Big Data Means Big Money – How Can You Get In On It?

Big data can mean big money for you as a service provider. By offering big data services to your customers, you can help their businesses succeed, and establish yours as a vital component of that success. Let's take a look at how.

What Is Big Data?
Let's start by making sure we're all on the same page. What exactly is big data? Simply put, big data refers to data sets that are too large to be handled by run of the mill office software. Examples of big data might include information harvested from software, website, customer relationship management tools or social media regarding:

• Inventory levels
• Customers' likes and dislikes
• Seasonal fluctuations in sales and preferences
• Business trends
• Productivity and turnaround times
• Customer demographics
• The success of social media posts
• How visitors interact with a website or online ordering portal

Big data is information that is gathered in large volumes about a business' sales, products or customers. That data can then be broken down and analyzed to gain insights and information. When you use big data to help your customers, you're helping them make better informed and more profitable decisions for their business.

The Many Uses Of Big Data
Big data can be used in many ways to enhance a business. Here are six common uses for big data:

1. Personalization and customization
2. Targeted content
3. Localized marketing campaigns
4. Identification of key trends
5. Analytical and results measurement
6. Behavioral analysis

How to Succeed With Big Data Services
If you want to harness the big money potential of big data, here are five steps you can take to achieve success:

1. Identify and Determine a Need From Your Customer Base
Talk to your customers. Look at what they frequently ask you for, or say they need help with. For example, would your customers benefit from data analysis to help understand the results of a marketing campaign? Or do they need better insights into their customers before a campaign starts?

2. Implement Custom Data Solutions
Implementing custom data solutions takes time and dedication, but is worth it for your business. Data solutions are a value-added commodity that increases your value to your customers, and helps you broaden your offerings and increase your bottom line.

3. Think About How to Market Your Data Services
You need to make very clear to your customers just how much value your data services add to what you do. Your marketing should focus on showing your customers what exactly the benefits can be to their business.

4. Develop a Pricing Model
Think about how to price your data services. Consider the cost of implementing the new service, such as paying staff to analyze data, or the time cost of harvesting it. Take a look at your current pricing mode and think about where it will fit within that.

5. Staff Accordingly
Like any other marketing initiative, you need to be committed to data. This may require hiring additional resources (i.e. a "Strategic Data Manager") to your staff who can own the process and ensure that you’re capitalizing on all that big data has to offer.

Big data sits naturally with printing and mailing services. The use of big data can greatly increase the effectiveness of your customers' campaigns and give their businesses a valuable boost. By offering data services, you're giving them all the benefits of big data with none of the work and expenses from inefficiencies in harvesting and analyzing it themselves, which is an offer that they can't afford to miss.