Does it seem difficult to understand your customer? How does a business parse the multiple data points in a connected world? What can you do to help your customer move from consideration to purchase? What is the meaning of life, the universe, and everything? Oddly enough, it sometimes feels like the last question is the easiest to answer (and if you’re a fan of The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, you know the answer is 42). Online interaction with customers has never been higher, with 81% of people conducting online research before they buy. That extreme amount of online activity means that businesses can know what customers search for, how often they visit their website, and other online preferences and behavior. But collecting and understanding that data across a massive amount of touchpoints, media, and advertising is easier said than done. That’s why Salesforce has brought its almost 20 years of customer journey knowhow to connect every touchpoint and experience with your brand across advertising channels, marketing and social, commerce, sales, service, and apps. Salesforce Marketing Cloud was developed to increase sales, retain customers, and help businesses become customer-centric companies.

Increase sales

According to one study, 70% of people make purchases based on how they feel they are being treated as a customer. That’s a significant amount of purchase power behind customer experience. Think about the best interactions you’ve had while making a purchase, whether in store or online. For me, the most enjoyable moments share a common theme: The correct information is available to me and tailored to my specific needs, whether through a helpful salesperson who has taken the time to ask the right questions to understand me or through a website that has anticipated the questions I want to ask. Marketing Cloud enables businesses to visualize the customer journey and build in touchpoints for emails, calls, or other interactions at scale, including AI and machine learning to help you make adjustments.

Retain customers

Once a customer has made a purchase, the journey isn’t over. 40% of online store revenue comes from 8% of total customers — those that have already made a purchase. It’s impossible to overstate the importance that repeat business is to your bottom line. Research from Aberdeen suggests that companies with the strongest omnichannel customer engagement strategies retain an average of 89% of their customers, as compared to 33% for companies with weak omni-channel strategies. You need to utilize your entire arsenal to make sure that your customers feel wanted and understood so that they will return to you again and again. That’s possible with Marketing Cloud, with tools like automation, email marketing, mobile messaging, and other touchpoint tools.

Related: A few reasons why your team needs Salesforce Marketing Cloud

Become customer-centric

The much cited book by Dale Carnegie, How to Win Friends and Influence People, has a central message: care about other people. He suggests simple strategies, like asking people about their interests and really listening, to have success in connecting with others. This same advice is applicable to businesses with their customers; by listening to customers (through digital interactions and touchpoints), collecting and parsing that data (through Marketing Cloud’s excellent analytics platform), and using that data to tailor your messaging across all channels to your customers, your business can be successful.

Salesforce Marketing Cloud can help your business to win fans and influence customers with a personable, considerate approach to the customer experience. Your final stat of today is this: 73% say getting useful information from a business is the most important attribute when selecting a brand. Making the jump from a business that shouts its product features into the void to one that consultatively sells at scale can be done through customer journey mapping and data collection to exceed your sales goals, improve retention, and become customer-centric.

Are you ready for your Salesforce solution? Contact Simplus today for expert implementation and consultation services.