Rather manual: customer data maintenance

Almost every second manager (47%) in the DACH region believes that the use of a customer data management solution strengthens customer loyalty. 39 percent say that it improves customer support.

More than one in three see the potential to win back customers. These are the findings of the current study "Customer data management in SMEs", which was commissioned by Uniserv.

Too expensive?

Although 78 percent of SMEs see clear potential in improving customer data management, 67 percent consider the introduction of new solutions to be costly and are of the opinion that this is associated with high personnel costs (60 percent).

42 percent of respondents even believe that only large companies can afford such solutions.

"Companies should always compare their individual costs resulting from manual data maintenance with the potential offered by a customer data management solution. In our experience, the ROI of professional solutions is already visible after three to six months"

explains Holger Stelz, Director of Marketing & Business Development at Uniserv.

Lack of knowledge

"Nevertheless, decision-makers often lack knowledge about which measures are actually practicable and profitable. As a result, they still shy away from using modern technologies. This is often based on false assumptions."

According to the study, 69% of respondents state that customer data in their company is always up-to-date, complete and correct. A deceptive certainty, as Uniserv knows from decades of experience.

"SMEs in particular assume that manual data maintenance is cheaper and more reliable than a technological solution that meets individual company requirements. However, in times of digitalization, when the volume of data is exploding, this is no longer the case"

says Stelz. 84 percent of the managing directors and project managers surveyed stated that they generally still maintain their customer data manually.

At the same time, one in five companies (22 percent) complain that they do not have enough staff to ensure that their data is up to date.

"Manual processing in combination with staff shortages in particular harbors a high risk of incorrect, outdated or redundant data being used in sales, marketing and customer care. This means that data-driven marketing campaigns remain ineffective"

says Stelz.

Data silos make data management more difficult

Companies store their customer data in several systems: primarily in financial and accounting systems (49 percent), CRM systems (30 percent) and marketing solutions (17 percent), for example for email marketing or direct marketing.

This often leads to data silos. According to the study, one in five company decision-makers (21%) do not know where and in which systems customer data is stored.

However, in order to have an all-round view of the customer in a digital world, companies need to overcome their data silos by centralizing the management of their customer data. A standardized data source is not feasible without the support of technology.