Welcome to our series on marketing jobs to be done, where we explore how BlueConic helps hands-on doers achieve their core objectives and drive transformative results with every click. In this first installment, we focus on the importance of knowing your customers.
In marketing, success hinges on four core jobs: growing your audience, keeping customers engaged and loyal, driving conversions, and maximizing revenue opportunities. Central to each job lies a fundamental requirement: a deep understanding of your customers. The better you know your audience, the more effective your marketing efforts become.
Yet, many businesses rely on fragmented systems like CRM software and email platforms that hinder their ability to truly understand their customers. These systems often focus on isolated data points – like purchase history or email opens – rather than providing a comprehensive, real-time understanding of each individual. The result? Missed opportunities for meaningful engagement and growth.
At BlueConic, we provide hands-on marketing and growth doers with a better way. Here are five strategies that you can use to better understand your customers and fuel smarter growth:
1. Convert unknown visitors into known customers
To truly understand your customers, you need to know who they are. But many businesses have a large number of website visitors and digital interactions that remain anonymous, making personalized marketing nearly impossible.
By collecting and unifying basic first-party data – such as visitor behavior, device type, and location – you can create more relevant, value-driven experiences that boost data collection and deepen customer insights. Simple tactics, like offering special deals or exclusive content in exchange for customer information (e.g., email addresses), or using interactive tools such as quizzes, surveys, polls, and product finders, can help engage visitors and encourage data sharing.
These strategies not only expand your pool of known customers, but also generate richer insights to tailor your offerings and marketing strategies to better meet their needs.
2. Integrate data for a holistic customer view
Companies can’t solely rely on online customer data to truly understand their audience. Gaining a deeper, more accurate understanding of your customers means factoring in offline data as well.
Start by collecting online data from sources like your website, email platforms, social media channels, and e-commerce systems for insights into digital interactions, behaviors, and preferences. Then, enhance this data with offline insights from CRM platforms, POS systems, and in-store interactions, such as purchase history, support interactions, and in-person engagement.
This holistic approach ensures a complete, up-to-date history of each customer’s interactions with your business, providing richer insights into their preferences and needs. By merging online and offline data, you can uncover hidden patterns, anticipate customer behavior, and deliver more personalized experiences that resonate on a deeper level.
3. Manage privacy while gaining insight
Respecting customer privacy is no longer optional—it’s a fundamental requirement. However, balancing privacy with data-driven insights can be a tricky task.
With a CDP, it doesn’t have to be. Start by familiarizing yourself with the privacy laws that apply to your business, such as GDPR, CCPA, and other local regulations. Then, select the privacy zones you need to adhere to based on customer locations or require consent from all customers, regardless of where they are. Remember to limit data collection to only what is necessary for your marketing efforts.
By collecting and using data within these privacy frameworks, you can build trust, gain deeper customer insights, and deliver more personalized experiences – while mitigating your consumer data risk at the same time.
4. Streamline consent management
Alongside privacy, managing customer consent is critical for compliance and trust. By integrating consent into your brand experience, you demonstrate your commitment to ethical practices and empower customers to take an active role in how their data is used.
Start by creating a user-friendly interface – like an opt-in form or consent banner – that clearly explains the data you plan to collect. Be sure to offer granular consent options that allow customers to specify how their data can be used (e.g., for personalized communications, for analytics, etc.), and ensure they can easily modify or withdraw their consent at any time.
Additionally, ensure your system automatically synchronizes consent across all your data sources and delivery platforms and makes it easy to promptly respond to right to be forgotten requests. By adopting these practices, you not only ensure compliance but also gain deeper insights into customer preferences, leading to more personalized and effective marketing strategies.
5. Effectively segment and activate your customers
Once you’ve built a comprehensive and compliant understanding of your customers, the next step is to take action.
Start by identifying the attributes for segmentation that are most important to your specific business objectives. These attributes can include demographics (age, gender, location), psychographics (lifestyle, interests), behavioral data (purchase history, order frequency), and more.
In addition to these standard attributes, consider incorporating super-targeted attributes derived from interactive elements like quizzes. For example, a beauty brand could use color matching results to create precise segments based on individual preferences. This allows for more tailored marketing efforts, such as triggering automated emails with recommended products that align closely with each customer’s unique profile.
However, it’s important to remember that just because you can create a million segments from your data doesn't mean you should. Start by identifying the most valuable segments and crafting your campaigns accordingly, and then expand from there.
In an era where customer data is the most valuable asset, companies that can access and act on the most relevant data will be the ones that succeed. By implementing these strategies, you can achieve real customer understanding and drive tangible outcomes for your business.
It’s time to stop guessing and start knowing.
