The Role of Predictive Analytics in Today’s Marketing World

Predictive Analytics: It’s an impressive term with impressive power. But savvy companies have actually been using it for years. Anytime you’ve given a cashier your phone number or email address, you’ve been exposed to predictive analytics. How? Simple: Providing your phone number helps companies with geo-location. It helps them to better understand where buying customers come from and how far they were willing to drive to shop there. Giving your email helps a company re-target you with customized, promotional messages in hopes that you’ll buy.

The Expanding Influence of Predictive Analytics

But today’s predictive analytics are growing ever more intelligent. As far as your website goes, predictive analytics can help you identify common features among your shoppers. You can then use that information to target others in that same demographic. Once you understand that your biggest customers are middle-age moms, shopping for jeans for teenage daughters, you can publish content that appeals directly to them. You can also design successful marketing campaigns around them.

Predictive Analytics Defined

By definition, predictive analytics uses historical data to predict future results. Today, statistical algorithms and artificial intelligence help identify commonalities among consumers. This means the data being farmed accumulates much more quickly, helping businesses better design their marketing focus, methods, and materials.

The applications for predictive analytics are ever-increasing, as well. Once a good way for companies to gather contacts and gain shopping insights, today’s predictive analytics can help you identify customers you’re in danger of losing, help you court non-customers who match your target demographic, and help you personalize an emotional message that will impact individual consumers right in the feels. If you’re not taking advantage of everything this marketing science has to offer, you’re leaving unnecessary money on the table.

Predictive Analytics and You

Marketing campaigns that make you tons of money are only good if you’re able to recreate them. The way to do this is to study the analytics of that successful campaign. Who responded? What did they buy? What do they do for a living? Are they male or female? Old or young? Once you nail down a target demographic that responds to your product, you’ll be better able to go after those consumers with your message. It’s predictive analytics that make this possible.