State of B2B Marketing Data Deemed “Questionable”

March 26, 2015

This article is included in these additional categories:

Analytics, Automated & MarTech | B2B | Customer Relationship Management | Data-driven

NetProspex-State-of-B2B-Marketing-Data-in-2014-Mar2015Most B2B records are missing key data such as industry information (72% missing) and phone numbers (54% missing), according to an analysis of more than 223 million records by Dun & Bradstreet NetProspex. The study evaluated database health across 4 best practice areas – record duplication, record completeness, email deliverability, and phone connectability – determining that the overall “Health Scale Rating” of the records analyzed was “Questionable.”

The overall rating of 3.2 was based on a 5-point scale defined as follows:

  • 1 = Risky;
  • 2 = Unreliable;
  • 3 = Questionable;
  • 4 = Functional; and
  • 5 = Optimal.

A breakdown of the scores for the specific best practice areas is listed below.

  • The average score for record duplication was 4.3 on the 5-point scale, meaning that companies’ databases are “functional” in this area. A “functional” rating indicates that, on average, 0-10% of records were duplicates. In this case, the study finds that 90% of files had less than 10% duplicates.
  • The average score for email deliverability was 3.2, falling in the “questionable” bucket. That rating indicates that email deliverability ranged between 70-80% on average. Manufacturing companies tended to fare the worst in this category, as none registering an “optimal” health rating.
  • The average score for record completeness was just 2.9, putting this area in the “unreliable” category, where only 50-65% of records are complete. Indeed, 84% of files analyzed lacked revenue information, 82% were missing company size by employees, and 71% lacked industry information. Moreover, the analysis finds that the files were twice as likely to be deemed “risky” (0-50% of records are complete) as “optimal” (90-100% of records are complete). On a positive note, this year’s average health rating of 2.9 represents a step up from 2.7 last year and 2.5 the year before.
  • The phone connectability score was 2.7, the worst of the best practice areas analyzed, as 54% of the records analyzed did not include a phone number.

The results are in keeping with a recent study from Experian Data Quality, which found that the state of data quality around the world is worsening, with US companies believing that almost one-third of their data, on average, is inaccurate.

About the Data: The “NetProspex Data Health Scale” was determined by evaluating the results of assessments, known as the NetProspex Data HealthScan, completed in 2014 and then statistically determining ranges based on the data. The industries represented were: Business Services (39%); Software (20%); Retail (13%); Finance (11%); Manufacturing (8%); Media & Internet (4%); and Other (5%).

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