Frequently Asked Questions
What does AMI Group do?
We specialize in providing companies with marketing information and business intelligence based upon existing customer and prospect data in order to better target their sales and marketing efforts. Our goal is to help our clients maximize the potential of their existing customers, more effectively prospect for additional customers, control the cost-effectiveness of their marketing efforts and clearly understand who their customers and prospects are.
How do you do this?
Our work is entirely data-centric. We don’t do anecdotal, survey or focus group studies. Rather, we employ sophisticated, proven pattern recognition methodologies to discover the complex behaviors and characteristics associated with your customers and prospects.
Is it also called ‘data mining’?
Yes and no. Originally, the term ‘data mining’, and later KDD was coined to describe algorithm-based pattern detection in data. However, in recent years the term has been increasingly used to describe virtually any kind of ‘drill-down’ data analysis.
What value does this have for my business?
The only way you can effectively communicate with and service your customers is to understand who they are. The only way to get more ‘good’ customers is to understand what distinguishes your good customers from your less profitable ones and from the population-at-large. It would be great if customers fell into only one or two ‘types’ but that is simply not the case. In reality, there are dozens of customer segments each with its own distinct behavior, characteristics, profitability and loyalty. By identifying these segments it becomes possible to get on the right side of the '80/20 Rule'.
My company already has an IT group. Can’t they do this?
Doubtful. First, most companies’ IT groups have their hands full supporting the information infrastructure and operations of the business — and it is configured and staffed to most effectively support those operations. Also, this is a specialized field requiring very unique expertise, equipment and applications rarely found in IT groups.
What kinds of marketing activities can these services support?
Our services are ideally suited to support almost any marketing program. Understanding and segmenting your customer and prospect base is fundamental to developing effective customer communications irrespective of channels. Most of our engagements utilize data collected over a variety of channels including broadcast, print, direct mail, email, online and telemarketing.
My company is a start-up and doesn’t have any data. What can you do for us?
Probably the most important strategic undertaking for any new business is to develop an accurate customer profile. Absent any legacy data from which to draw intelligence, it is critical to develop a communications strategy that provides for testing of your customer targeting hypotheses. Furthermore, a start-up has the advantage of designing its operations to accommodate the collection of appropriate data that will serve as the foundation of its marketing intelligence activities later on. Collecting the wrong data (or collecting the correct data in the wrong way) is far worse than having no data at all.
Is this the same as CRM?
What we do is at the core of CRM. Dedicated CRM systems (which are significantly more expensive than our services) are based upon 'rules' that segment customers according to behavioral patterns. We provide the same intelligence (although most often using far more sophisticated methods). Unlike CRM systems, however, we have the flexibility of meeting specific needs and conforming to ever-changing tactical demands without the enormous infrastructure expense and ramp-up time.
How much data do you need in order to provide your services?
It ranges from none to lots. If we had our druthers we’d opt for the latter. All things being equal, more detailed data will enable us to provide a deeper level of intelligence. But as mentioned previously, even if your data resources are rather thin, we can ensure that you collect the most valuable data in the most appropriate manner.
What kinds of data can you work with?
We have expertise working with a wide array of data types and sources. There is hardly any data type with which we cannot work. Typically, clients provide data from a variety of systems including order-entry, customer support, telemarketing systems, data warehouses, fulfillment systems, web logs, stand-alone databases and such. Data can originate in-house, from numerous locations, from vendors or sales partners.
My IT department is swamped. There’s no way they’ll be able to get your group the data you need.
Minimizing the impact on your IT group is one of our most important considerations. Our goal is to be as transparent as possible. Rather than ask for specific data ‘pulls’ we will instead identify ‘up-stream’ data points where raw detailed data is already available and simply have your IT group provide a copy. For a number of reasons we would rather do the necessary data aggregation ourselves than saddle your IT staff with it.
How long does it take and how much will it cost?
Understandably there’s no easy answer to this question. Our engagements are specific to the client and each has unique requirements, data resources, objectives and scope. We plan each engagement to validate the feasibility of the project’s objectives and identify any potential obstacles to its successful execution as early in the process as possible. Our assessment process is in place specifically for this purpose. Getting actionable intelligence in the shortest amount of time — even if it isn’t the ultimate goal of the project — is key.
What does a client get at the end of a project? Do you just provide reports and graphs?
Although a full-on analytics project can provide some pretty interesting reading, we strongly believe in undertaking projects where the results can be directly implemented, tested, optimized and measured. Naturally, we provide reporting, recommendations and appropriate supporting information. But in the end it’s all about getting results. In our eyes, coming up with a powerful data discovery that can’t be implemented — no matter how interesting — amounts to no more than an expensive term paper.
Do you do business-to-business as well as consumer projects? Is there a difference?
We have significant experience on both sides. The approach is pretty much the same. The major difference is in the breadth of data available. Consumer data tends to be far richer in that regard.
How would we initiate an engagement with you?
Let’s talk. We’d like to understand your business, your business model, your marketing history and current programs, your operation, your current challenges and business pain and your objectives. This will help us determine the suitability of our services to your situation and help us to develop an assessment plan for the project. At the completion of the assessment we will present a recommended course of action and proposal.
Can we be assured of success?
I guess that depends on your definition of success. One of the reasons we perform the assessment process is to determine the feasibility of your project. If we feel its outcome is dubious we will recommend against proceeding and offer an alternative direction we feel is of value and/or make operational recommendations (perhaps some change in data collection) that can facilitate the project. Our business only benefits if your project goes to completion and is implemented.
Who owns the data and what becomes of it if we eventually part company?
The data belongs to you. If your program comes to completion or in the unlikely event that we should part ways we will return to you (or destroy at your option) all original data sets as well as all meta (aggregate) data sets and (if applicable) categorization/scoring logic. The data will be provided in an ‘importable’ format consistent with your systems or requirements.
Where will the data reside and how do we know it’s secure?
We house the data on our secure servers. The system is physically secured and all individual drive arrays are also under lock-and-key. The system 'mirrors' the data for redundancy and encrypted rotational back-ups are performed on our robotic data library. These backups are securely stored off-site. In addition, access to the data is restricted to the LAN.
Can we remotely access the data?
Although technically possible to implement we strongly recommend against it. We've yet to enter an engagement where putting their data on the web was actually necessary. There's almost always a better alternative. Several of the country's most respected and well-heeled companies have suffered serious data breaches of late. Data security is a serious issue.
