As an online business, no matter what industry you are in, you need to be ahead of your customers today. Being ahead of your customers means you need to know what they want before they know, which leads to a good sales strategy.
How is that possible, you may think? Well, thankfully, there’s big data in the picture. With online data analysis tools and data analysts available today, it is possible to peek into your customer’s brains(metaphorically) and know their next move.
Customer data analysis may seem huge as a concept. However, if we break it down, the smaller fragment of customer data analysis is to analyze a local customer’s behavior. Especially if you are in the FMCG sector, consumer packaged goods analysis will help you stay ahead in the game. You cannot certainly know your customer’s next move; however, with data analysis, you can predict their next move and take action.
Other than regional and global shoppers, customer analysis also differs primarily on two factors:
- Occasional or random shoppers
- Bulk shoppers
Some shoppers randomly stumble upon your website and make a purchase. At the same time, some may wait for holiday sales to come up and buy products in bulk. Sales strategies differ for both cases. The latter point has become more prominent especially post-Covid. People got more into the concept of retail therapy to feel good about themselves, which rampantly boosted sales for various products. You can read more here if you want to know ways to boost holiday selling.
Now that you know the importance of customer data gathering let us take a step further to understand how it helps devise a good sales strategy. So let’s get to it.
5 Ways how gathering info about your shoppers helps make a good sales strategy
Many qualitative and quantitative data analysis tools are available to help you gather and analyze customer data. Doing so will help your business thrive in four of the following ways:
1. Helps you bridge the gap between customer’s and your demands
One of the critical aspects of collecting customer data is that it lets you understand your product’s performance. You may think that product A will add value to your customer; however, your customer may not benefit. When you have concrete data that shows the frequency and feedback of the customers of your product, you will know how they feel about your product.
This information helps you fill the gaps between your demands and your customers’ demands. This data also allows marketers to identify products that perform poorly in the market. They can take a step to reduce the effort put behind the products or services that have no demand.
If we dig deeper and break down the customer data analysis concept, we learn that analyzing a customer begins locally. Demographics play a significant role in knowing your customer. Your product A may be the best-selling product in a part of the location while it could be the worst in another region. This is why you must first know your local customers and their preferences.
Knowing your local customers will give you a real-time insight into which products are liked and which aren’t. It will also let you know if you need some amends in the existing product or if you need to develop a new one.
2. Enhances communication with customers and customer satisfaction
The customer’s data includes his purchase history, reviews, and post-purchase feedback. This information helps you know the customer’s buying behavior so that you can offer an even better experience to them.
Personalization is key to enhancing customer satisfaction. However, to personalize, you not only need to analyze customers’ data but also communicate with them. One of the ways to do so is to use AI-based chatbots. You can use them to empathize with your customers and personalize their experience, taking customer service and eventually customer satisfaction metric a notch higher.
Suggesting products to your customers based on their choices automatically improves customer satisfaction levels and trust. Customer data collection thus helps enhance their buying experience, eventually boosting sales!
3. Helps widen your customer database
Behavioral, personal, and demographic customer data collected from several data sources account for strengthening your database. The equation is relatively simple–the more the data, the deeper the insight. As your customer database grows, it will help you gain deeper insights into their experiences.
An increase in customer data doesn’t just help quantity-wise but also improves the quality of analysis. Two customers liking a product versus two hundred customers wanting a product speaks volumes about their likings and dislikings. With more data, you can make reliable decisions.
This is especially helpful for small to medium-scale businesses. So if you are a small business, keep gathering customer data and expanding the database, as it will help refine your strategies.
4. Helps you in designing the right pricing strategy
As new products get added to the database, pricing them could get a little challenging. You may be wondering: What should the product cost? How much should the service cost? How to arrive at the appropriate product and service price?
Customer data helps drive pricing analytics based on which product is used by the vast majority. Moreover, it helps identify the most profitable channels and customize promotions.
5. Helps in scaling personalization
63% of customers believe that personalization is a standard of service.
Businesses today heavily depend on data and its analysis. Customer data gives insights into the factors that affect their decisions, the frequency of the purchases made, and the overall understanding of the market. Analyzing this data gives scope to leverage any possible analytics and know your customers better. So it is safe to say that personalizing directly impacts sales generation.
Once you identify customers with similar interests, you can use segmentation and pitch a segment more effectively about your new products or services. Doing so will make your customers feel more connected to your brand and reduce the sales cycle.
Wrapping up ways to gather info about your shoppers
Hopefully, you now know the importance of customer data analysis and how it helps make a good sales strategy. However, you need to have a solid customer base before implementing steps to analyze data. After all, you require sufficient data to perform analysis on.
So if you are a small business, it is wise to focus on building a customer base. You should have a concrete vision and a solution that adds value to a user’s issue.
While if you are an established business struggling to boost your sales strategy, you can use these tips and witness the results. All the best!
