Better Business, with Better Data

In every business, you are collecting data. Whether or not you have a structured method of data collection, chances are you have done it. If you are collecting money from a customer, you are most likely invoicing and keeping record of transactions, which is one type of data collection. Data is a valuable resource for your business. Below, we will go through a few of its methods.

Surveys
Surveys allow you to directly ask consumers questions to gather information. A survey is a list of questions that respondents can answer in just a few words, or where they are given answers to select from. Surveys can help you collect qualitative or quantitative data, or both, making them a great option. You can conduct surveys in many ways: over the phone, through emails, or within pop-ups on your website. You gain the most valuable data if there are many respondents. If your survey isn’t getting many responses, you could offer an incentive for completing the survey. A few incentive ideas could be free shipping, a chance at winning a contest, or even a small discount. Surveys are usually quick to complete, and offering a nudge to convince a consumer to complete, it may be very worth it.

Social Media
Another type of data collection is uses something your business most likely already has–social media. Monitoring your social media can be a useful and easy way to collect data about who follows you and the common traits and interests amongst your followers. This will help enhance your understanding of the target audience, and how you can grow it. Many social media platforms provide tools you can use to track and record the analytics of your posts. That said, the analytic tools a social media monitoring software from a third-party may give you, can offer more in-depth insights. These insights may be information such as, likes, shares, saved posts, and traction of your posts. Social media is something every business should have in place, and monitoring it is a great tool.

Subscription and Registration Data
Offering your customers something in return for basic information is an efficient way to collect data. Require basic information from site visitors, or customers who want to sign up for emails, through a rewards program, or another simple program. This  data comes from people who already show an interest in your business. The data you ask for, however, is a tricky balance. Asking for too much information may make the customer second guess giving it to you. Yet asking for too little will make the data you collect less useful. While it may take some time to figure out the right information to ask, the data collected can be extremely beneficial. This data, which comes from customers already showing active interest in your brand, will help you with growing your target consumers.

Data collection is vital to a business’s success. It can be tricky not to be invasive regarding consumers information, but asking the right questions can help you with your data collection, without making customers uncomfortable. Various sources collect valuable information, and once you get the data, make sure you are putting it to use by growing your target audience and improving your business based on the feedback.