’re shooting for, here’s how to do data analytics in 2015:
Don’t stick to a single source for data — with so many possibilities from CRM systems, online tracking tools, sales applications, and more, you have the information you need to create the deepest, most complete understanding of your customer base possible. So use it! Combine relevant data from multiple sources and use it to create a multifaceted understanding of trends, competition, and ways to improve.
Analytics make it possible to target clients according to average deal size so you can create individualized approaches, whether you are going for the highest-revenue-producing clients or building your reliable, steady stream of medium-revenue-grossing clients. Understanding your customers helps you predict their behaviors so you can allocate resources accordingly.
It’s important to know more than results: you also need to understand your customers’ behavior practices — and now, there are more options than ever. With so many different outlets for marketing, you need to know where you are retaining (and losing) established client basis, as well as what streams are pushing new clients towards you.
This is where salespeople really come in. Automation and analytics do not push away the need for human sales experts — if anything, they enable salespeople to use their capabilities in more specialized ways so they can apply their knowledge to real-time behaviors. While data can help with predictions, only a person’s input and knowledge of the field can make the decisions on what will work and what won’t.
To get the upper hand, you need to be looking at more than just your own data. Harness the power of big data and track your competitors’ actions just as much as you track your own. Your competitors can help you avoid making mistakes they made as well as give you inspiration for sales and marketing tactics to try.
These are some of the most important trends to integrate into your sales and marketing analytics scheme now. So get on it, before the competition gets ahead. What do you think? How has your analytics game changed with the advent of big data?
Tamar Garfunkel is the Marketing Manager at Adclarity. Her talent and experience enables her team to creatively design campaigns with scientific accuracy and measurement.
