Measuring the ROI of a customer intelligence platform

Without the right setup to handle data at scale, many enterprise organizations suffer from data fragmentation—data is scattered or siloed across departments and it can complicate efforts to gain a unified view of customers. As many enterprises navigate digital transformation or heightened consumer expectations, tapping into the power of customer insights has become more critical than ever. Customer insights are more than just data points; they represent the narratives that drive user behaviors and experiences. They reveal the underlying motivations, preferences, and pain points that define how customers interact with products and services. Leveraging a comprehensive customer intelligence platform can enable enterprise organizations to embed a deep and ongoing understanding of customer needs into decisions, strategies and workflows. It can better enable enterprises to innovate effectively, tailor their products to meet real demands, and build stronger customer loyalty.

What is a customer intelligence platform?

A customer intelligence platform serves as a centralized platform to aggregate, analyze, and share insights organization-wide, ensuring customer-focused decision-making at every level. However, not all platforms are created equal. Measuring the ROI of customer insights can validate the effectiveness of an insights hub and justify investment. Ensure that resources are allocated efficiently toward strategies that yield the highest returns.

What is the business impact of a customer intelligence solution?

A unified view of what matters to customers helps enterprises drive team alignment, speed up decision-making, and maximize go-to-market opportunities. Though, for many enterprise organizations, data fragmentation can mean that valuable insights remain dormant and unutilized. In fact, Forrester principal analyst Mike Gualtieri estimates that as much as 73 percent of all enterprise data goes unanalyzed.

This is where a customer intelligence solution can help. An effective customer intelligence platform can help enterprises to:

Enhance strategic planning by offering a holistic view of customer needs and preferences, ensuring decisions are informed and targeted.
Improve product development by providing real-time feedback that aligns product offerings with actual user needs and expectations.
Foster a customer-first culture by encouraging an organizational mindset that prioritizes customer needs and satisfaction.

Key areas where a customer intelligence platform delivers ROI

Whether you want to drive faster, more confident decision-making, increase efficiency and resource optimization, or uncover new revenue streams, a customer intelligence platform can help.

So, which areas experience the greatest impact when considering the ROI of customer insights?

According to a survey conducted by Dovetail with 192 participants*, a customer intelligence platform helps teams to:

Improve UX in their products: 94 percent of companies say their customer intelligence solution enables them to design and build better experiences—an essential factor in driving customer satisfaction, retention, and brand loyalty at scale.
Prevent misguided product efforts: 89 percent of companies say that their customer intelligence platform helps them better focus their efforts and avoid building the wrong products or features, prevent wasted investment, and ensure efficient resourcing.
Uncover new revenue streams: 68 percent of organizations report that centralizing customer insights has helped them to identify new revenue streams, driving business growth.
Get products to market faster: Speed to market is another key advantage. 66 percent of companies report that their customer intelligence platform accelerates their product development cycles, allowing them to respond swiftly to market demands and maintain a competitive edge.

*All respondents use Dovetail as their customer intelligence solution. To learn more, download our free whitepaper ROI of AI-powered insights: Save time, reduce risk, build better.

Measuring the ROI of a customer intelligence platform

How does your customer intelligence platform contribute to driving sales? To what extent is it improving customer retention? Does it actually help you make better product decisions? Quantifying the financial impact of a customer intelligence platform is key to understanding its effectiveness. So how do you materially measure the ROI of customer insights? To do so effectively, you can concentrate on a few key performance indicators:

Time savings: Quantify the reduction in hours spent on traditional research, design or product development tasks, showcasing efficiency gains.

Customer satisfaction metrics: Track improvements in customer satisfaction through measures like CSAT and NPS scores.

Conversion rate optimization: Analyze changes in conversion rates due to insights-driven product strategies.

Churn reduction: Assess decreases in churn rates correlated with enhanced customer engagement and satisfaction.

The right customer intelligence platform will do the heavy lifting of measuring ROI by helping you understand performance across a range of metrics. For instance, Dovetail’s Channels allows you to understand performance at scale by uncovering trends in constant streams of feedback like support tickets, NPS scores, product reviews, and more.

Choosing the right customer intelligence solution

Selecting the right customer intelligence solution is crucial for enterprises aiming to maximize ROI. To ensure that your insights hub effectively improves business outcomes, ensure that it:

Helps you make sense of complex data: An effective customer intelligence platform will transform large amounts of complex data into insights that inform better decision-making at every level within your organization. If it doesn’t help you make sense of diverse streams of data, it isn’t doing its job.
Enables cross-team accessibility: Facilitating insights-driven decision-making requires a platform that encourages access and collaboration among various team members. This ensures insights are leveraged across departments and not confined to isolated units, promoting a more cohesive and aligned operational strategy.
Integrates with your existing tools, systems, and workflows: Your insights should fit into your existing way of working while adding value, not complexity. In doing this, it should have the ability to expand and adapt as your company grows or changes, ensuring sustained performance.
Prioritizes safety and security: For enterprises—often handling large amounts of sensitive and valuable customer data—protecting data is crucial to maintain customer trust, comply with legal and regulatory requirements, and safeguard your organization’s reputation. A robust security framework can help to mitigate the risk of data breaches, financial losses, and legal liabilities.

Maximizing ROI of customer intelligence with Dovetail

Effective customer intelligence platform can help organizations transcend beyond reactive measures, proactively designing products and services that resonate with their audience. A well-deployed customer insights tool becomes the foundation of innovative strategies that meet and exceed market demands.

Dovetail’s AI-driven platform speeds up the discovery of insights by automating data synthesis, cutting down analysis time, and facilitating quicker and more effective decision-making—even in the most complex organizational setups. For enterprise organizations, Dovetail offers a powerful way to embed a customer-focus at every level of the organization. By automating repetitive tasks, breaking down data silos, and streamlining workflows, it increases efficiency, allowing organizations to focus on strategic initiatives and optimize their understanding of customer needs at scale.

Connect with our sales team for a comprehensive demonstration of Dovetail. Not ready to chat? Check out more of our enterprise resources or download our free whitepaper to further explore the benefits and functionalities of Dovetail.

For businesses eager to invest in a customer intelligence platform, the rewards are clear and substantial. Companies not only affirm their commitment to understanding their customers but also propel themselves toward sustained success and growth. Embracing these technologies equips organizations to effectively navigate the complexities of today’s markets with foresight and confidence.