Predictive analytics – The most promising data technique in B2B marketing

Mike Connolly, April 14, 2014

Predictive analytics – The most promising data technique in B2B marketing

Digital presence has revolutionized the entire sales process in a B2B market. The buyer in today’s scenario has done tons of research before making that purchase decision; which makes the phase of consultative selling almost nonexistent. This means that the sales team comes at a much later stage than the making-the-buying-decision phase. Thus it’s important for each one of us to be upbeat and predict the consumer’s buying behavior. Hence, the birth of predictive analytics!

The B2C market adopted the predictive analytics method to understand its consumer long ago; from Amazon to Netflix on websites. With the emergence of the concept, gradually, demand generation can be completely based on predictive analytics.

Scope of Predictive Analytics

So, does predictive analytics limit it to understanding the buyer’s personality? Not really!  Predictive analytical tools like Bigdata etc. help you to discover the customer behavior patterns that lead to conversion much ahead of the actual spend. With such insights, marketers can easily study volumes of data, unleash the most impactful insights, and predict the potential of a campaign planned with maximum precision. This is extremely relevant for B2B as much for B2C.

Today, B2B predictive analytics is resulting in double-digit increases in leads, opportunities and sales — sometimes high double digits. Early adopters of marketing automation tools and statistical sales are reaping huge benefits while their competitors are wondering what clicked. But several years from now, predictive analytics is going to be the mantra – you have to do it otherwise you would be left behind. To the early adopters, may the force be with you.