Poor data is limiting manufacturing sales

Data cleansing and data maintenance are still serious problems in manufacturing companies, potentially impacting sales. A survey commissioned by automotive systems integrator gedas finds that 65% of IT directors are aware of the issues, and the firm’s report suggests that lack of customer focus, coupled with out-of-date, inaccurate, even unusable data – leading to mis-spelt names and unfulfilled mail – are to blame. By not having the strongest databases to back up marketing, manufacturing is losing sales leads, says Bob Mountford for gedas UK. “Inaccurate data reflects badly on companies and this may impact on the number of sales. Our research suggests that manufacturing industry has a challenge ahead in the selection, maintenance and utilisation of data.” Gedas’ solution is InfoClear, a service aimed at improving companies’ quality of data that’s already in use at Audi. Phil Tarry, Audi prospect manager for the A8, A6 and all-road vehicles, says: “Accurate customer data is essential... The gedas data cleanse service allows us to maintain our records to the highest standard possible.” And Laurie Baker, brand manager at Heritage Audi, adds: “We used gedas to tele-market our customers following a mailing to increase response levels. The additional data gedas gathered, together with the updates, will allow us to communicate more effectively with them in the future and keep them as customers.”