First-party data will be more important than ever.
When it comes to facing the inevitable economic downturn, it’s easy to think of the famous quote from British author H.G. Wells: “Adapt or perish, now as ever, is nature’s inexorable imperative.” Though he dealt mostly in science fiction in the 19th and early 20th centuries, the fact of the matter is that this timeless quote illuminates what’s needed from the most proactive businesses right now during the pandemic. We’ll all be forced to adapt to this new world because change is happening so fast. Those that hold back will be left behind. The question that remains: how?
While businesses trying to navigate this uncommon crisis are in this together, there is no single way to address all of the pandemic’s ever-changing problems. Still, some answers may lie in the differentiators that have continually driven those businesses. They don’t necessarily need to change — they only have to evolve.
When it comes to retailers, a key to this evolution post-crisis will be in the ways they acquire new customers, motivate existing customers, and increase engagement. They’ll do this by maintaining a robust first-party dataset to both gain and retain customers, and increase their shopper knowledge.
From personal user accounts to social network likes, proactive retailers have already been able to compile hundreds of thousands of new touch points for current and potential customers. But just having a massive collection of data alone isn’t enough. For retailers trying their best to navigate the downturn in real-time, the ongoing challenge will be to identify the relevant data.
RevTrax has leveraged technology by helping clients deliver the right offer, on the right device, at the right time via plugging directly into wide ranging data assets to capture relevant new customers or deliver rewards to key existing ones. What’s more, targeting offers to customers based on geography, CRM data, basket data, social influence or other relevant data points helps build stronger, more personal connections with customers — giving greater insights to brands.
Obtaining or enhancing first-party data means tracking the path-to-purchase and beyond. Brands gain insight into the consumer’s path to purchase because of our tracking technology. They can also discover what an individual’s price sensitivity is, preferred channel for engagement, best time to engage and more.
Collecting granular information about an audience, media channels, and other key attributes to each conversion will guarantee a full customer picture. This data is effective for tracking conversion from digital engagement to potential in-store sales once states open back up, and builds a promotions pool for the long-term. Proactive solutions like RevTrax can then dig deeper to offer customizable variations, even when targeting the segment of your database for reactivating dormant customers.
What’s also important is understanding your audience’s price sensitivity on an individual level, and utilizing integrations with media partners to optimize sales. Most retailers are opening up the floodgates and wasting money by running too many inefficient offers. This is because they don’t have the right data and platform to determine who gets what offer. Increasing shopper knowledge means utilizing smarter executions on existing offers, and expanding to a place where you use data to discover how to deploy new and better offers.
By using this key information to send potential wary consumers the right messages at the right time in the right channels, brands will gain an analysis of a customer’s behavior that may track in the long-term. By gaining full shopper knowledge by targeting customers with directly meaningful offers, retailers may gain some clarity despite the current level of uncertainty. If you’re interested in learning more about how RevTrax can help, click below to talk to a specialist.
