At Beckon, we often use a finance metaphor to help marketers understand that there’s a better way to approach marketing measurement and it starts with the data. Borrowing proven practices from the finance department, marketers can clean up, structure and ultimately leverage their marketing data to make data-driven decisions. For example, would you ever put receipts from a business trip into a shoebox and turn it into finance to get reimbursed? Of course not! Everyone in the company fills out the same type of expense report that gives finance the information they need to report the expense and reimburse the employee. Do you include all of the data from each receipt in your report? What you ordered, who your waitress was, the address of the restaurant? No way. Finance would end up having to dig through and track unnecessary information that’s not relevant to their needs.
Putting marketing data management into this perspective really hits home with marketers, as well as the analysts and reporters I work with here at Beckon. That’s why we’re especially pleased to share this iMedia Connection article by Beckon CEO Jennifer Zeszut. In it, she shares 3 data management tips from the finance world that can help marketers change the way they think about data so they can garner valuable insights and make better, data-driven marketing decisions. If you’re interested in data-driven marketing, check it out! We’d love to hear what you think!