Big Data refers to the immense amount of information that is now available via the internet that can be used by companies to reach to customers. Much of this data has grown with the explosion of information and communications technology. Objects like the SmartPhone and other mobile devices have helped customer data from across the world become more present in the pool of the internet. This data can be captured and used by companies to better understand the marketing and organizational behavior of customers, whether they are other businesses or consumers. To capture and interpret Big Data, a new breed of analytical workers have professionally arisen that are hired by companies to search Big Data for the most beneficial information for a company.
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Narrow On Specific Data
For many executives or managers, Big Data might sound like a complex subject. However, a savvy marketing team should be able to best use the information from Big Data. For example, a marketing strategy team tend to think about the problems the company faces and how to solve that problem. This is the first step with process utilizing Big Data. Knowing the problem helps narrow the data a company should focus on. For example, a company can look customer data, such as demographics or market share, in specifically defined geographic regions.
Getting to Know Something Better
Whether its business-to-business or business-to-consumer companies, Big Data is a potential goldmine to reach customers. However, the company needs to understand that this information reflects the customer base; it cannot be something manipulated. Many companies might assume from older forms of market research or within reason how customers act, behave, or like. The data that can be found on customers can discover unique attributes of a customer base that the company may have never thought of or understood before. Big Data should be seen as an opportunity to know the customer better, not conform any data to pre-concieved notions on consumer behavior.
Sensitive Data
Big Data gathering businesses need to keep in mind that Big Data is a real-time and ever-changing, in flux flow of information. Consumer attitudes and appetites change, as well as the technology they use to gather this information. One difficulty to being a Big Data analysis is the professional needs to keep up-to-date with the technology that customers use to spread out data into the internet. Think of how much communications have changed; an increasing number of consumers use their SmartPhone to provide and spread information over a desktop. So, an analyst that finds and captures data that could represent only desktop users could be hindering the amount of useful data the company could be using. Staying alert with how this information changes and how consumers provide information is very important to succeeding with Big Data.
Benefits of Big Data
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Forrester Research has called the Big Data era the Age of the Customer. This means that Big Data can potentially help a business tap into an pool of wealth by focusing the marketing strategy toward data. According to a McKinsey & Company analysis, companies that centered acquiring data as part of their marketing strategies improved their rate of investment by 15-20%. Big Data has the potential to change a business around and improve, not only their profits, but how the business interacts with consumers.
