Understanding Your Customers Through Data

By Stan Bindell, QCBN

Knowing where Quad Cities customers are traveling from helps business owners know where to send marketing messages about their products and services. Regional Economic Development Center economist and data analyst Ryan Jones says knowledge about demographics are key to making effective business decisions.

He shared information about tools that can help inform businesses with the Chino Valley Chamber of Commerce last month.

Customer tracking data is extremely valuable, he says. Whenever cell phone customers download apps, companies download data about the customers and sell it to other companies.

Buxton and Placer.ai are two companies that capture such information.

With information from cell phone apps, these companies can acquire customers’ marital status, income and education level.

For example, the data show that 73% of visitors to the Founding Fathers Collective in Prescott live within 25 miles of the entity, but they also come from Phoenix and Bagdad, Arizona.

“They know where you live so they can tell how much you make and have

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Issue 3 Volume 11 customer profiles,” said Jones. “They can tell how likely someone is to visit Founding Fathers.”

Jones points out that grocery stores like to serve a population of about 14,000 people. While Chino Valley’s population is slightly below that, the Safeway there remains one of the busiest in the country. Thus, data helps companies determine their market reach based on elements beyond simply