In the third of our Catapult series, we delve into the evolving relationship we have with data, First-party data and the opportunities with the data you own.
In our last article we looked at the key challenges to measurement and attribution when third-party cookie data becomes extinct. This week we are shifting our attention towards one of the opportunities we mentioned in our first article - the data we own, First-party data.
First-party data is the information that you collect from your own sources. In other words, any information about customers from both online and offline sources, such as your website, app, CRM, social media or surveys. It may include data on behaviours, actions or interests demonstrated across your website(s) or app(s), data relationships in your CRM, subscription data or social data. It can also include non-online information such as completed surveys, customer feedback and other customer information.
WHAT ARE THE OPPORTUNITIES WITH YOUR FIRST-PARTY DATA?
Because you collect First-party data directly from the source, you own it and you know it’s far more accurate. As it comes straight from your audience, you know it is relevant to your business. Not only does this keep you in the safe zone of GDPR legalities, but it also empowers you to:
- Gain much greater insight about your audience
- Predict future patterns and behaviours
- Create more tailored and personalised experiences
HOW CAN YOU MAKE BETTER USE OF YOUR FIRST-PARTY DATA?
Gain greater insight about your audience
Your first-party data gives you the chance to not only store the data, but to also understand your audience better. You can integrate customer data, using a DMP, from various sources to create an insightful, dynamic view of them. Historically we have enriched this data with external sources (3rd party data), to fill in further detail on customers profiles. However, there is now an opportunity to capture more data. Data that is willingly and purposefully shared with brands and publishers. It is up to us as marketers to ensure we offer customers the right value exchange, to fill in the gaps with even better data that we can capture at source. From knowledge about users’ interests, demography or purchase intentions, to name a few, they will be of critical importance to planning future campaigns.
This sounds good if you have a big pool of data to work with, but what about smaller audiences? Even with a smaller audience, your first-party data can give you very valuable insights. A tool like Lotame’s Audience Optimizer, is very useful to use to analyse your data for traits that your customers have in common and build out that initial audience to include new customers who also have those characteristics.
Predict future patterns and behaviours
The accuracy and relevancy of your data can predict future patterns in your audience behaviour. Future patterns of behaviour can refer to a user’s engagement with specific content, a customer’s shopping behaviours or even their preference for what they are most responsive to in terms of communications via online and offline marketing channels.
Create more tailored and personalised experiences
First-party data allows you to get to know your customers or users in detail. Segmenting your audience allows you to create more tailored and personalised experiences for your customers. But these experiences should not only be limited to personalised content or ads, they should also extend to the entire customer experience when engaging with your brand.
ZERO PARTY DATA IS THE KEY
The key to making the most of your First-party data is wrapped up in the evolution towards Zero party data, and the value exchange we need to get right as marketers. Getting the value exchange right hinges on leveraging the most out of the benefits of using your First-party data we detailed above. The question is; what information are your customers willing to give you, and what are they expecting to receive in return? One of the main benefits of zero party data is the intrinsic customer engagement. Brands using zero party data can be assured that customers actively want to hear from them – and will be engaged when they are targeted. It’s a huge opportunity to build better, more intimate relationship with customers through better use of content and creative.
Join us next time…
Keep your eyes peeled, next week, for the fifth instalment of our series. James Perrin, our Head of Content, will be talking creative dominance, advertising effectiveness will depend on great cut-through creative that gets attention, rather than relying on hyper-targeting from third-party data
