Customer intelligence (CI) is the process of collecting and analyzing detailed customer data from internal and external sources to gain insights about customer needs, motivations and behaviors.

CI helps organizations understand customers better so they can improve interactions and deliver more personalized customer experiences. It also provides the crucial information organizations need to improve customer communications with segmentation strategies and optimal campaign planning. All of this then helps improve customer journeys and drives the organization's future growth

The need for customer intelligence

Improving the customer experience (CX) is becoming imperative for businesses to stay ahead of competitors. To deliver elevated CX, businesses need to gain critical insights into customer behaviors, including what they need and where they are in the buying journey. When available in real time, these insights provide a comprehensive view of customers that goes beyond their name, age, gender or other simple "signals" of purchasing intent or other targeted behavior. Here's where CI comes in.

CI helps create a powerful, comprehensive, sophisticated customer analytics ecosystem that enables businesses to create dynamic customer profiles and deliver superior CX to each customer. When these capabilities lead to actionable recommendations, businesses can understand customers better and design tailor-made cross-channel communications and marketing strategies at every stage of the customer journey. These strategies, when properly implemented, can increase conversion rates and customer retention.