Leveraging Big Data in eCommerce

By: Retail CIO Outlook | Friday, November 30, 2018

Big data is fast turning into a ubiquitous catchphrase in most enterprise environments. The vast amounts of data about a product, person or trend sourced from multiple areas such as PoS terminals, eCommerce sites, social media and so forth, are all party to the big data trend. The retail and e-Commerce domains have been leveraging big data in multiple ways to survive the aggressive market competition. It is, however, worth noting that big data is just one part of the process; analytics is the key to unlock the immense potential held by big data. The confluence of big data and analytics marks the inception of the path-breaking trend of big data analytics.

The prominent utility of big data analytics in sectors like the eCommerce and retail is to predict the current trends for a holistic understanding of products/strategies that produce the best results. Sentiments analysis aides the understanding of customers’ habits and preferences at an individual level, as also their spending patterns during different times of the year, which the businesses could use to an advantage. For example, if a customer is known to order clothes, shoes or bags during Christmas or the Easter, companies could roll out attractive offers tailored to suit his preferences, as a part of the loyalty program.

Big data has entered even the customer service domain. Customer feedback is available at a myriad of touch points such as the social media, live chats or feedback panels on eCommerce sites. Catering to a customer’s feedback as appropriate is an area that eCommerce or any other business cannot afford to overlook. Furthermore, using the data from their previous interactions is equally important, to ensure a positive experience failing which the negative feedback could circulate on the online platforms easily. A customer insight platform could help businesses obtain a single pane of view of each customer interaction.

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