Data is king or so the saying goes. We are all at the mercy of it, as businesses we need data to operate and above all manage and promote prospects and customers. Many organisations have begun the process of evolving business data to the highest levels for production, logistics and finance. Yet when it comes to the management of sales and marketing data, it isn’t possible to offer such praise. Quite the opposite state of affairs exists with poor data quality, little or no management and refresh, island or pockets of data spread all over the business or indeed in sales own ‘black books’.

As a function, data management can only improve in the sales and marketing function. With more and more data being used to drive campaigns there is little wonder why such campaigns fail when duplication, incorrect contact details, poor update from sales force automation tools and little segmentation exist.

Most business try to fix this in isolation of business strategy, then fail because without a Data Lifecycle strategy the need for data change remains reactionary and never ending. Managing the process of data and its quality now has to be the bedrock of any business success plan.