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CO N TEN T O FFER IN G S

KU D O S

C U S TO M ER -R ELA TED D A TA Q U A LITY

IS SU ES C A U S E P A IN

ABO U T

C O N TA C T

D EA LS !

B LO G

G O O G LE PLU S

Poste d by: St uar t Se lip | o n Au gu st 24, 2013

C ustom er-R elated D ata

Q uality P ain in Early
Survey R esults

PR IO R PO S TS
Select Month

C ATEG O R IES
We have an early yet strong indication of
customer-related data quality issues across
the full size range of organizations responding
to our Poor Data Quality Survey. While there are
many other areas of inquiry within our survey,
Ive selected customer data quality for this
review because of its universality. Every business needs, and hopefully values their
custome rs. However, despite all the talk about knowing your customer and the ascendancy and
near-universality of customer relationship management (CRM), our respondents say that their
custome r-related data quality is sub-par and that has real dollar costs.

S trong and R apid R esponse S uggests w e S truck a N erve

At the time of this writing, the survey, developed by the consortium of Principal Consulting, Robert
Frances Group, Chaordix, and the IBM InfoGov Community has been in flight for two weeks, and has 88
completed responses with another 40 in the pipeline. Given the early August launch, with summer and
vacation on peoples minds, the extent of this survey response suggests that Poor Data Quality
leading to Negative Business Outcomes has struck a raw nerve.

You can read about the

survey launch, and many prior posts on the survey, starting here.

C ustom er-R elated D ata Q uality Issues C aused LostB usiness

Our survey respondents were unanimous about the existence of poor customer-related data quality
and told us about the problems they experiences, the likely causes, and the monetized cost of those
problems. Ive prepared several graphs that Ill present following, with minimal commentary. The results
largely speak for themselves. Click on the graphs to see a full size version.
As shown in the analysis of survey question 9, more than 70% of
the respondents either
customer-related

data

problems or knew of
such problems in their
organization.
10
more

Question

responses
than

show

68%

of

respondents believed their organization lost client business

because of poor customer-related data quality.
Lets look at question 10 responses broken down by
business

size.

Bad

news

nearly

89%

of

respondents working for businesses in the 5,000

-10,000 employee size are reporting losses due
poor customer-related data quality. Only for the
smallest business in the survey did fewer than 50%
of respondents report customer data-related losses.

P oor C ustom er-R elated

D ata

Q uality

M ade

C ustom er

Select Category

A cquisition & R etention M ore C ostly

As shown in the Question 13 graph, the 5,000 10,000 employee-sized businesses lead the way
again, with 100% of respondents indicating that poor
customer-related data added to the cost of acquiring
and/or retaining their customers. In no business size
category did less than 50% of respondents affirm
additional customer acquisition and retention costs.

S im ilar C auses C ited for P oor

C ustom er-R elated D ata Q uality and P oorD ata Q uality O verall

Inaccurate, unreliable, ambiguously defined, and missing

data lead the causes
cited

by

respondents

when asked about poor

customer-related
quality

(left

data

graphic),

and when asked about

the top three causes of
poor data quality across
all

survey

problem

reporting areas.

These are fumbles in basic data quality blocking and tackling.

R espondents Estim ated the C ost of P oor C ustom er-R elated

D ata Q uality
A key driver of our survey effort is putting a
monetized value on the cost of poor data quality.
Therefore, we asked our respondents to estimate
the cost, loss in value, or similar concept that
resulted from poor data quality, or the increase in
profit or value that would result if poor data quality
were avoided.
More than half our respondents offered a
mone tized

estimate

to

our

question

about

additional revenue that might have been realized if

poor

customer-related

data quality had

been

eliminated. Over 15% of respondents believed

that up to 5% more revenue might have been
attained if poor customer data quality issues
were eliminate d. An additional 20% believed that between 6% and 10% more revenue might
have been attained.

W hatcould 6 % m ore revenue m ean in realdollars?

So, lets say a 1 billion dollar company fixed its customer-related data quality issues and attained a 6%
revenue increase. That would mean $60,000,000 in additional revenue. It might cost that company
about $3,000,000 to obtain and implement data quality tooling and services to make that fix.
Thats a 1900% Return on Investment.
Given numbers like these, is it really possible that IT organizations havent been able to sell
their business colleagues on data quality investments? That sounds improbable, yet it
appears to be true. Remember, this is just the customer-related data. The re are 12 other
functional business area on our survey, each with additional opportunities to increase
revenue and/or decrease cost.

The B ottom Line

We are at a very early point in the life of this poor data quality survey, which will run through the
end of this calendar year, and then repeat annually. The interim results Ive presented here are
not surprising, but they will prove disappointing to data quality professionals. I hope they
will motivate organizations to improve their data quality situation.
One takeaway at this stage is that InfoGov community professionals are eager to be heard about the
data quality problems they experience and their associated costs. They want the world to know that
data quality problems are still rife, and they are costing organizations and their stakeholders real
dollars.
I will report on survey progress, aggregated responses, and additional insights as we enter Fall, and
the relaxation of summer begins to fade.

S h a re th is:

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Posted in Assessing, custom IT research, data quality, Surveying | 3 Comments

Poor Data Quality Survey Now In Flight!

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Business and IT Perspectives

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3 C O M M EN TS TO C U S TO M ER -R ELA TED D A TA
Q U A LITY IS SU ES C A U SE P A IN
D a t a Q u a l i t y B a s e l i n e P r i n c i p a l C o n s u l t i n g L L C . says:
December 11, 2013 at 5:58 pm

[] Frances Group and I will be interviewing IBM Infogov Community members who participated in our
2013 Poor Data Quality Negative Business Outcomes online survey. In conjunction with our online
survey, we will find out about the challenges our survey []
Reply

R o b b e d o n t h e L a s t M i l e o f S a l e s P r i n c i p a l C o n s u l t i n g L L C . says:
February 4, 2014 at 1:37 pm

[] Tuesday morning, I looked at our Poor Data Quality Negative Business Outcomes survey results
and I noticed a surprising agreement among participants in one sales-related area. []
Reply

The

Dispr opor t ion

of

T h e or y t o Kn ow l e dge

Pr in ci pa l Con su l t in g

L L C . says:
March 24, 2014 at 3:47 pm

[] have written frequently about the miserable data quality situation revealed by our Poor Data Quality
Negative Business Outcomes survey. Respondents have told us that, in a big way, they lose money
and suffer business challenges []
Reply

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