Did you know that 82% of marketers plan to increase their use of location data over the next two years? Given this strong majority, it’s more important than ever that marketers understand how best to integrate location data into their marketing strategies and activations. We recently commissioned a study with 451 Research to better understand marketers’ relationship with location data and found that most marketers are highly interested in using location intelligence but still need help refining their use of it.
The study revealed three factors that marketers should consider when building location-based programs, to help them not only optimize their own programs but also gain a competitive advantage over their peers.
1. Learn how to measure success better.
One of the biggest hurdles marketers face with regard to location intelligence is a lack of strong KPIs to quantify their results. This impedes marketers from being able to measure their success accurately, and thus makes them less likely to take bolder approaches to location intelligence. For instance, 27% of survey respondents cite revenue by channel as a KPI, while 41% said that brand market share is one of their main metrics — illustrating that when it comes to location data KPIs, marketers have conflicting perspectives on what matters most. In order to identify the most effective KPIs, marketers should test programs incorporating location, measure the outcomes, and then iterate on those programs until they can identify best practices.
2. Improve coordination between marketing teams.
There is also a disconnect between brick-and-mortar teams and overall marketing teams that is hampering marketers’ success with location intelligence. A striking 42% of respondents said that communication between these groups is only so-so. What’s more, they revealed that the information that is shared is too delayed to have much impact. In order to fix the disconnect, it’s imperative to build coherent collaborative processes that enable all players to work in tandem — those who produce data, those who analyze it, and those who act upon it. With location intelligence increasingly on the rise, it’s ever more important that marketers learn to communicate effectively to avoid creating operational silos.
3. Consider competitive intelligence as a primary use case.
Finally, marketers need to build upon what they already have developed with location data. For example, a marketer may already be using location intelligence to target segments of their own audience. However, they can expand their targeting efforts by using location intelligence to identify entirely new audiences. A marketer can use location data to identify which segment of competitor consumers is most vulnerable, and then target them for conquesting. In fact, location data offers a wealth of competitive intelligence, such as how many times a brand’s consumers visit its own stores versus its competitors’ over time.
In this respect, competitive intelligence is a nascent use case for location data. There is widespread interest in it, with 71% of survey respondents claiming they would be likely to deploy location data for competitive intelligence. In order to unlock the full potential of location data, marketers should consider competitive intelligence as a primary use case.
To unlock more insights about the current state of location intelligence, download the full 451 Research report here.
