Tag Archive for 'Location Intelligence'

In the Press: Schoolcraft College Taking Strategic Approach to Targeting Potential Students

Published on March 29, 2010 in Leslie Nogue. 0 Comments Tags: , , , , , , , .

Leslie Nogue, Pitney Bowes Business Insight

In the Spring 2010 edition of Community College Technology Update, Marty Heador of Schoolcraft College discusses the value of integrating consumer segmentation data and analyses into direct mail programs.   Schoolcraft College, a continuing education college in Livonia, MI, reached out to the predictive analytic consultants at Pitney Bowes Business Insight for help in maximizing the value of their direct mail campaigns. 

Through effective customer profiling, PBBI consultants were able to identify the affect that distance has on Schoolcraft’s student response rates.  They also determined the student count was dropping and the course load was decreasing per student faster than the number of students enrolled.  By uncovering the most “in-profile” students and the “out-of-profile” students, Schoolcraft’s marketing department is now able to re-direct their direct mail towards the carrier routes within the 10 miles of the college with the highest concentrations of potential students.  This effort has allowed Schoolcraft to “gain a deeper understanding” of their target student, but has also helped focus their marketing funds on those areas with the highest ROI. Read full article…

Spotlight on the Customer: Schoolcraft College

Published on March 17, 2010 in Leslie Nogue. 0 Comments Tags: , , , , , , , .

Leslie Nogue, Pitney Bowes Business Insight

The Challenge
Schoolcraft College, a comprehensive, open door, community-based College in Livonia, Michigan was seeking to target their mass mailings to neighborhoods with the highest concentrations of potential students.

The Solution
Through in-depth analysis of customer, geographic, and demographic factors, analysts at Pitney Bowes Business Insight were able to weed out under-producing carrier routes, allowing Schoolcraft College to focus their energies on the neighborhoods most likely to produce students. As a result of the segmentation analysis, Schoolcraft College gained a deeper understanding of its target student, enabling them to communicate with with prospects more effectively.  Using Pitney Bowes Business Insight’s comprehensive customer segmentation analysis, Schoolcraft College was able to identify concentrations of in-profile students, ultimately boosting enrollment and reclaiming valuable marketing dollars through targeted mailings.

To find out how Schoolcraft was able to quantify and utlimately increase their ROI, download the case study.

12 ways location data yields better decisions – Part II

Published on January 22, 2010 in Deb Purcell. 0 Comments Tags: , , , , , , .

Nearly 70 percent of all business data contains a geographical component, so it’s not surprising that more businesses and government agencies are using location intelligence to reach, serve and grow customer relationships. Last week we looked at the latest trends related to customer-facing initiatives Today we’ll examine the ways geo-spatial data is being used in operations and the public sector.

 

Crime fighting. While governments have long used geo- technology to support public works decisions, such as highway and sewer planning, a number of specialized applications now incorporate location intelligence in the area of crime mapping. In many municipalities, citizens now have a centralized portal where criminal intelligence and information is shared by law enforcement at the local, state and federal levels—giving law enforcement agencies the insight needed to solve and prevent crimes.

E-Government: In the public sector, location intelligence is used to plan for growth, improve public services and share information with citizens. New government legislation, such as INSPIRE in Europe, is changing the way public organizations manage and share their GIS data. Many agencies have found ways to keep costs down, serve citizens and comply with new government mandates.

 

Tax management. State and local tax jurisdictions involve complex rules and boundaries that have no relationship to postal codes—and the failure to collect or pay appropriate taxes can result in significant penalties. This need is especially prevalent in certain industries, such as telecommunications, where miles of fiber optic cable may cut across hundreds of distinct tax jurisdictions—each with unique rules and tax rates.

Risk identification. In financial services, predictive analytics based on geo-demographics now provide an early-warning mechanism to detect borrowers who may be at risk of bankruptcy and default. In the insurance industry, companies have integrated spatial analysis into underwriting and claims management systems—instantly calculating the distance between a home and the nearest fire hydrant, flood plain or fault line.

Fraud detection. Due in part to the recent recession, fraud attempts are on the rise and more organizations are integrating customer data quality and location intelligence into their fraud management systems. In the credit card industry, geo-based analytics can instantly assess whether two credit card purchases could have been made by the same person using the same card based on time and distance.

Routing and fleet management. As consumers shift to online shopping, location intelligence is increasing part of the delivery system, as retailers and shippers calculate optimum drive routes and determine where to locate distribution centers—decisions that provide for faster deliveries and lower costs.

 

Experts predict that the market for business geographics and location intelligence will grow 50% over the next five years. Clearly, new solutions such as those offered by Pitney Bowes Business Insight are making an impact.

Have you started looking at any of these areas this year?  Feel free to share any questions or insights here.

12 ways location data yields better decisions – Part I

Published on January 14, 2010 in Deb Purcell. 0 Comments Tags: , , .

Location intelligence has clearly become a mainstream business practice—driving decisions across most every department. As we begin 2010, we wanted to provide you some insights into twelve of the latest trends and applications. Today we’ll look at how geo-spatial information supports customer-facing initiatives.  Next week, we’ll examine the same trends in operations and the public sector.

Site Selection. Opening a new store or branch location can cost millions of dollars, with payback often calculated in years. Companies can now analyze market demographics, competition and consumer buying habits across alternative geographies in order to predict events well into the future. This is especially important in times of economic uncertainty, when many firms are deciding whether or not to close or relocate stores and branch locations.

Customer Segmentation. Marketers can go beyond simple postal codes to identify households at the neighborhood and street level who are most likely to become new customers or to purchase additional products and services. Color-coded maps overlay multiple levels of data, including revenue, Census information, proximity and customer penetration—making it easy to visualize how market demographics correspond to sales potential.

e-Tailing. The exponential growth of online shopping adds another dimension to marketing decisions. While consumers may transact in a “virtual world” they still access the Web from specific locations. Understanding the relationship between where online customers live and work vis-à-vis the location of retail locations and competitive outlets makes it easier to develop strategies that best leverage both on- and off-line efforts.

Customer onboarding. The opening of a new account can be one of the most critical times in the relationship between a customer and a company. Geocoding applications help validate the exact location of new accounts so correspondence and shipments reach customers in a timely fashion. Increasingly, organizations are also using location-based information to make real-time decisions on which products or services to cross-sell in the first 90 days, when customers are most open to expanding their relationship.

Customer self-service. With an ability to integrate vast amounts of data, analytics and customer-friendly mapping applications, customers can now view the same information used by back-office personnel. In one instance, an insurance company shared details on a hurricane’s path online, discouraging individuals from submitting false claims.

Customer care. In many companies, telephone reps now navigate intuitive, user-friendly mapping applications to make on-the-spot decisions based on location. In most cases, these technologies are employed to identify cross-sell opportunities and provide accurate information to customers regarding network access.

While spatial analysis is just now hitting its stride in terms of business applications, it is likely that major breakthroughs are yet to come.  New tools and solutions are making it even easier to locate new opportunities, connect with customers and communicate more efficiently.  So tell us… what other ways are you tapping the “power of where” in your business?

Holiday Trends Highlight Increased Role for Location Intelligence

Published on October 14, 2009 in Al Beery and Brian Hill. 0 Comments Tags: , , , , , , .

Al Beery and Brian Hill, Pitney Bowes Business Insight

Over the next few months, consumers will head to the malls, superstores, and in increasing numbers, to their laptops—and retailers will be looking for any edge they can find to increase sales and margins during this holiday shopping season.

Given the sluggish economy, cost pressures and changing consumer behaviors, there has never been a better time to leverage Location Intelligence in your business. Retailers, manufacturers and shippers will find ways this year to move product to more people in smart, cost-effective ways by analyzing the relationship between distribution centers, retail sites, critical customer segments and household locations.

This is especially critical in light of expected shifts in customer behavior. The down economy means that many customers are buying less, they’re more price-conscious, and they are more selective about what they buy. Many customers are also buying more online—increasing the role of logistics and fleet management,

Using location intelligence to chart how these trends are impacting your business is often the key to greater profitability. Better Location Intelligence can help you to:

• Better project performance of existing retail sites
• Determine optimal locations for new retail sites
• More effectively allocate marketing dollars
• Chart more efficient delivery routes
• Reassess distribution-center locations in light of the increased proportion of direct-to-consumer shipping

In fact, companies that invest in top-quality location intelligence solutions often see positive ROI inside of six months. And many achieve a six-figure return on their investment within the year. Add in the intangibles—happier customers, happier delivery people, and happier customer-service personnel—these all result from greater efficiencies, better communications, and better information sharing throughout your organization.

More information on how Location Intelligence and other data-quality improvements can enhance day-to-day and long-term business performance are available in our White Paper Special Delivery: Just-in-Time Savings or by speaking with your local PBBI representative at 800.327.8627 or via email at pbbi.sales@pb.com.

Cutting Through The Noise – The Value of Location Intelligence in Relevant Customer Communications

Published on September 28, 2009 in Leslie Nogue. 1 Comment Tags: , , , .

The September issue of the ABA Banking Journal includes an article titled “Cutting Through The Noise: Combine Location Intelligence With Account Data to be More Relevant” contributed by Hal Hopson, managing director, industry solutions for Pitney Bowes Business Insight. In this article, Hal highlights the role predictive analytics and location intelligence play in facilitating the creation of “targeted and personalized messages that grab and hold the customer’s interest.”

Hal first discusses the importance of analyzing customer behavior, arguing that marketers can and should leverage demographic and behavioral segmentation data associated with the customer’s geographic location to consumer discern age, income, stage of life, leisure activities, and shopping preferences. He also notes that marketers need to recognize the importance of convenience. The physical location of a branch matters to consumers when they are making their banking decisions, and savvy marketers should take that into account when defining their service offerings.

Hal concludes the article with a sample study summarizing the results of a Location-intelligent statistical model created to assess the likelihood of a given household to purchase a checking account, money market, time account, or home equity loan. The results demonstrate how marketers can harness the power of predictive analytics and location intelligence to narrow their universe of customers to those with the highest propensity to purchase specific service offerings. In doing so, marketers can significantly reduce their marketing spend by targeting their mailings to only those households, improving their baseline ROI. To view the full article, please visit the ABA Banking Journal.

Location Intelligence Still Matters

Published on July 27, 2009 in Devon Wolfe. 0 Comments Tags: , .

Devon Wolfe, Pitney Bowes Business Insight

We’re sending our first son off to college this fall at the University of Oklahoma. We live in Michigan. So, as we’ve been looking at the various logistics of setting up a 17 year old on his own 1,000 miles away, we’ve had some decisions to make. One of those decisions has been where to set up his bank account. I think the story of how we made that decision has a lot to say about the changing dynamics of location in the Internet world.

Our thought process went like this: He needs a bank that has ATMs and a branch close to his dorm. So, we went to Google, typed in “banks Norman OK” and started looking around. Meanwhile, my son went to a new OU student site on Facebook and learned from other students where some ATMs were located that were not on the Google map (imagine that, incomplete data on a map!!). As it turned out, one of the ATMs not on the map belonged to a large nationwide bank that just opened a branch near our home in Michigan. Once we saw that, we took a few minutes online to compare account features, learned that they were all about the same, and decided to open an account here in Michigan at the large nationwide bank before he goes to school.

Now, here’s where it gets interesting. When we open that account, his account will be “domiciled” at the bank near our home address, which would on the surface seem logical since it’s quite close to our house—but the reason we made the decision is primarily about where he’s going to school—the proximity of a branch near our home was just an added bonus.

So what can we learn from a location strategy perspective? First, the old, time-honored location criteria about visibility and local media awareness are changing in our Internet-centered world. Today’s consumers use Web searches and social media instead of neighbors, phone books, and direct mail flyers to make their decisions about where to go. It’s still all about location, but the information is gathered in a much different way than in the past. Second, our example says a lot about the inherent advantages of a large network. The bank that got our business isn’t first in market share in either the Oklahoma City or Detroit markets, but due to its network coverage, it met the needs of a transient person. Does ubiquity at a lower metro market share afford an operating advantage that is sustainable?

I realize of course that most customer decisions are not quite the same as those of a college student going out of state. But, the fact is the consumer’s way of interacting is changing rapidly—which begs for more consumer research into the way that people make location decisions today.

Reflections from Insights09

Published on July 8, 2009 in Clarence Hempfield. 0 Comments Tags: , , , , , , .

Clarence Hempfield, Pitney Bowes Business Insight

Last month, we held two events back-to-back in Orlando, an Analyst Day followed by our Insight 09 User’s Conference.

Clearly, these are two distinct audiences. The analysts who cover our industry, including Gartner, Forrester, IDC, TowerGroup, Ventana Research, Information Difference and Saugatuck, ask a lot of big-picture questions. They want to understand how Pitney Bowes Business Insight—formed when Group 1 Software and MapInfo merged—creates more value than the prior two entities.

While some analysts focus on specific technologies or vertical industries, all were eager to learn about our strategies across the six PBBI product portfolios. The subject of customer data quality came up a lot, and we heard how customer data quality is often not seen as a top priority—until something goes wrong. How those errors can be costly, affecting risk, profits, regulatory compliance and customer relationships. And how making customer data quality a foundation of every PBBI engagement made sense, especially when combined with our unique location intelligence, predictive analytics, document creation, data enhancement and postal efficiency capabilities. Overall, we heard a lot of positive feedback.

But we were challenged as well. Events like these provide PBBI executives with opportunities to listen and learn. Analysts wondered how we planned on supporting hundreds of solutions over the long term, and how we could ensure we didn’t lose focus as we continue to grow.

When one analyst later wrote, “Refreshingly, PBBI people were not full of themselves,” I took that as a testament to our willingness to listen.

In some ways, crossing the hall the next day to meet with customers at our user’s conference was a major shift. While industry analysts deal in big picture strategies, many of our users came to Orlando to gain insights on specific point-level applications. The need to ensure that we didn’t lose focus was quickly evident.

It’s not unusual for specific users to know us for one solution and one solution only. Their interest in PBBI is much more straightforward and their question clear: how is this one thing you do going to make my life better.

They wanted to know whether complying with the USPS Intelligent Mail® mandate will require them to redesign customer statements, whether our new mapping interface will help them work more efficiently, and how we can help them expedite remittance processing.

Throughout our merger, we’ve made it a priority to put customers first. And as our day-to-day users value tangible innovation more than strategic plans—it was important for us to demonstrate value in a hands-on way. Over the past year, we introduced a long list of product innovations, including MapInfo Professional 10, EngageOne Interactive and Mail360 to name a few, and the response has been excellent.

Clearly, the needs of our users are different from the needs of department heads and company executives, which are distinct from the needs of industry analysts and other constituents. While we are one company with one story, we have to adapt our message so that it is relevant to each and every market we serve.

While that may not be an ‘aha’ moment, this reflection did cause me to smile. Coming off a major merger, Pitney Bowes Business Insight is still evolving, but must also remain true to the customers who have known (and liked) us for over 20 years. And given today’s economic realities – doesn’t every company face this same challenge?

Banks are consolidating. Insurance companies merging. Others reinventing themselves. Every organization is evolving – balancing the needs of diverse segments, shifting from strategy to tactics, becoming something new while remaining faithful to long-term customers. Some constituents want to read about long-term vision while across the hall, someone wants you to fix a button. To be successful, companies need to understand the needs of all their constituents. They need to target messages more effectively. They need to predict outcomes with greater confidence. And take into consideration more data points than ever before.

So while flying back from our analyst day and user’s conference I smiled for a simple reason. This challenge we face – this challenge every organization faces – explains why PBBI exists.

Helping companies locate new opportunities, connect with customers and communicate more effectively is what we’re all about.

Some days, we’re helping firms make smarter decisions about where to open, close or update their retail facilities—making strategic decisions based on underlying market needs and sales potential. Other days we’re helping companies pull together disparate data, create accurate customer profiles and initiate one-to-one dialogues using more relevant Transpromo communications.

In a nutshell, we’re providing the insights, expertise and tools than can help organizations respond to the one question that is on the mind of every customer, executive and shareholder: how is this one thing you do going to make my life better.

Now that’s focus.