B2B Lead Generation | The Problem with Marketing Data

updated article with recent data

Trend 5: The Company with the Best Data Wins

Fact: An average marketing database contains 25-30% useless records. In best-in-class, it’s under 5% (SiriusDecisions)

Data quality is a massive problem in B2B marketing companies. Marketing relies on accurate data, but most companies have inaccurate information. In fact, a large portion of in-house data is wrong and due to rapid change, the problem grow progressively worse and worse.

I recently had a conversation with the SVP of Marketing for a $500 million software firm who asked me how they could improve data quality. He said poor data quality was a big problem. He’s not alone.

Here’s what the experts at SiriusDecisions told us:

“The amount of prospect and customer data in the average b-to-b organization typically doubles every 12 to 18 months, so even if data is relatively clean today, it’s usually only a matter of time before things break down.

According to our research, between 10 percent (in strong organizations) and 25 percent (in typical organizations) of customer and prospect records at any given time include critical data errors ranging from incorrect demographic data to a lack of current disposition.”

We also suggest you visit Ruth Stevens, who publishes great white papers on B2B data and sources.

At Find New Customers, we’re working with top vendors to address this very problem. We believe a new partnership between B2B companies and data providers can go a long way to solving this problem.

Marketo uses enterprise offerings from Jigsaw to improve database accuracy. In addition, they use Jigsaw to complete the record for a new name being added. For instance, if the prospect enters an email address, the system can look the person up in Jigsaw and popular company, title, phone number, etc,

We’ll soon share new and innovative ways vendors can help B2B marketers address this problem. Stay tuned.

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