Three Types of Data You MUST Pay Attention To

On Monday, we talked about the struggle many marketers have with proving the ROI of their work. We think that one of the main reasons for their difficulty is the explosion of data, and the results of IBM’s CMO study seem to agree. There are so many sources of data, and sometimes, it feels near impossible to focus on what matters most.

To help you out, we’d like to share our list of the top three types of data well feel all marketers MUST pay attention to. While your list of measured data sources will probably contain more than three items, these three should definitely make the cut:

• Blogs – Today, your consumer is a publisher. They’re writing valuable content about your company, and failing to listen to what they’re saying would be a major missed opportunity. Want to track mentions of your brand on blogs? We recommend inkybee.com, a newly launched blogger outreach and measurement tool from Forth Metrics, LTD.

• Consumer reviews – Think reviews are only for business-to-consumer companies? Think again. Thanks to the proliferation of review sites like Yelp, CNET and Google Reviews, consumers are reviewing everything from restaurants to commercial refrigeration equipment. Make sure you’re hearing what they have to say, measuring sentiment and responding proactively. Deleting unfavorable responses does not count as a proactive response. Though we think true consumer reviews should be a priority, third party reviews could also be grouped into this category.

• Social Media – Every day, your customers (and target customers) are talking about your brand, and thanks to social media, you have the opportunity to listen in real time. Don’t waste it.

We like these three data sources most simply because they give you the best insight into your customers’ opinions, preferences and personalities, and the applications of insights from these data sources are practically endless.

However, we realize you might have other data priorities, and we’d love to hear about them! Tell us which data sources you get the most value from in the comments!

Photo via: opensourceway.com