Most business data are in streams – connected up over time for a specific customer or account. For example, consider these key data streams:
- Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) – this platform brings buyer behaviour and revenue data streams for specific customers
- Customer Relationship Management (CRM) – CRM brings internally sourced data streams over time on interactions, internal interventions and campaigns which touch specific customers.
Until now, the Voice of Customer (VoC) hasn’t been a very compatible part of big data because it is almost always a collection of disconnected survey snapshots. Sometimes it’s even anonymous, so you don’t even know whose voice it is! There’s little of the joining up that makes VoC a stream that’s connectible with your other data.
All you need to do is to start ‘following’ your customers.
That turns their voice into a movie, rather than snapshots. Using a longitudinal technique like MirrorWave is the secret; re-contacting the same customers and asking them the same questions each time, so that you get a connected up individual voice stream.
Here are five great things you can do by bringing together ERP, CRM and VoC data streams:
- See the whole customer story.
Bringing data together means you can deep dive into a holistic customer story – so much more than a 360 degree view. You can see everything that you can see in CRM from an inside out point of view (company perspective), combined with what the customer thinks (customer perspective) by deep diving down to the individual story. - Gain a really valuable heads up.
You can create valuable heads up type of reports, quickly and easily. Account managers are busy – and this kind of heads up report means if they’re just about to see a customer, they can go straight onto their device and see typical CRM info (e.g. what they’ve bought, what they’ve bought most recently) AND can also see their feedback (what they said, what you did about it). - Choose between a Customer Voice first view – or a CRM first view.
If you want to be more customer centric, there’s nothing better than starting with the Customer Voice and populating it with CRM and other data (which adds richness and meaning). Or to make sure your internal view isn’t too far from the truth, you can populate CRM with customer sentiment. - Discover unexpected relationships.
It’s possible that your happiest customers are also the most unprofitable. Co-mingling data can bring unexpectedly valuable data relationships to the fore. Bringing data together in creative ways, results in fresh insights. - Build unparalleled accountability.
By co-mingling Customer Voice and CRM data, you can see if a customer is unhappy (and why), take action, see how sentiment has changed as a result, and also if behaviour has changed. It’s so much more powerful to combine what customers are doing with what they’re saying.
This doesn’t have to be a huge job that requires lots of code. All you need is compatible data streams and some inventive connections into your existing platforms.
So rather than sinking in rough and wild data, try swimming in a smooth data current that will take you places.
- Check out our ‘Customer Sutra’ infographic for 9 tips to become a better customer lover!
- Read more about big data integration and alignment