What does it mean for a B2B firm to become truly data driven?

Join Valtech's Martin Wammen as uncovers the common mistakes B2B businesses make, how they can avoid them and what it takes to become truly data driven. He'll outline what it means for B2B firms in reality, how can they thrive in the modern era and highlights the steps you can't ignore if you want to succeed. 

Short on time? Here are our key takeaways:

• Where you place the data intelligence is key: it's hard to achieve efficiency if you're running small de-centralized teams in each market. Some kind of centralization (eg a centre of excellence or a central hub) can make a big difference.

• Make the connection between marketing & sales: the classical clash between who owns the customer and who owns the buying cycle! We're moving to a second generation where we need to focus on automating the buying process and making it more intelligent. You need to fix your organisational structure to support that ambition. 

• Remove the silos: The second generation of a data-driven business applies to the full enterprise. You want to be able to capture the data that your customers are generating when they interact with your business across paid media, on the website, apps etc, and then to work with customer data at an enterprise level. That changes a lot for businesses who are forced to look at how they can collaborate when it comes to looking at the customer data, because my expectation as a customer is that when you are collecting all this data, you must recognise and know me across every interaction.

• Understand how to consolidate your data by redefining roles: instead of working in silos with data in your ERP system or your CRM system, your ecommerce system or your paid media system, you should have the ability to connect the data across the different databases that sit within a typical enterprise. Prioritise collaboration of teams across the business when it comes to customer data and consider a new organisational design to help you deliver the best experience for your customers.

• You can't over-invest in people: from digital requirements to a digitally skilled organisation, it's vital to upskill your teams and attract the best talent in the market, supported by agile product teams and c-level investment.