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Rich data is needed to gain a competitive edge in the market and maintain modern-day business operations. In the current world of digital communication and transactions, data will help you in numerous ways (especially in sales and marketing). Out of all its usage, establishing a strong relationship with your target consumers and customers is one of the most remarkable uses of data. But, just about any form of data can not be utilized for such purposes since raw data has many errors and discrepancies. It needs data processing and validation, which is done through data enrichment.
Let’s discuss how data enrichment helps you create a ready-for-use database, its benefits, and how you can build a robust consumer engagement strategy based on this data.
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The Need for Data Enrichment
Data enrichment is the process of refining raw data by adding missing values, correcting errors, removing duplicate values, and giving it a standard structure. Businesses require data enrichment to create an efficient database that will be readily available for operations. If your operations are supported with good data, it will be reflected in better results and improved customer engagement.
Data enrichment is needed because raw data has many discrepancies; it can’t be used for operations in the same form. Moreover, you cannot trust the data sources unless you run the information through credible verification processes.
Utilizing general data can lead to a waste of marketing and sales efforts. It can hamper your business growth. Data enrichment saves businesses time and investment.
How Data Enrichment paves the way for Strong CRM
Clean data is critical to driving engagement. Business organizations have consumers at the center of their operations. To influence your customers, you need data on their shopping history, behavior, likes/dislikes, decision-making, etc., along with the consumer’s basic profile like contact information, demographic details, family information, professional details, and more. All this is gathered based on consumers’ previous interactions during shopping.
Through such enriched data, an authentic and personalized engagement can be created. It assists in the development of a loyal bond and lively communication. Data enrichment is a great process as it improves the data quality and standard, making it readily available for customer relationship management operations.
How is Data Enrichment Advantageous for Business
Clean data loaded with all the information is an asset for organizations. It has multiple advantages regarding a firm’s customer relationship management. This is the reason businesses are adopting data enrichment processes.
The following are the advantages of enriched data:
- Helps Understand Your Customer
Enriched data is loaded with detailed insights that lead marketing operations with a clear view of approach strategy. It provides exact knowledge that can be utilized to give an identity to your consumer. Based on this you can divide your specific consumers. According to these consumer segments, a personalized communication strategy can be built for marketing, sales, and service.
- Helps Effective Engagement
As it helps you create a database of consumer key attributes, a relevant sales and engagement plan can be formulated. These insights help create more personalized offers and sales pitches. When you engage the customer with relevant information, the chances of conversion grow manifold.
- Increase in Sales
When you are backed by rich data, your ability to gauge the decision-making of a consumer increases. You know the customer’s requirements, what drives the buying decision, and who will make the call. This helps you create an engagement strategy, which results in sales.
- Better Customer Experience
As you are equipped with a customer’s buying information, it helps you create an acquaintance. You can offer personalized sales and service experiences. Consumers love such interaction and wish to stick to you for shopping satisfaction. It also builds a loyal relationship.
- Assists in Sales Automation
Enriched shopping data, along with a customer’s profile, help in the development of machine learning algorithms. It assists in creating artificial intelligence programs. These AI features further improve customer experience. It can also be used by sales and marketing teams to inspire better customer engagement.
- Reduces Data Decay
Data enrichment services keep your data updated. Consumers may change their phone numbers, emails, job, or location. It may also undergo life events that affect decision-making. In such a case, if your data is not updated, it will decay. The data enrichment process keeps this data intact so that you don’t lose any prospects.
How to Create The Right Data Enrichment Process
Several steps lead to an efficient data enrichment process. If you can integrate these, keeping in mind the goals of the process, you get a rich database to conduct your CRM operations. The guidelines followed by efficient data enrichment companies on the process are as follows:
- Data Matching
Begin with matching the raw data with the respective constituent in the business’s CRM. Data matching or identity resolution is important as wrongly placed data values may lead the whole operation to go to waste. It can corrupt your database. You will have to organize extensive clean-ups that will incur additional costs. You should try to use many data points to cross-validate data with CRM.
- Data Validation
Along with data matching, its validation is equally important. For instance, verify phone numbers and identify the person who holds this contact. Verify email id to check it is proper and delivered to the primary constituent. Similarly, every appended data should be validated to give the database strength.
- Data Quality Check
For effective CRM operations, you need to stop every bad data from entering the database. This can be achieved by detailed scrutiny of data quality right from the beginning of the cycle, starting from the data-entry level. Bad data can have a serious impact on your CRM operations. For instance, if a medical practitioner is recorded as a law practitioner, it will incorrectly overwrite the information.
Quality Assurance should be initiated before updating your database. Run quality checks on small data batches right at the entry-level. This will help identify entry points with wrong data inputs and validate data along with the whole process.
- Group Appending
This technique helps speed up data enrichment, saving time and resources. Manual data enrichment is time-consuming and may involve human errors. Whereas, bulk appending is an automated process done in batches. It is a sustainable process and results in accurate data collection. Also, bulk appending is scalable and keeps the data updated, leaving no chance for loss in data decay.
- Data Enrichment Services
If you are an organization that wants to improve client engagement with good data but you don’t find it feasible to hire an in-house team, then what are the options? The answer is to outsource data enrichment to a company.
A good data enrichment partner should have the following capabilities:
- It should have access to respective data sources that meet your demand.
- It should be able to examine data for compatibility, match it with existing constituents and do its data standardization.
- Add relevant quality data in missing spots.
- Help you save time, resources, and money, and meet your data goals.
Analyze the data enrichment services providing companies on these grounds before contracting them for your business requirement. The company should have accountable resources, experienced staff, advanced technology, and infrastructure.
- Analyze Your Data Goals
Understanding your data needs will help you create an efficient data enrichment process. Not just CRM, every stakeholder should analyze their data goals and reach a consensus on what kind of data can help overall business goals.
If you can identify clear goals for data enrichment solutions, it will conclude in a precise strategy to begin the process. Most organizations that best use their data are found to have well-marked and measured goals.
Conclusion
Hopefully, the article was able to explain the role of data enrichment for personalized engagement and rich customer experience. High-quality enriched data will give you freedom from the ‘shooting-in-the-blind’ style of marketing and sales operations. Utilize this process to step into the era of data-driven personalized customer engagement. You can outsource to data enrichment companies to start immediately.
Read more: Data Integration Made Simple With AI/ML Technologies
