BlogDigital Marketing / Inbound Marketing

How to Leverage Big Data for Your Inbound Marketing Strategy

By Team #ARM Worldwide
October 29, 2017

You obviously know what is big data if you have not been living under a rock. In today’s day and age, big data is the one thing, the most important aspect that impacts inbound marketing like none other. The implications of big data and the way it is transforming the marketing scenario is for all to see. Data is one of the main forces that drives every inbound marketing initiative you execute. You need to look at the data available to create a flourishing business model and convert an inbound marketing campaign into a lead generating machine. Collating and culling out data because everyone else is doing it will not make any difference. You need to put this data to work so that you can make your inbound marketing strategies more efficient. Analyzing and implementing the data at hand is what will help you become more efficient and competitive. It will add to the prospects of attracting customers, converting leads and closing sales apart from delighting loyal supporters.

How can big data be utilized?

It can be used in a plethora of ways. From pointing out the shopping behaviour of customers to their demographics, big data can be used for inbound marketing services in many ways. Not just that, big data will also highlight your follies – from incompetence in your workflow to inefficient business processes, it can tell you just about everything. Inbound marketing companies are using big data to:

Recognize trends in shopping, so that top-selling products and services can be highlighted and the products that are either underperforming or not performing at all can be rejected.
Know demographic trends, so inbound marketing services can cater to the target audience based on age groups, income brackets and locations.
Find out what advertisements are faring well and which ones can be removed to avoid wastage of resources.
Divide user data to come up with customized inbound marketing campaigns that cater to a particular group of shoppers.

How can inbound marketing services be improved with big data?

The importance of big data can’t be undermined. It has unquestionably become imperative for your marketing strategy. All you need to do is understand and use it well to increase sales.

You get to know your target audience

Analyzing the data available can be of immense help in knowing and understanding your target group. With data on ages, geographies and income groups, you can make concentrated efforts for those specific markets. These factors can also lend themselves to comprehending sales, the influence of social media, ease of shopping online and much more.

Your readers can benefit from your pearls of wisdom

Your findings will benefit your readers/users because they could use it further and apply the data findings themselves. This leads you to become an authority in that field, and you know what’s going on in and around that area. This also showcases you in a highly positive light, because when your readers need an insight, they link it to you.

You can easily drive business efficiencies

With lesser efforts than yesteryears, businesses today can come up with a much better quality of work. This is all thanks to the insights that can be converted to opportunities. And these – in turn – can be streamlined into processes using the latest technologies that no longer require manual labor or multiple systems.

You can target new customers

Once you know and understand your buyer personas, it will become easier for you to appeal to prospective customers as well. With tools such as Facebook’s ad targeting platform, you can always get the right message across to your target audience, and acquire new customers in the process.

You understand the context that lies behind the content

Once you understand the way searches occur, or figure out the patterns of posts, you can pinpoint the issue your customers are facing. You also get to know who exactly can benefit from you. Every time you blog or post on social media, it will showcase your intent and define where you want to take your business.

The strategy for pricing can be devised

Inbound marketing tactics can’t be employed in a silo. Pricing is also an extremely important part of marketing. Big data can let you know what price tags work best. It will make no sense to direct innumerable leads to the website if the price is a put-off. Prices, when reasonable and competitive, can work really well, and with the correct usage of your data, you can identify various levels of pricing and know how it impacts your sales.

Monetization opportunities galore

Inbound marketing companies are taking advantage of opportunities that present themselves to monetize the data they garner from various sources. Programs like geo-targeting augment revenue models through alternative means.

You will be able to predict churn and loyalty

Specific strategies can be targeted towards the most loyal customers to keep them that way. Likewise, customer churn can be predicted and campaigns can be created to tackle just that aspect.

You can say what your users want to hear

Use big data to understand what the target group wants to hear and what it likes. Design your messaging around this. After all, your communication needs to resonate with the customers. If it fails to do so, then the marketing strategy is nothing but a complete failure. Once you know which advertisement has had the greatest impact on the users, then you will be able to create more ads around those interest areas.

New sources of revenue can be looked at

If you analyze big data for purchasing patterns and user behaviour, then you will be able to figure out opportunities for growth in areas other than the ones you operate in. According to newer demands of the market, you could create new products and services.

It’s the ultimate chance to cross-sell and upsell

Throughway of service requests, usage of products and other forms of communication, customers usually manage to say a lot and leave a history of interactions behind. These insights can be utilized to recommend products or services to the customers. It is a known fact that it is much more cost-effective to upsell to your existing clients than it is to acquire new customers, so why not?

What is the future of big data for inbound marketers

Inbound marketing is quickly becoming a discipline that uses all the marketing tactics such as pricing, positioning, product, messaging, and branding, apart from technical data. The coming years present a great opportunity (apart from a few hurdles that need to be overcome) to be able to leverage big data to the fullest. Business leaders, as well as their marketing counterparts, need to be educated so that one can be up to speed on available opportunities. They also need to be aware of the risks of using big data in inbound marketing. With the upcoming General Data Protection Regulation or GDPR 2018 in Europe, that is all about protection of privacy, compliance and internet laws, marketers could face a few challenges. New platforms and newer technologies could lead to a shortage of talent adept in those technologies. With artificial intelligence and cognitive computing now a part of our worlds, marketers will need to smarten up to apply human thought processes to machines.