ca. 30 Minuten
nach Wunsch auch mit VideocallDo my Google Adwords activities actually pay off? Should I invest more in my Facebook advertisements? Would it be advisable to proceed with expanding my affiliate network? If yes – which affiliate partners are the important ones, considering the ROI in particular?
The efficient controlling of online channels isn’t an easy task. Quite the contrary, in fact: Normally, it raises a whole lot of questions. This case study shows how those questions become answerable for you as an online retailer on the basis of holistic data analyses – optimization of online channel management with Business Intelligence (BI).
Initial situation
Our case study’s online shop – a nextel customer from the Fashion & Lifestyle domain – notices a lack of efficiency concerning its online advertisements’ performance in comparison to Benchmarks. To counteract this development, shop employees define the goal to make the core metrics regarding customer segments and communication channels transparent (e. g. cost-turnover ratio or cost per order) and optimize them target-aimed on the thus created analytic basis.
So far, the respective metrics were merely gathered up in effortful manual work – provided on a monthly basis only and with a strong time delay on top of it all. Obviously, holistic analyses in real-time haven’t been possible on this basis at all.
Intelligent data integration
To evaluate online channels as well as marketing activities comprehensively, the single data sources have to be linked to each other in a first step. Only on the basis of a holistic data base, the entire customer interaction process can be modeled in significant metrics.
For nextel as a Business Intelligence service provider, this does mean concretely: integration of three different data sources – shop system (demandware), commodities management (MOS Tangram CHOICE 5) and Webanalytics (Omniture). Furthermore, a variety of decentralized data depositories for target figures and channel costs (most of all originating from Excel files) is eliminated by being transferred to the Business Intelligence solution’s Data Warehouse one-time-only. The feed and adjustment of figures is implemented browser-based and process-supporting. A holistic Data Warehouse containing all relevant information has been created.
Hierarchy of online channels
To make the information brought together in the Data Warehouse useable for the aimed-at reporting of key figures, a hierarchic channel structure has to be created. The main channel “Social Media” for example includes sub channels like Facebook and Twitter, the main channel “Search” includes the sub channels SEO and SEM, further divided in “brand” and “non-brand” partly. This way, all information about the customer’s origin, his or her impulse to buy as well as the Customer Journey’s single Touchpoints is to become relatable to every order anonymously.
In the nextel MDM (a tool for the purpose of creating a central data feed and master data maintenance), the online shop employees being in charge of channel management can adapt this hierarchy any time and associate the channels with new marketing activities all the same.
Holistically gained metrics: Analysis and evaluation
Via the Business Intelligence solution put in place by nextel, employees being in charge for the single channels, marketing directors, controllers as well as further parties involved in the channel management are able to measure the efficiency of the shop’s channels on a daily basis and in quasi real-time now.
As an example, the important metric cost per order (CPO) provides valuable indications about how to exploit sales potentials more effectively in the future; inefficient channels can be identified and corresponding steps be taken quickly – before having burnt large budgets. The impacts of implemented measures as well as of budgets having been transferred between the channels are clearly measureable with the Business Intelligence solution, so that a discussion about future campaigns takes place on the basis of real facts and figures.
Result
All in all, by means of the BI project‘s implementation, our case study’s online shop was able to achieve the following goals:
- The most important metrics and KPIs can be analyzed on a daily basis.
- It’s not all about the collection of data anymore, but about the optimal allocation of budgets.
- Every online channel can be evaluated in regard to numerous criteria (as for example contribution margins, new customers or cost per order).
With Business Intelligence, the online shop’s business processes can be modeled in a far more efficient way now than before.
You want to stay uptodate about the lates blog post or upcoming webinars? And you don't want to miss what's new with the minubo Analytics Cloud? That is no problem at all:
