Meet customer needs through data science. Tips for online businesses

From brick-and-mortar shops to online marketplaces, good communication is key!

Picture a traditional brick-and-mortar shop: shop windows, sales staff, products on the shelves. For those who work in this environment, it is not hard to understand the real needs of customers. If, for instance, a salesperson noticed that customers repeatedly ask them to locate a certain product, because they cannot find it, they would quickly realise said the product’s position on the shelves was not ideally thought-through, since the item is not hard to find for those who want to buy it. As a consequence, the product would be moved to a more prominent position within the store. What happened here is that the salesperson acquired data (the customers’ requests) and used it to empathise with the customers and make an improvement in the sales process. Why is it difficult to do the same with an online store?

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The importance of data

When running an online store it is much more difficult to collect customer feedback. Despite countless contact forms and invitations to rate the shopping experience, companies know very little about most users. One of the most common problems is the customer dropping out after filling their cart, but before checking out. Often the company is unable to find out why this happens. Did the customer have second thoughts or encountered a technical issue? Often, when customers leave feedback in the latter case, they only do so when they are frustrated and more intent on venting than solving the problem. This is why it is important to work on the collection and correct use of data.

Harmonising data and using it correctly to meet customer needs

To be able to offer a service that is truly based on customer needs, it is essential not only to collect the right data but also to manage it appropriately and effectively. At the moment, data protection laws in Europe are extremely strict, so there are severe limitations to the data that companies can collect automatically. When it comes to data that is voluntarily provided by customers, it is essential to be transparent about how it will be used to gain your target audience’s trust. Shared data management is also very important. This doesn’t mean, of course, sharing sensitive data with all levels of the company, but rather making sure that the whole team has access to the information they need to do their job. This means that sales will probably need different information than the CEO. Data management systems are excellent tools in this regard: often running on cloud technologies, they allow different levels of access to be set so that everyone has the information they need to understand the customer and optimise their work in a collective, harmonious and targeted way. As is always the case with cloud services, of course, it is always essential to choose a platform that guarantees absolute security and to keep an external backup of data.

Conclusions: quantifying empathy

This particular type of customer needs analysis, based on the collection, sharing, and analysis of data, is sometimes referred to as ‘quantified empathy‘. Understanding the customer’s point of view is one of the fundamental tasks of a company and is often the key to unlocking a new phase of growth.

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