The concept of ‘customer 360,’ or having a single view of all your customer data, is gaining traction in trade publications, analyst circles, and even mainstream media. But what exactly is a customer 360?
Even though the notion of “customer 360” is much narrower than Master Data Management Solutions, it has acquired support among IT professionals, business leaders, and the media.
It’s simple to see why. As consumer data accumulates in ever-increasing amounts, it frequently gets fragmented, duplicated, inconsistent, incomplete, ungoverned, and out-of-date as it travels throughout the business.
What is Customer 360?
Customer 360 is a master data management model that aggregates all the data about the customer to form a master customer record.
Customer 360 gives you a single, trustworthy view of a customer’s name, address, phone number, gender, and interactions with a company. Purchase history, billing, service difficulties, social presence, and channel preferences can all be included in the view. This information can be used to guide engagement strategies, customer journey steps, messages, personalised offers, and deliveries.
Organizations can generate value, gain a sustainable competitive edge, and optimize new customer acquisition prospects by using a Customer 360 view, whether in-store or online.
Which channels are involved with Customer 360?
Customers can use the following channels:
- In-person, at a company-owned, physical site
- Order via phone through a sales affiliate or partner.
- Online, via a company website or a mobile application.
It’s critical to know who your customers are and how they interact with your company, regardless of which communication channels they use. McDonald’s, for example, should be aware that the same customer is communicating with them whether through a mobile app, the McDonald’s website, a phone call, or the cloud – even across various retail locations.
This example exemplifies why it’s important to carefully assess which data should be included in a customer 360 view.
Whatever data is involved must give the enterprise this visibility so that customers have the same experience regardless of how they interact with the company. In this situation, McDonald’s must swiftly combine data from numerous transactional sources in order to identify the elements that influence customer relationships and choose which channels they may use to improve customer service.
How Customer 360 benefits your business?
Having a comprehensive, 360-degree view of your customers and interactions with them has economic, “defensive” advantages such as greater profits via better cross-selling and up-selling chances. They also enable a better consumer experience for more tailored marketing, resulting in improved conversion rates and income. A 360-degree customer view also lets you assess customer profitability across different products and services, allowing you to effectively categorize your customers based on relevant data and trends.
In addition to reducing the risk of issuing unfavourable credit terms and regulatory non-compliance, especially with new customer privacy regulations requiring organizations to secure personal data and provide it to customers upon request, creating a customer 360 helps with general risk management, which is critical for financial service firms.
Common Customer Data Problems solved with a 360 Customer View
Multi-channel communication only works when the underlying customer data and how it is managed are consistent. It’s challenging to maintain consistency when data about the same customer is scattered over multiple IT systems, each of which may contain data for every customer communication channel. Regardless of how many sources are included, true customer 360s provide consistency.
Customer data quality is another common challenge that customer 360 views can assist alleviate. The same customer’s name (or address, phone number, or other information) is frequently recorded differently in multiple systems or even inside the same system.
Customer 360s are designed to solve this problem by allowing users to determine which person or business comprises a customer entity and include their attributes in order to have more informed interactions with them. Because there is no consistency in how customer records are handled, leveraging third-party external sources like Dun & Bradstreet or social media data becomes difficult without it.
Why do I need a Customer 360 view?
A Customer 360 view is something that can be termed the cost of maintaining, satisfying, and increasing your customer base. It provides a set of universal benefits while also assisting in the resolution of challenges unique to businesses like manufacturing, finance, and retail. To optimize the customer experience, integrate Master Data Management Solutions with structured and unstructured data to achieve a 360-degree customer view regardless of your industry or vertical.
You may discover which of your customers are failing and attempt to enhance your gross margins by evaluating your profit margins by industry, account, and even individual customers. Understanding this allows you to better segment clients in order to reduce risk and increase profits.
A customer 360 view allows you to improve retention rates by enhancing your grasp of who your customers are. This information is crucial for raising marketing conversation rates by contacting the right customer with the right message at the right time and increasing revenue generation through relevant cross-selling and up-selling opportunities.
Increased adaptability to business and economic environments is another common benefit. Customer 360 views enable firms to respond to events like the COVID-19 pandemic by decreasing expenses while using the most meaningful customer connection channels by immediately providing them with all essential information about their customers.
In conclusion, effective Master Data Management solutions allow businesses to maintain a 360-degree view of customers and their journeys with the product. Leveraging a customer’s data to anticipate their needs and develop strategic communication plans is essential for long-term development.
About Artha Solutions:
Artha Solutions is a premier business and technology consulting firm providing insights and expertise in both business strategy and technical implementations. Artha brings forward thinking and innovation to a new level with years of technical and industry expertise and complete transparency. Artha has a proven track record working with SMB (small to medium businesses) to Fortune 500 enterprises turning their business and technology challenges into business value.
