Clean your data or die by data: Kunal Aman of SAS tells marketers

New Delhi: As a brand, you may collect data, design campaigns based on that data, and use it to target your audience. But have you ever wondered what would happen to all your efforts if the data you received needed to be corrected right from the start?

Ensuring data quality is crucial, and organisations should run data quality programs and have governance mechanisms to identify relevant and outdated data, emphasised Kunal Aman, Regional Head of Marketing & Communications—Middle East, Turkey, Africa, and India at SAS, the data management and analytics company. 

In an exclusive interview with BestMediaInfo.com, he said, “Regularly cleaning data, whether first-party or third-party, and conducting data audits is essential to maintain quality. The frequency of data cleaning depends on the industry and situation. Ensuring data quality through deduplication and data quality initiatives to identify and correct inconsistencies is vital. Once data quality is assured,  it will need attention basis the frequency of changes that might occur.”

However, he pointed out that the frequency of data cleaning varies; some industries may require frequent updates, while others, like Aadhaar data, may only need occasional reviews. Ultimately, maintaining data quality is an ongoing process that requires consistent effort and attention.

Previously, marketers used to die for data and now they die by data. Loads of first, second, and third-party data coming in can be a boon and a bane for marketers. It depends on how you use it. If used correctly, marketers can track consumer behaviour in real-time.

The need of the hour for marketers is to turn data into actionable insights but how can you do that?

Weighing in on the argument, Aman said, “One significant change is the volume, variety, and velocity of data that marketers must handle today. This triad creates substantial challenges in making sense of the data and generating actionable insights for implementation. Data quality and governance are crucial in this context. 

By layering analytics and AI on top of data management, marketers can handle large volumes of data more efficiently, creating actionable insights. AI excels at sifting voluminous through data, but marketers add value through creativity, deeper relationships, and empathy in communication. These challenges can become transformational opportunities if marketers get the basics right and enhance them with analytical and AI systems.”

Providing an example of how his organisation turned data into actionable insights and fixed some of the loopholes in the marketing funnel for a telecom brand, Aman said, “Organisations can monetise their data by making the best use of the goldmine they possess. A classic example is our work with a large telecom provider in India with over 250 million subscribers. They struggled with intelligently using their marketing efforts, often resorting to broad SMS/email campaigns instead of precise customer segmentation. 

We helped them segment and micro-segment their data, analysing behavioural patterns, purchase habits, demographics, age, and gender. This allowed them to create 50,000 micro-segments for targeted campaigns, resulting in a significant uplift. This example demonstrates how we addressed a specific challenge and ensured their marketing efforts were effective.”

Diving deeper into why some brands resort to intrusive bombardment of messages, Aman mentioned the lack of data and customer experience maturity in some brands. Expanding his thought on the subject, he said, “One challenge is data maturity—whether organisations can create a comprehensive view from all the data they have. Many struggle with data silos, preventing them from treating each customer uniquely. Pressure to Meet Immediate Goals and Sales targets or may push brands to maximize exposure quickly, leading to excessive messaging and leading them to overstep boundaries by sending unsolicited messages and neglecting the customer experience.  Another issue is the lack of investment in the right systems, such as marketing automation, CRM (customer relationship management), and campaign management tools. 

The marketing technology stack may not be mature enough to be useful. Traditional methods like cold calling and SMS campaigns, though effective, can be intrusive and require a cultural shift. Marketers and brands need to focus on trust as a currency, managing it as they do the brand. Earning and maintaining trust is a significant challenge that future marketers must address.”

To wrap it up, in the words of Aman, “If you don’t want to die by data, then clean your data regularly, monetise, invest in CRM technology, and most importantly, respect user privacy.”