Marketing needs more intelligence, says Forrester

Readers' comments (6)

• Kateryna Kolodnytska | Tue, 17 Nov 2009 3:17 pm

  Absolutely agree,
  You are not the only one who is not organised around customer and probably actually one of the few who has data in single database.
  I think also the problem is that systems that are developed are fit to specific idea at the time and are not flexible enough to change with time without further significant investment

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• Ken | Tue, 17 Nov 2009 4:32 pm

  I agree with everything in the article and everything you have just said Kateryna.
  
  It'd actually be very surprising to find real-life examples to the contrary!

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• Dave Gurney, Alchemetrics | Wed, 18 Nov 2009 11:57 am

  Customers can sit at the heart of an organisation’s strategy, if teams are properly directed to; develop understanding, formulate strategies to engage customers, and crucially use the insight they hold to interact with them, with the twin goals of improving the targeting and relevance of marketing, communications and ads (online), and to further enhance the data collected. Possessing a single customer view is a vital first step, but as more organisations apply the easy to use and cost effective tools now on the market, and empower their marketing teams to use customer data more effectively, the goal of a customer centric structure will become ever close.
  
  Kateryna and Ken; don’t be put off by trying to achieve this goal. Like you say there are many organisations that have been constrained by the legacy of ‘CRM’ systems they’ve previously invested in, but which are not flexible or pliable to meet new needs and challenges. The key to overcoming this is to look to solutions which can work with your existing systems, supplementing the parts which work, and bypassing the functions which don’t.

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• Ken | Wed, 18 Nov 2009 12:48 pm

  Thanks for your interesting response Dave.
  
  No, I'm certainly not put off trying to achieve this goal – it is something definitely worth pursuing, even with set-backs that are almost to be expected.
  
  Could you provide any real-life examples of companies who consistently put the customer at the heart of the organisation's strategy?
  
  It'd be really interesting (and a worthwhile learning exercise) to take a closer look at these companies.
  
  Thank you.

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• Dave Gurney, Alchemetrics | Thu, 19 Nov 2009 10:48 am

  We’ve actually been working with a publishing client, firstly on a trial, which has now been extended to a full project, and have some good results we’ll be announcing shortly. In the meantime, if you’d like to contact me on david.gurney@alchemetrics.co.uk I’d be happy to share the case study we have with you, as it may well give you some more food for thought. Unfortunately it’s probably too large to post here!

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• Dave Frankland | Fri, 20 Nov 2009 5:51 pm

  Folks,
  First of all, thanks for weighing in on this topic - it's one that I'm extremely passionate about. I absolutely agree with you that there are a limited number of companies that have a strategic, integrated approach to customer intelligence. In fact in the published report, we point out that only 12% of the 301 companies that we surveyed are operating at a level which we call Strategic Intelligence. We also discuss technical constraints, organisational constraints, and social constraints that prohibit firms from elevating their customer intelligence function.
  
  The full report can be accessed on our site. If you're not a Forrester customer, and would like to learn more, you can also check out my blog post about the report - http://tinyurl.com/yhaxyk7.
  
  In the mean time, please keep up the dialogue - together we can help increase the number of firms with a strategic approach.
  Best,
  Dave Frankland
  Principal Analyst
  Forrester Research

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