Customer data

Customer data

Do you know your customers? Do you know how they use your product or service? Do you know what they think of you? Do you know if you are in danger of losing them or not? What are their actual needs?

You can find the answers to these questions and many more in customer data. In short, it’s about you being better informed about your customers. Customer data takes many forms, comes from numerous sources and can be used for all manner of purposes.

The simplest form of customer data is the customer’s name and contact details. These are used to engage in dialogue with the customer and should preferably be stored in a CRM system. This should also contain information about sales and purchases and any contact you have had with the customer.

Depending on the industry, customer data can also be directly linked to use of a product or a service. A media firm, for example, may log your use of their products in order to send you relevant offers, adapt content to suit your needs, and reward their most active customers. By analysing this data, they can look for patterns that tell them something about whether a subscriber is in danger of leaving or not – and so take action to keep them.

LEVELS OF CUSTOMER DATA:

The degree to which companies are able to make use of customer data varies. In very simple terms, we can divide it into three levels:

Level 1: The company uses data to describe a situation – for example, number of customers in different categories and how they use the products and services

Level 2: The company uses data to estimate how the customer will act – for example, whether the customer is in the process of leaving the company or not

Level 3: The company combines insight with automated actions – for example, a gym that sees a customer beginning to visit less may send out new tips on exercising or an additional offer to keep customers

EXAMPLES OF CUSTOMER DATA: 

What do you know about your customers and what information is valuable for successful product and service development, sales, marketing and customer service? This obviously varies from company to company, from B2B to B2C, from industry to industry. Here are some examples:

Identity data – name, date of birth, gender, address, telephone number, e-mail address, information about social media, account information, company information, position and consents

Quantitative data – transaction data, communication information, activity on website or in apps, social media activity and information from customer service

Descriptive data – family relationships, lifestyle and career

Qualitative data – attitudes (how satisfied are you with the help, etc.), opinions and motivation/challenges/needs.