Out of the countless number of leads B2B marketers generate every day, an average of 40% of those leads are invalid, incomplete or duplicates. In addition, even the accurate leads may not meet marketers’ criteria. This is one of the many findings in a recent report by Integrate, a cloud-based marketing software provider.
The Data Quality Index report examined the data quality of more than 775,000 leads generated for B2B marketers in the technology industry in 2014. The report aims to highlight the impact unclean databases have on B2B organizations, while also highlighting how B2B marketers can leverage marketing tools to overcome the challenge of collecting accurate, valuable data.
The study also shows that duplicate data (15%), invalid values/ranges (10%) and missing fields (8%) are the most common data quality issues.
“As marketing becomes increasingly data-driven, it’s time for marketers to make data quality a top priority,” said Scott Vaughan, CMO of Integrate. “Integrate’s analysis clearly shows that marketers are generating a large portion of poor quality leads, including those with improper formatting and even inaccuracies. Bad prospect information can have negative consequences, including wasted media investment, squandered resources and poor customer experience, which marketers simply can’t afford.”
Other key findings from the report include:
- Invalid formatting, failed email validation and failed address validation are less common errors, but are more difficult to remedy and significant when combined — affecting data accuracy from 5% in SMB, 10% in enterprise and 7% in media companies;
- Had the media companies analyzed not been using data governance software, they would have needed to manually catch and correct a combined 313,890 prospect data errors; and
- Failed email and address validation issues translate into more than $2.5 million in wasted media spend, with average B2B lead prices at over $50.
Click here for a full copy of the report.