“The 2030 Today Report,” a forward-looking survey that shares new details about the present and future state of the CDP industry, was released today by Twilio Segment, the world’s largest customer data platform (CDP). The report finds that 73 percent of respondents agree that a customer data platform would be crucial to their customer service efforts by surveying over 4,000 decision-makers and drawing on expertise from leading marketers at HubSpot, AWS, Peloton, FOX, Okta, and more.
Peter Reinhardt, CEO of Twilio Segment said for any serious digital-first business, customer data is the new currency because it underpins all successful client interactions.
“Fifty-eight percent of respondents expect customer data to drive revenue growth for their company. To do that, the data must be accurate and real-time, so they can deliver hyper-personalized experiences that exceed expectations in the digital era.”
The New Digital-First World Key to Consumer Data
The COVID-19 pandemic changed the way we do business dramatically and accelerated the digital transformation roadmaps of most businesses by at least ten years. This relentless shift pushes businesses to work through digital platforms and devices while handling an explosion of direct consumer interactions on a scale previously deemed difficult to manage.
During Black Friday and Cyber Monday in2020, which saw record-breaking online sales, this shift was illustrated, while store traffic dropped by more than half compared to last year. This behavior underlines that the preferences of consumers have changed, making it important for businesses to offer memorable and personalized digital experiences. This is reflected in the Segment Survey, which found that the number one priority for companies is customer experience.
It takes an up-to-date, real-time view of clients to drive effective digital interactions, making CDPs a must-have infrastructure for any organization seeking to meet these modern realities.
A recent survey by Segment revealed a range of perspectives on how and why businesses are turning to CDPs, including:
- Data silos are being broken down: Companies see reliable real-time consumer information as essential to their efforts for digital transformation and are hungry for accessibility and integration of data. Sixty-one percent of respondents said they wanted improved access across the organization to data.
- Personalization: For personalization, real-time client profiles, and multi-channel campaign orchestration, businesses are turning to CDPs. More than 60 percent say that their personalization activities would be crucial to a CDP.
- AI usage: Marketers are searching for new ways for their consumer data to be applied. For AI and machine learning, nearly 50 percent say they would use a CDP. In preparing information for AI/ML applications, CDPs are critical, which will push the future of cutting-edge and personalized consumer interactions, such as automatically rating content or placing the right items in front of each customer.
Because of COVID-19, CDP budgets have risen, and technology is expected to remain a strategic priority in the years ahead. Sixty-two percent of respondents say this year they will spend over $100,000 on their CDP, and 47 percent say in the next five years they will raise their CDP budget by 25 percent.
