As much as some of us may have chosen a more creative path, there’s no escaping numbers. Especially in the ever-changing, fast-paced digital world, data-driven marketing has become a standard practice that empowers brands to make more informed decisions based on optimised, reliable and accurate results.
Data-driven marketing may have been a new shift in the marketing stratosphere, but there’s no denying how effective and meaningful it has been proven in terms of keeping a competitive edge and creating a more personalised experience for consumers. It’s no longer a guessing game, where marketers have to predict and guess what their target audience is after. Data collection and analysis can provide great insights into what’s working and what’s not and a brand’s success can be carefully curated, measured and crafted with data-driven strategies and campaigns.
What is Data-Driven Marketing?
Data-driven marketing is when marketers build their strategies and campaigns based on the thorough analysis of data. It puts data collection and research at the center of all executive decisions, whether they are creative or strategic. It can be an empowering way to make informed decisions and deliver personalised experiences to consumers. The power of data can give brands a great edge against their competitors, while also allowing marketers to optimise their campaigns by implementing strategies and activations that have been data-proven.
By focusing your decision-making on the analysis of data, it gives you better insights and chances of actually reaching your target audience, which means you get higher possibilities of your ad being clicked on, your landing page getting more engagement, your blog being read or any action that would help you meet your conversion goals.
What are the Best Practices in Data-Driven Marketing?
Know Your Audience
Collecting data is great and immensely useful, but is it accurate enough? The best way to navigate your data-driven strategies is to first have a pretty clear understanding of who your target audience is. It is the foundation of having an effective data-driven marketing strategy in place. Your data must be a direct reflection of your customer persona and you need to be fully aware and familiar with all the intricacies that make up your target audience.
Data collection and analysis give you the opportunity to gain valuable insights into your audience, like their preferences, behaviors, likes, and needs. Conduct market research, create buyer personas, use focus groups and questionnaires to gather a clear picture of who you are selling or referring to. The more you know your customer, the more you can trust your data, and also be able to evolve accordingly by continuously monitoring their behaviors.
Data Management
Collecting the data is one thing, but managing them is a whole other aspect. You need to establish a robust management system that keeps track of all your data in a thorough, clear and organized way. It can also help marketers set customer data analysis in their routines by implementing reliable methods and tools that will then allow them not only to save time and resources but also to evaluate new marketing opportunities.
A vital component of data management is the right kind of systems and tools that can ensure consistency and accuracy. As certified HubSpot partners, HubSpot Marketing Hub offers a new marketing reporting feature, Customer Journey Analytics, where marketers can get content related to revenue attribution, lead-nurturing flows, and visitor flows.
Stay Compliant
This is where it gets serious because all of your data collection would be pretty worthless if it was not done by abiding by relevant laws and regulations.
With recent compliance regulations that have been put into place on a global scale, such as the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA), it is more crucial than ever to be respectful of customer information, informed with any changes in data privacy trends and staying compliant with relevant regulations. Compliance can help strengthen your brand reputation and make your business trustworthy, transparent and reliable in consumers’ eyes.
Set Up Data Standards
Establishing quality and explicit internal practices when it comes to your data collection and analysis can make all the difference in maintaining consistency and reliability. Be thorough in your categorization, guidelines, naming conventions, etc, in order to ensure data uniformity among all departments and teams, as it will be pivotal when the time comes to actually utilize your data and put them into effect for your next strategy or campaign.
By setting up your data standards early on, you can ensure efficient practices that will inevitably lead to a more informed decision-making process.
Marketing Analytics Platforms
When it comes to analysing your data, it can be an overwhelming and daunting task. There are numerous platforms and tools that can save you a lot of time and effort in garnering accurate results and insights from your data analysis. Tools such as Google Analytics and Hubspot Marketing Hub can uncover trends, patterns and measure the impact of your marketing in a fast, efficient and useful way that allows you to then proceed with your marketing efforts and strategies, based on all your data analysis.
There are many optimized platforms and tools that you can experiment with in order to figure out which one works best with your business practices.
Source: https://blog.hubspot.com/agency/data-driven-marketing