Outgrown Your Analytics Program? Embrace People, Process, and Technology.
Switching analytics platforms alone won’t fix your organization’s analytics program. The challenge is more complex. Your analytics program consists of your people, processes, and technology – and if one of these is out of balance, you’ll be held back. Look at it this way: You don’t win a race by just buying a Ferrari. You must know how to drive it (processes) and have the right driver and pit crew to make the desired impact. Without the right people and processes, the Ferrari is just a very expensive showpiece that never delivers the desired outcome. And so it is with that tempting, shiny new analytics platform.
I see organizations repeatedly underutilize their amazing analytics platform technologies. I’ve even seen organizations held back by analytics platforms as they destroy confidence in data. This challenge is too important to ignore – organizations want the right data at the right time to improve the customer experience and increase revenue and outcomes.
If your analytics program isn’t as mature as you’d like, you’re not alone. According to research conducted by Forrester, “low measurement maturity remains a challenge for CX leaders”.
To improve your analytics program, you need an objective understanding of where you’re at today. This is why BlastX Consulting developed our Analytics Program Maturity Framework, leveraging decades of experience. This framework lets you quickly measure your level of maturity and understand how, by working with our team, you can develop a roadmap to increase your maturity.
I highly recommend you check out the BlastX Consulting Analytics Program Maturity Framework to assess your organization before reading the rest of this article.
How Mature is Your Analytics Program?
Where did you land on the scale? As we all strive towards hitting that Level 5 “Leader” categorization, there’s a journey ahead that involves up-leveling your Analytics Program – one that’s centered on people, process, and technology.
If you rank lower on the maturity framework than you’d like, you’re not alone. According to Forrester’s research, “low measurement maturity remains a challenge for CX leaders”. Many organizations struggle to track customer experience metrics, embed these metrics into decision-making, and then prove the value of the investment. Look at this as an opportunity. Your competition is facing the same pressures you are. This is your opportunity to leapfrog your customer experience ahead by focusing on a significant opportunity within your analytics program.
There are three primary signals you’ve outgrown your analytics program, and it’s time to act. These are:
- The right people are on the team and processes are coming into maturity, but you’re being held back by an analytics platform technology that doesn’t give you the right visibility into the customer journey/behavior – leaving you unable to leverage data insights to take action.
- You’ve adopted an analytics platform technology that’s far beyond your current people and process capabilities. It isn’t being leveraged and there’s a lack of return on analytics investment (ROAI).
- You don’t have the right people and/or processes AND you also lack the right analytics platform technology.
These three signals are the norm rather than the exception for most organizations. Let’s explore each scenario in more detail and review possible solutions:
Scenario 1: Analytics Technology Bottleneck
Your team has the skills, and your processes are well-defined, but your analytics platform is holding you back. It lacks the ability to integrate data from various sources (omni-channel data view), to provide a self-service interface that promotes a data-driven culture, or to perform advanced analysis. These limitations are significant and prevent you from gaining a comprehensive understanding of the customer journey.
The potential solutions are:
- Evaluate and select a new platform – Not all platforms are created equal, and you may be in a position that necessitates moving to a different platform. A clear vision and realistic expectations about capabilities and total costs (license, migration, maintenance, etc.) are vital.
- Upgrade your existing platform – It may be possible to select the right features/add-ons to achieve your analytics platform vision.
Scenario 2: Platform Underutilization
You’ve invested in a powerful analytics platform, but it’s not being fully leveraged. This may be due to a lack of training, complex interfaces, or unclear use cases within your organization. As a result, you’re missing valuable insights and failing to maximize your return on analytics investment (ROAI).
The potential solutions are:
- Build a roadmap towards platform utilization – You may be underutilizing your current platform, so this is a good place to start. There’s a cost to switching platforms, so there’s a strong case to be made for staying put and investing in improving utilization.
- Implement a training program – Your team needs the skills and knowledge to effectively use the analytics platform.
- Upgrade your dashboards – By creating user-friendly dashboards that cater to specific needs, you can improve your organization’s data-driven culture and encourage additional use of the platform.
- Create a better set of clear use cases – Identify specific business challenges and map them to your analytics platform capabilities so that insights are accessible and action is taken.
Scenario 3: People and Process Deficiencies
Your team may lack the necessary expertise, or your processes might be inadequate to collect, analyze, and interpret the data. This results in inaccurate insights, poor decision-making, and a lack of trust in the data.
The potential solutions are:
- Upskill talent or bring in knowledge – Invest in training programs to upskill your team’s capabilities, or consider hiring externally or leveraging a consultancy. The quickest path to success is pairing someone who’s done this before with a team that’s motivated to improve.
- Develop or upgrade data governance practices – Define clear data ownership, data quality standards, and data privacy controls. Define the methods and frequency of data audits to keep trust in the data high.
- Foster a culture of collaboration – Encourage communication and collaboration to build a data-driven culture. Share insights and outcomes between data analysts, marketers, and other stakeholders.
The journey to analytics maturity is an ongoing process that requires continuous evaluation, adaptation, and improvement.
Positive Steps Towards a Better Analytics Program
The first step to a better analytics program is to admit you have an issue. The Analytics Program Maturity Framework discussed earlier will provide clarity on that front.
Now it’s time to objectively assess and begin building a roadmap to analytics program improvement (up-leveling) that’s aligned with your business goals. This objective assessment includes activities such as user interviews, an analytics audit, a broader MarTech/CX audit, and an understanding of your current processes and data governance.
Once you’ve defined a roadmap, BlastX Consulting can help you leverage change management processes to enact improvements to your analytics program. We bring our extensive experience from working with organizations across the spectrum of maturity, and we have the case studies and impressive outcomes to back it up.
This work isn’t easy, but the rewards are incredible. Your organization will be better prepared against the competition and positioned to be a Customer Experience (CX) leader in your industry.
A note of warning: addressing only one aspect of the people, process, and technology trifecta is insufficient and won’t yield the results you’re looking for. A comprehensive strategy that delivers a pathway to success must consider all three elements to ensure sustainability and continued improvement.
None of this is easy, but the rewards are incredible. Your organization will be better prepared against the competition and positioned to be a Customer Experience (CX) leader in your industry. The right analytics program done the right way can make this your new reality.
Whether you’re feeling held back by your analytics platform technology or aren’t sure how to leverage the full capabilities of your impressive platform, the signals and remedies shared in this article will help you move forward and improve your overall analytics efforts.
If you’d like to dig even deeper or get some help in moving your analytics program forward, BlastX Consulting is here to help. Feel free to contact us or reach out to me directly on LinkedIn with any questions you have.
