B2B

Good News: B-to-B Prospecting Data Is More Accurate Than You May Think

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By Ruth P. Stevens

Business marketers are always complaining about their customer data. “It’s pretty bad,” they’ll say. “It’s a mess.” Over the last decade, my colleague Bernice Grossman and I have studied this issue, producing a series of five research reports on the quality of the data B-to-B marketers can rent or buy for prospecting purposes. Our latest study, published this week, shows that prospecting data is surprisingly accurate — well over 90 percent. We actually verified the accuracy by outbound phone, thanks to the call center at PointClear.

In past studies, our focus has been on both data quantity and quality, with the goal of giving marketers a sense of how likely they will be to reach all the prospects they want, with minimal waste, using the prospecting data provided by U.S.

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Headshot of Ruth P. Stevens

Ruth P. Stevens

Ruth P. Stevens consults on customer acquisition and retention, and teaches marketing at companies and business schools around the world. She is past chair of the DMA Business-to-Business Council, and past president of the Direct Marketing Club of New York. Ruth was named one of the 100 Most Influential People in Business Marketing by Crain's BtoB magazine, and one of 20 Women to Watch by the Sales Lead Management Association. She is the author of Maximizing Lead Generation: The Complete Guide for B2B Marketers, and Trade Show and Event Marketing. Ruth serves as a director of Edmund Optics, Inc. She has held senior marketing positions at Time Warner, Ziff-Davis, and IBM and holds an MBA from Columbia University.

Ruth is a guest blogger at Biznology, the digital marketing blog. Email Ruth at ruth@ruthstevens.com, follow her on Twitter at @RuthPStevens, or visit her website, www.ruthstevens.com.

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