Big data continues to be the subject of much discussion and hype, and its application to business is considered quite profound and valuable. Emerging technologies that address big data enables firms to exploit new type of information and to remain closer with customers. Big data help firms to move according to dynamic market trends and thereby gaining trust in customer minds.
Big data is the information gathered from non traditional sources like social media, blogs, email, sensors, and so on. Though this information seems voluminous and unstructured, it can provide deep insights to business, customers and partners. Easy access to customer data and availability of advanced technology had made the usage of big data easier.
As marketers are interacting directly/indirectly with customers more unlike earlier years, it is leading to generation of big data. Creating services that influences customers often helps marketers to explore a lot of such data.
A video displayed in a market place can act as a source for generating big data. Analyzing the customer’s shopping cycle that answers the preferred purchases, the frequency of purchase, etc will contribute to the big data as well. Also tracking customer activities like page views, paths followed, and comments posted on various social networking platforms enable firms to have better understanding of customers and to plan the strategy according to their interest.
Big data collected from different reliable sources can be used for developing a relational database. Data gathered from diverse sources must be collectively analyzed to make a clear picture out of it. Customer retention, selling individual customers more products, attracting new customers, etc are some of the benefits of analyzing the big data.
There are firms who specialize in analyzing the big data. There are many Marketing Process Outsourcing (MPO)
firms who are engaged in analyzing this big data and giving meaningful conclusions to the clients.
Experts say that the buying process has now turned as a non linear function. It will be much different from the traditional linear model relied by customers in olden days. Buying as a non linear model, are influenced by a number of factors like YouTube, magazines and print ads. Making arrangements according to changing market trends and customer needs are very important to remain competent in business.
