Engaging Customers Using Big Data

Big Data is rapidly transforming a number of business functions across many industries. The biggest transformation is in how we market to our customers. This book shows marketers today how to seek small samples from their customers to observe their behavior, predict changes, and act using a series of unconnected business actions. Big Data has changed the game completely-we can connect with customers, record every click on the web, watch every step in the store, and listen to all public conversations. Unlike today's environment, where marketers broadcast across a set of customer segments, we can now personalize our communications to each customer based on their current predisposition to the products being sold. The book makes three major propositions: 1. Big Data brings all the data to the table leading to a lot more detailed analysis and discovery. We can get a lot more understanding about consumer behavior. 2. Automation and Social Media drives a lot more influence on the decisions. We can converse with the customers as they make decisions and influence their decision-making using a series of sophisticated marketing tools. 3. The market leaders will integrate their resources and investment to optimize across a number of instruments in ways we have never seen before. These changes have tremendous impact on our marketing processes and capabilities. In the first half of the book, using a series of examples from big data pioneers, such as PF Chang's, Best Buy, Google, and IBM, Sathi describes how each marketing function is undergoing fundamental changes: how personalized advertising is delivered using online channels where the marketers identify the specific customer and tailor their messaging based on customer behavior, context, and intention; how customer behaviors are collected from a variety of sources across many industries and examined to identify micro segments; and how online and physical stores collaborate to provide a unified shopping experience and deliver product information. The second half of the book examines the tools and techniques for marketing science in support of these capabilities including statistical techniques, qualitative reasoning, and real-time pattern detection, to name a few. Based on these changes, the book prescribes the changes needed to update our skill and tools for Marketing Analytics.