How the Internet of Things is changing the marketing department

Marketers, if you think the Internet of Things is just about controlling your central heating with your phone, you need to think again. The Internet of Things (IoT) will completely change your marketing department. In fact, it’s already doing so for many businesses. So, it’s worth getting up to speed right now so you can stay ahead of the curve.

The first thing to know is that breakthroughs like the Apple Watch, Fitbit and Nest Thermostat are great applications of IoT. But they’re just the beginning. Expect to see smart, connected computing everywhere going forward.

What this means for marketing professionals is that the trend of data-driven marketing will continue apace, and we’ll get access to even richer information, generated in real time.

This will enable us to interact more closely with customers, understand exactly what they want, and personalise our communications with them, among many other things.

In a nutshell, IoT means more touch-points, more data on your customers, and more content for the marketing team to create and manage.

Deeper customer insights

In the future, marketing teams will use IoT information to analyse customer buying habits across different platforms; and gain deeper insights into where customers are in their buying journeys.

We are already doing this to some extent: analysing web or mobile behaviour and customer journeys, or using social listening to find out what buyers are saying on social media. The difference is that businesses will be able to embed smart, connected technology into the very products they’re selling, bringing the customer closer to them.

Consequently, IoT will enable us to gather information about how consumers interact with their products — how and when they use them; and what additional products and services they’re looking for. This will really open up the up-selling and cross-selling opportunities for sales and marketing teams, mark my words.

It also means we can use IoT to provide real-time notifications and target ads to the place that will be the most effective. This might be the product’s interface — the front of the fridge or a car dashboard. Imagine the possibilities.

This kind of close interaction with end-users will help customer services resolve issues more quickly. It will also open the door for marketing experts to reach consumers with personalised and highly appropriate content. We will have the power to market to people on even more devices, with customised messages, and receive an explosion of useful marketing data as a result. It’s going to be unprecedented.

You might be reading this and thinking: how on earth is my department going to cope with the onslaught of new information? You might already be having a tough time analysing your current data streams. Just wait a few years: the IoT is expected to connect 50 billion devices by 2020! But don’t panic.

The answer will be to maintain best practices. Keep calm and carry on applying a strategic and methodical approach, particularly when it comes to content. If anything, the rise of IoT will mean even more sophisticated and personalised content will be required.

With this in mind, it will continue to be crucial that all your data and information is available to everyone in the same place, using a comprehensive, well-organised, well-tagged content system. You also need to make sure people can access and collaborate efficiently on customer accounts, documents and, as I covered in my last article, marketing assets.

Box’s content and collaboration platform is ready for IoT- enabled marketing; and you can learn more about it here.

Jo Pettifer EMEA VP Marketing