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Resources / Blog

Methods of data collection

Topic: Data Exchange, DMP
  • Start to collect data
  • 7 popular methods of data collection and common data sources
  • Using collected data in digital marketing

Overview:

Methods of data collection can help you select and control the right data from billions of bytes that are flooding around online. Google conducts almost 4.5 million searches every minute – recent DOMO’s infographics reports. Want to make sure users search for your product? Find out what the users want the most by gathering data out of their both online and offline behavior. Choose the most suitable method of data collection according to your business needs and admire your profit raising. 

Start to collect data

Before you start to collect data and choose the right method for collecting data, it’s extremely important to know what kind of data you need and what is its further use. Set a timeframe for data to be gathered. Decide if it’s going to be quantitative or qualitative data or both. 

Quantitative data can be measured, converted, compared or included in advanced logical statements. Therefore it’s numeric data, e.g. time of the certain event that was performed by the visitor or amount of his orders.

Qualitative data is descriptive and includes e.g., the user’s opinion or marked points. Once all needful data is collected, define a goal for the integrated dataset and prepare your tools to analyze the given results. 

7 popular methods of data collection and common data sources

Depending on the chosen type of data for your business purposes, you can select the best data source and collect it in one place, like within a Data Management Platform. OnAudience DMP has a database with over 27 bn user profiles and offers to store, organize and activate data for any operational, analytical or marketing purpose. Find out more about the benefits that DMP offers and 5 the most profitable ways to use DMP in online marketing

7 data sources and the most useful and popular methods of data collection:

1. Offline data, internal systems and polls. 

This kind of data source has big potential because of their access to the users’ fresh opinion just after their contact with your brand. You can store both online and offline data (e.g., from surveys or your internal CRM systems). You must be very careful with preparing the surveys and include important information only. Have in mind that people usually find annoying long texts and a lot of questions. So, work with your copywriters to have this done short and informative.

As an example, you can add a pop-window on your blog page. This could work when the user is about to leave the website, but you still can attract his attention. You can propose something interesting for him depending on the post subject. Ask him about his experience and offer something instead. People like presents. 

2. Digital Campaign Analysis 

This method of data collection is focused on data from online campaigns. Analytical approach allows gathering numbers about ads that were shown to the potential buyers and point their places, number of conversions, clicks etc. 

Integrated systems offer to calculate the spent budget and sum-up campaign efficiency, based on the ongoing marketing actions. 

Audience reports, available on OnAudience DMP offer to stay always up-to-date with  your audience insights – know their interests, purchase intentions or demography. 

3. Desktop & Mobile Audience Data.

This is what marketers focus on during the planning of their online campaign and what is developed the most in the digital marketing market. You can gather data about users’ current preferences and buying intentions out of their online behavior. Based on the processed dataset, marketers can reach their target audience or enrich it by finding new clients. 

Check available audience segments by OnAudience.com

4. Purchase data.

With a transactional tracking tool, you have insights into the customer journey on your web store. Moreover, you can see the number of users who had made a conversion and successfully ordered your product or failed to pay and why. You can find and segment audiences that made a purchase by using such technologies as a DMP or CDP.

5. Social Data. 

social-method-of-data-collection

Collecting data out of your accounts on social media, you can observe the tendencies of your followers’ behavior. You can register the most viewable time of the day and the actual day of the week when users react to your posts, the most readable length. 

Having this information, you can raise your brand awareness by creating informative content for your posts and publishing them with respective frequency. 

6. IoT Data

One of the methods of data collection that is dynamically growing in the recent years is gathering data from connected devices. This data is gathered out of AI devices that are connected to the network.

For example, driving assistance systems that monitor driving, test combustion efficiency, etc. Given results help to perform diagnostics remotely and get the actual results that help you to be aware of your car condition. Those information can help you with selecting the most important features of app for your users.

7. Subscription data

This data is super useful for your future newsletters and mailings about your company news. You can apply here the same hint as in the example with pop-window earlier. Ask visitors to subscribe and guarantee in return a discount for their first purchase, for example. 

Using collected data in digital marketing

Discovering methods of data collection, you can use for your business needs the most suitable one, or even more than one. Choose the DMP provider that offers high-quality services with all privacy regulations kept. OnAudienece.com DMP stays compliant with privacy regulations so all your data is secure and automatically anonymized. 

Let’s see how you can use collected data:

  • Target audiences accurately with high-quality data

Thanks to precise data collection and segmentation, you can create a personalized marketing message for your target groups. 

  • Create audience segments for targeted ad campaigns 

Stored data lets you set your own segmentation rules that represent characteristics of your target audience and then use custom segments in campaign. 

  • Increase the ROI of your digital campaigns 

Thanks to collected audience data you can reach a relevant group of users with high-quality content, at the right time which help you increase ROI. 

  • Discover unique insights about your audience behavior

You can analyze stored data to learn what stands out your customers of the selected Internet users group by generating audience reports with precise analysis of your visitors. 

  • Find new ad audiences that match your current customer profile

First, collect your data and second – find the digital twins of your best converting users by looking for similar characteristics among all the users. In result, you can expand your customer network with new clients.

  • Eliminate ad fraud and non-human traffic 

DMP algorithms identify bots on your webpage by analyzing your visitors’ browser history or time spent on website. Discovered bots are eliminated automatically so you don’t waste your campaign budget on bot traffic.  

Not sure how to start collecting data?
Find out how the DMP will help you.

See how a DMP works

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