Only 49% of Marketers Can Successfully Integrate Different Data Sources

When it comes to utilizing data, marketers are still exploring the benefits of leveraging analytics. That being said, new research suggests that marketers still face a series of struggles when it comes to integrating data into their existing strategies.

The “Customer Data Imperative” conducted by Econsultancy and SAP recently discovered that only 49 percent of marketers are now able to successfully integrate different data sources and activate that information. About 89 percent of marketers claim that “a data-driven and transparent marketing process” is “critical” or “important” to them. However, only 44 percent describe their organization’s capability in this area as “optimized.”

“Marketers must take ownership of customer data and ensure they are building the right connections with other business functions to help work towards a single customer view, including both online and offline data,” wrote the authors of the report.

The Growing Importance of Data and Analytics

This is not the first research to signify a shift in the importance of data and analytics among marketers. Previous statistics indicate that more marketers are continuing to see data as critical to achieving their top priorities.

SAS, Intel, and Accenture recently teamed up with the Harvard Business Review to conduct the “Real-Time Analytics: The Key to Unlocking Customer Insights and Driving the Customer Experience” report. Their statistics showed that 60 percent of marketers already believe that it’s “extremely important” to have the ability to deliver real-time customer interactions across touchpoints and devices today.

Within the next two years, about 79 percent of marketers say they envision it becoming “extremely important.”