Customer analytics should be seen as a journey rather than a destination. Assessing the ‘how’, ‘when’ and ‘why’ will help you build a roadmap to achieve customer growth.

The overarching goal of a customer analytics project is improved decision-making capabilities.

Unlike software development, where teams have embraced the “agile” model, the business of customer analytics tends to lack structure. Projects are often not very well defined. They tend to have an extended lifespan, and take you down paths that were never predicted. Customer analytics requires a disciplined mindset; it requires a process (a series of steps) rather than a product.

The challenge is well known. CIO Magazine reported that around one-third of all customer relationship management (CRM) projects fail. Reasons vary, but are generally based on the definition of success and goals – or the lack of definition.

Harvard Business Review surveyed executives about CRM projects and found an even more dire problem: they reported a failure rate of closer to 90%. Why? Companies were trying to address more objectives than are reasonable.

In order to be successful at analytics, businesses need guidance to assess where they are on a spectrum: the “analytics maturity curve” as Forrester calls it. (See the The Forrester Wave: Customer Analytics Service Providers 2021 report, in which Kantar was rated as a ‘Strong Performer’.)

A good analytics partner helps clients understand where they are, where they need to be, and how they can get to the best possible outcomes.