3 Reasons data privacy legislation is not the enemy

Are you concerned about what the impact of recent and anticipated customer privacy legislation like GDPR, CCPA, etc. will mean to your organization? Are you a marketing leader whose definition of demand gen success is measured by the size of your prospect database? Or, are you an IT leader unsure of how to provide technology solutions to customer data management? Perhaps you are a C-suite executive that needs to mitigate downside risk while maximizing upside gains. If you change the way you think about the impact of privacy legislation, you could create a competitive advantage instead of a threat. Here’s how…

1. Leverage consent and preference gathering to drive deep segmentation, personalization, and conversion.

For organizations that primarily measure return on marketing investment (ROMI) by the size of their database, there is a real fear that requiring consent and preference gathering will decimate their database. While they may experience the downside of data quantity reduction, the upside of a quality database far outweighs the risk. Contacts that expressly provide consent are more likely to engage with you and convert to customers and/or remain loyal to your brand.

Perhaps of greatest benefit, by gathering communication preferences such as the type, topic, and frequency, you are able to move beyond generic segmentation criteria like location, job role, and gender to more insightful data points such as product of interest, propensity to purchase, and sales readiness.

Deep segmentation is critical to delivering personalized experiences that boost conversion. Speaking of personalization…

2. Offset data management investments by mining your first party data

“Right to be forgotten” clauses require companies to be able to locate, update, and or expunge all data about an individual. The investment in time and materials to meet this requirement can seem daunting. However, you can offset data management costs by uncovering a gold mine of first-party data about your business including where to invest in product innovation and how to reduce operating expenses.

From a sales and marketing perspective, we’ve all learned the hard way that acquiring a customer is much more expensive than retaining a customer. Reduce customer acquisition costs by ceasing to purchase nefarious, third-party enrichment data (which you’ll soon have to dump. Before you DMP, CYD (check your data).

3. The “right to be informed” is a two-way street

Brands that provide proactive transparency about how they store, use and/or share their customers’ data, while empowering customers make informed decisions about how their personal data is used, are reaping the benefits.

According to an article in Forbes, “75% of consumers [who understand how their data is used] are willing to share it with companies in exchange for a product or service they value and a brand they trust. Even more consumers, 80% were positively influenced into sharing personal data …when they received special offers or data-enabled benefits…” — Forbes

Net-net, be transparent and reap the benefits. Brands that fail to be to do so will not only lose the trust of their customers, they will miss the opportunity understand them better in order to deliver 1:1 experiences.

Daniel Vasey joined Slalom in 2017. He solves problems in a pragmatic way, helps clients understand their customers through data, and deploys sales and marketing automation capabilities.