BlueVenn is incredibly excited to announce JOIN 2017, a data marketing conference for marketing and insight professionals, held at the Aria Hotel & Resort in Las Vegas, November 2-3, 2017.

It’s easy to get excited about the use of artificial intelligence (AI) - such as predictive analytics and machine learning - in B2B marketing. It seems like only a few years ago that virtual assistants using speech recognition, customer service chatbots and machine learning-optimized recommendations seemed like the stuff of science fiction.

The deluge of data from an ever-increasing number of channels and sources has opened up a wealth of new possibilities for businesses to reach out to their customers and prospects. To some, though, such volume has also proven overwhelming. Consider this: 47% of marketers of marketers claim to be “very confident” in their ability to analyze complex data, yet 64% believe that analysis should not be part of their role.

This reluctance to engage with data beyond its collection, particularly when so many marketers say they understand it, doesn’t appear to be the best approach. The same report found that over half (58%) of surveyed consumers believe they are inadequately targeted by marketing campaigns, with 83% saying they hate irrelevant ads and email marketing.

For a long time, omnichannel was just another of many confusing marketing buzzwords. 

In some cases, it was unclear precisely how an omnichannel strategy differed from a multichannel approach. In others, it met resistance because of a reluctance to move away from the product-centered practice of getting a product or service in front of the right people.

Now, the paradigm shift to omnichannel is impossible to ignore. The overwhelming emphasis today is about getting people to product, while making the process of doing so as effortless, consistent and contextual as possible. 

First up, some (sort of) good news. A recent global study conducted by Ponemon Institute found that the average cost to a business of a data breach has declined 10% since 2016, to $3.62 million (£2.79m), or $141/£108 per lost and stolen record.

The not-so-good news is that this decline isn’t likely to continue once the forthcoming General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) comes into force on May 25, 2018. Not just when you consider the swingeing fines for transgressing GDPR (which can include failing to notify of a breach in time), but the increased costs associated with managing the breach in a timely manner.

Is your business looking at its marketing through the lens of the customer? Because if you aren’t using customer insight to find out what customers want and how they want it, you’re stuck in the past.

We’re pleased to announce that the latest update to the BlueVenn Customer Data Platform and marketing automation tools will be live from June 30, 2017, and contains a number of interesting new features.

There are some very exciting developments so I thought I'd take the time to write down some of these new features and enhancements:

Bristol, UK & Boston, MA – June 29, 2017 :: Leading Martech providers BlueVenn and Adestra have announced today that they have formed an alliance to combine the Single Customer View, analytics and segmentation capabilities of the BlueVenn Customer analytics and real-time customer journey automation platform with Adestra’s email marketing solution.

Part of constructing effective marketing communications is being able to adapt, and marketers have to be ready to change their approach when old strategies start to look obsolete. With the introduction of new technologies, cultural shifts, and the evolution of customer expectations, the digital age never pauses.

The most obvious and monumental change is the shift away from the Age of the Seller towards the Age of the Customer.

Is there any difference between Single Customer View and the Golden Customer Record? If you spend some time reading up on the pair, you might not think so. In recent years, the two terms have been used somewhat interchangeably, yet I’d argue that today there is a definite distinction.

The Golden Record is just what it sounds like: a holy grail, a gold standard. It’s what all data-driven marketers should aspire to: a clean, organized, comprehensive record of their customers, purged of inconsistencies and inaccuracies. Easier said than done.