Retailers: Differentiate With Customer Intelligence

Multichannel retailers, who often have a direct-marketing provenance, have marts and warehouses full of customer data. But very few of them are turning that data into Customer Intelligence (CI) the way some verticals — financial services and travel, for example — have done. The reason is twofold. First, channel silos are a legacy mindset for these organizations, and second, the resource requirements to develop a CI practice can be restrictive. However, as brand and message relevance become an ever-increasing challenge, retail firms need to bolster their CI capabilities to stay competitive, engender loyalty, and convert new customers.