For the last 1.5 years I’ve spent my time working with enterprise consumer brands on their customer data strategy and execution. For many large brands this is a key workstream as they move data to the cloud. Naturally, the topic of Customer Data Platforms (CDPs) is always in the conversation.
If I had to boil down my learnings to the 3 most important areas of attention for brands who want to modernize their customer data tech it would be:
- Initial focus of any data transformation is first-party data quality
There is no CDP or database that turns bad data into good data. If your site analytics install is more than 5 years old and/or you are heavied-up on 3rd party tags or reliant on a DMP as a data lake, do not pass go. Figure out a modern “owned data” strategy and begin executing before tables are joined, IDs are created and you muddy things up.
- Your data is only as good as your people
This means org structure and talent. When you remove data silos you must remove org silos too. Data transformation demands a reorg, experienced data leadership and new skills. This is where most brands fail.
- Begin and end with revenue-driven use cases
If you can’t clearly put the customer case, business case and expected monetary benefit of modernizing your customer data into words and numbers prior to decision making, your will never do so in practice once your decisions have been made and your money has been spent. On the back-end, phase 1 implementation should always be about delivering on a use specific case. Not about a technical checklist to get data activated.
I’ve written a great deal on the subject of CDPs and customer data. Here are the 10 blog posts I’ve done (in order) on CDPs and customer data products and services over the last 18 months. One other data point you will find from these posts – there are no cookie cutter solutions. Every customer base interacts differently with different brands based on numerous factors, especially (for better or for worse) the legacy of the brand.
CDPs: The Great Transformation
CDPs and Identity: The Great Unknown
To Compete With Platforms Become One
Contextual Event Data and Products
2019 CDP Market: Thoughts and Predictions
Please reach out if you know of any new or novel customer data tech I should take a look at, or if I can be helpful. This market moves fast and with the advent of AI and Machine Learning stitched to customer data, things will only accelerate from here. The time to act on this data is now!
jonathanmendezblog.com 
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