In this special guest feature, Doug Camplejohn of Fliptop outlines four ways that big data and predictive technology combine to improve modern-day sales and marketing. Doug is the CEO and Founder of Fliptop, a leader in Predictive Analytics applications for B2B companies. Before Fliptop, Doug founded two companies, Mi5 Networks and Myplay, and also held senior roles at Apple, Epiphany and Vontu.
“90% of the world’s data has been created in the last two years.”
Unless you’ve been in a coma for the last few years, odds are you’ve heard this sound bite touted across TED Talks, conference presentations, sales pitches, and recently even HBO’s hit “Silicon Valley.” We’re certainly guilty of it ourselves (see: first sentence) and with good reason: breakthroughs in data accessibility, costs to store and process, and the emergence of the tools to make sense of it all are transforming the way we sell.
According to IBM, we now create 2.5 quintillion bytes of data every day. Most marketers are aware that this data exists, but awareness and action are two very different things. Between CRM and Marketing Automation systems, marketers sit on a wealth of native, structured data. Add to that the rich pool of unstructured data available across the public web (e.g. digital photos/videos, browsing patterns, social content, etc.) and you’ve got the ingredients for better marketing, whether or not you’ve got the recipe just yet.
Until recently, it was commonly accepted that it takes an enterprise-level budget and a team of data scientists to realize any real benefits from big data. As a result, many companies have attempted to process and derive insights from these massive data volumes in house—an expensive, time-consuming, and often error-prone practice. This is no longer the case as predictive marketing technologies have emerged to help companies of all sizes collect, process, analyze, and interpret this data in form of actionable insights.
Today, more and more marketers prefer to leave the “recipe” to the experts—letting predictive solutions to do the heavy lifting when it comes to big data—and the predictive tech industry has exploded as a result. To put things into perspective, at Fliptop, we currently score over 75M records per month, analyzing these records against over 300M contacts and 20M company records in the Fliptop Data Cloud. With access to this massive data warehouse, we’re able to build predictive models and provide a suite of applications to help companies pinpoint which prospects and campaigns are most likely to convert, increase deal velocity, and improve efficiency across the organization.
Need more convincing? Consider the following four ways that big data and predictive technology combine to improve modern-day sales and marketing:
- Campaign Optimization: With big data and predictive technology, marketers can now track real-time performance across campaigns and channels. This analysis can be used to pinpoint which campaigns are sourcing the highest quality prospects, and identify where marketers should double down on investments (as well as where to cut).
- Hyper-Personalization: The promise of targeted marketing is not new, but the availability of big data is finally helping marketers get it right. Marketers can use the insights provided by predictive technology to develop the content and messaging that top prospects have historically been most receptive to, and ensure that it’s being delivered to them at the right time and place.
- Sales Efficiency: Insights provided by predictive can inform whether Marketing should prioritize, nurture, or drop a lead. In doing so, Sales knows exactly when a prospect is primed, tailor their follow-up plan accordingly, and prioritize based on which prospects are most likely to convert and/or have the greatest impact on revenue.
- Predictive Forecasting: Big data has helped companies tie marketing activity directly to revenue and paint a clear picture of what is working and what is not. Based on this information, marketers know precisely where to increase spend and can even forecast how and when those investments will impact the sales pipeline and revenue.
According to CSC, by 2020, data production will be 44x greater than it was just a few years ago. At Fliptop, we recently hit a company milestone processing 1 billion marketing activities across 100M sales records. We expect that number to grow exponentially in a short period and thankfully, what once required a team of data experts and millions of dollars is now accessible to Enterprise and SMBs alike—all for a modest subscription fee.
Predictive tech has simplified the complex process of data collection and analysis, transforming the way we understand and engage our prospects. You’ve already got the data to facilitate smarter Sales and Marketing. The only question is: will you seize the opportunity—capitalizing on the trove of insights buried in your data—or sit idly by as data-driven competitors harness the power of predictive tech and leave you in the dust?
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