Boom and your Data’s Clean!
Wouldn’t it be great if it was as easy as spraying your database with a cleaning spray to get rid of all those out of date contacts that give you those terrible bounce back rates? Unfortunately it isn’t that easy, however, the benefits of a clean database should not be underestimated just because it’s a tough job.
Most companies have some form of existing database but often don’t know what’s really in it. That database might have taken years to pull together but is now just sat there not being used to generate any leads, opportunities or income! This is where cleansing can help.
The building blocks of your marketing campaign
It’s estimated that business data can become redundant by more than 35% per year with over £18million a year going to waste on mailing dead people? It’s a sobering thought isn’t it?
In light of this, all organisations should be looking at their database and checking how accurate it is. There’s been a lot of talk about ‘big data’ and how important it is to marketing and sales activity but the truth of the matter is that it doesn’t matter how big your data is if it isn’t accurate.
Having clean and current data are the building blocks of any marketing campaign. By cleansing your data you know that the businesses exist, that they form a part of your target audience, and that you have relevant and accurate contact details in order to make a connection and nurture your leads. No time is wasted and you can focus on what you need to achieve.
What Does Cleansing your Data Mean?
Cleansing your data is more than just getting the right phone number or email address. It’s about making sure that you don’t have duplicate records of the same customer, that you have correct postal addresses, that you have decision maker contact names and job titles, that you have the correct category of industry they are involved in and even checking if the customer contact is still with a business. Without this information, any kind of segmentation approach would be very difficult.
Knowing that your targeted marketing message will reach the right person, is likely to yield better results. It is not rocket science but based on how many organisations don’t bother, you would think that it is! Okay, maybe we’re being a bit facetious to make a point but time and time again you will hear companies moan about telemarketing or email results when it was actually the quality of the data that was at fault.
The reality is that every day there are numerous changes in business data; phone numbers change, companies move premises, email addresses change and people move on. People are much more mobile now and it’s often the case that there are numerous versions of the same database on different portable devices. The capacity for confusion and wasted effort in this scenario is massive. This is why cleansing data and having one version of a database is so critical if organisations want to maximise on their marketing efforts and get the desired ROI.
Additional Benefits of Cleansing your Data
Another key benefit of cleansing your data is identifying gaps in your contact list. Once you have gone through the rigorous exercise of cutting the chaff from the wheat in your list, it’s amazing how often you will spot a hole in a potential segment that you want to target and that you need to fill. This can be achieved by purchasing a targeted list or building that additional data to supplement your database.
In addition, cleansing your B2B data is all part of responsible data protection practices and it is your responsibility as a data owner to keep people’s personal data up to date and accurate. With the revisions to the EU data protection regulations, it looks like all B2B data will have to be opted in to receive your marketing messages – cleansing your data is an ideal time to do this as well. It’s a good job that there are organisations out there like GCL Direct that can do this for you….#justsaying!
