Neeraj Singhal – Country Manager at Zeotap India, talks about the rise of people-based marketing In India and how does knowing your users and then targeting them, gives you a competitive edge. He then speaks about why brands often struggle to implement people-based marketing and also explains the importance of getting in control of identity resolution and deploy people-based marketing which in turn, provides a better return on investment. Have a read!

India boasts of a whopping 560 million people who are online, making it the second-largest Internet-consuming population worldwide. For its brand marketers, it is mission-critical to dissect the constant traffic passing through a myriad of apps, monitors and devices and reach the people on the other end of the screens. Progressive marketers are switching gears to people-based marketing. The question is, how do you get to the people themselves?

Breaking Down People-based Marketing

As a brand marketer, knowing your users and how to target them gives you a competitive edge. For this to happen, data from multiple points needs to be collected and correctly matched to form a 360°-user view, called people-based marketing.

People-based marketing offers a comprehensive view of every single user. It connects the different devices that belong to each user and provides additional data points about their online and offline behaviours. (See figure 1). With the rise of martech, progressive brand marketers are already applying people-graphs to their 2019 marketing strategies.

People-graphs: Back to Basics

Industry shifts in Martech and Adtech have forced brands to narrow in on their digital strategies. They are moving away from traditional advertising mechanisms that reach a wide, yet unspecified audience, to very targeted campaigns that reach specific users on specific channels. To implement People-based marketing, brands need to start creating people-graphs, 360° views of their customers and prospects.  Once the graphs are rich with data, it is easier to differentiate between customer segments and ascertain behavioural aspects. People-graphs connect devices and their online identifiers associated with a particular user; for example, these could be mobile/desktop cookies and Mobile Ad IDs (MAIDS). People-graphs also connect online data and identifiers with offline ones, like emails and phone numbers stored in CRMs. Although this breaks down the data silos in devices and CRM, it only offers us a partial glimpse into who is on the other end of the screen. Additionally, people-graphs are also able to attach behavioural attributes, like purchase intent or socio-demographic data, to this single user, allowing us a 360° insightful view.

Brands often struggle to implement people-based marketing due to a lack of technical infrastructure, resources and growing unattainable data silos in CRM and DMPs. The answer is to revert to companies or vendors who facilitate these end2end data solutions. Such solutions can help match different online and offline identifiers and attach additional data profiles to these users, to target them across screens accurately. The reliance on external parties poses a few obstacles. First, for a new brand, there are numerous choices when it comes to data solutions. However, low-quality offerings are often used. It means that brands must do the leg-work and scour the landscape for a reputable vendor. Second, once a suitable vendor is found, brands need to also keep in mind certain questions; “Is the matching deterministic or deferred?” and “How does the vendor gather the connections?”. Finally, brands need to question the quality of the data, its source, how it was collected and aggregated. Only after answering all these questions can a brand determine if the data is accurate and of high-quality.

More accurate people-graphs result in a more precise marketing strategy.

The figure shows a 360° view of a people-based marketing user. User devices are depicted on the right, and additional behavioral insight about one specific user is on the left.

Becoming customer-centric through People-based Marketing

People-based marketing gives insider knowledge of users’ most crucial trigger points, through omnichannel consumer views (understanding CRM data) and a deeper understanding of consumers (better insights, clustering and more attributes). It allows for smarter and more cohesive targeting (holistic strategy) and improves acquisition and up- and cross-selling.

BCG still predicts that 83 per cent of companies cannot yet make connections across consumer touchpoints and devices and that 80 per cent still suffer from inadequate cross-functional coordination. This inability of brand marketers to keep up to date with martech developments results in hindered growth.

The message is clear for brand marketers: get in control of identity resolution and deploy people-based marketing for a better return on investment.