B-to-B Marketers Believe Data Drives Effective Sales and Marketing, but Aren’t Confident in Data Quality

A new report from Dun & Bradstreet finds only one-third of firms are adopting buzzworthy marketing strategies

Most B-to-B marketers (89%) believe data quality is at the core of successful business performance; however, only half (51%) are confident in the quality of their organization’s data.

The findings come from a Dun & Bradstreet survey of 250 B-to-B professionals. The top industries represented in the sixth annual edition of the report were manufacturing, business services, wholesale trade, finance, engineering, communications and transportation.

The report authors found poor-quality data to be a common theme among B-to-B organizations, and the pace of change in business makes it easy for data-related opportunities to be lost. The report provides an equation for improved data:

Image courtesy of Dun & Bradstreet

The formula suggests that the essential components that will advance results for businesses are record completeness to support go-to-market strategies and record accuracy. These components will be scaled by the breadth and depth of the data. Improved data must be balanced with the appropriate processes, including standardization for ease of sharing, compliance with regulations and permissions, plus continuous updates.

Image courtesy of Dun & Bradstreet

A lack of trust in the quality of data has hampered B-to-B businesses from employing many data-driven strategies. Only 38% of those surveyed reported that account-based marketing is part of their go-to-market strategy. Of those not currently using ABM:

• 6% say they plan to make ABM part of their go-to-market strategy in the next six months.
• 12% say they plan to use it in the next 12 months.
• 41% have no plans to use it within the next year.
• 41% aren’t sure.

The survey shows 88% of marketers believe quality data is core to implementing an ABM strategy, suggesting such data is a barrier to ABM use. Other critical factors identified in realizing ABM campaign success included:

• Sending email (86%).
• Scheduling one-on-one meetings (76%).
• Social engagement (66%).
• Content personalization (60%).
• Workshops/private events (57%).
• Direct mail (50%).
• Programmatic advertising (38%).
• Microsites (29%).

Image courtesy of Dun & Bradstreet

Acknowledging that data goes beyond ABM efforts, the report found the top activities positively impacted by quality data to be:

1. Campaign execution.
2. Personalized content and messaging.
3. Sales prospecting and closing.
4. Generating customer insights with analytics.
5. Lead qualification.

Despite challenges with data quality, the report found B-to-B marketers to be somewhat more confident in engaging their audiences. For example, 62% of those surveyed said they were confident in their ability to create a list that accurately represents their target audience for a campaign. Half of those surveyed expressed confidence in their ability to segment this list.

Image courtesy of Dun & Bradstreet

One surprising trend was that only half of respondents said they are using analytics to drive market prioritization and identification, a drop from 70% in 2017. This trend suggests B-to-B marketers may be recognizing the need to double down on quality data before they can use such insights to drive sales and marketing strategies.

This is also illustrated in the uncertainty respondents had around integrating data with their CRM systems:

• 13% reported they are advanced at integrating this data.
• 34% identified themselves as intermediate users.
• 28% said they are novices.
• 11% were beginners.
• 14% were not sure.

This trend also points to the difficulty in aligning sales and marketing data about companies and contacts across channels.