Advanced Marketing Analytics: A Burberry Case Study

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Advanced Marketing Analytics

TABLE OF CONTENTS
Introduction......................................................................................................................................1
Company profile..............................................................................................................................2
Devising Big Data Strategies...........................................................................................................2
Identification of supporting big data requirements..........................................................................8
Data analysis..................................................................................................................................10
Conclusion.....................................................................................................................................12
References......................................................................................................................................13

LIST OF FIGURES
Figure 1: Sources of Big Data.........................................................................................................6
Figure 2: BI with Big Data Architecture.........................................................................................8

LIST OF TABLES
Table 1: Revenue generation by Burberry in past few years.........................................................10

Introduction
Big Data can be defined as larger sets of data that are required to be analyzed computationally so
that current trends and patterns can be revealed related to human behaviour and associated
interactions. Therefore the current report will consider the example of Burberry and will help to
understand various elements that are essential for devising big data strategies. In addition to this,
it will also identify supporting Big Data Requirements such as business intelligence or analytics.
On the basis of data analysis, appropriate recommendations will be made associated with
marketing decisions.

Company profile
Burberry Group Plc operates as a luxury fashion house in Britain and is headquartered in
London, England. The organization has higher focus over distribution of trench coats, ready to
wear outfits, fragrances, cosmetics, sunglasses, and accessories. Burberry was organized in 1856
that initially focused on creating outdoor attire. The organization is listed on London Stock
Exchange and is part of FTSE 100 Index. It has owned 73rd position as per Interbrand's Best
Global Brands report in the year 2015 while competing with brands such as Prada and Louis
Vuitton. Burberry currently owns number of stores in 51 countries.
It has been identified that organization has experienced an increase of £26.9m revenue as
compared to 2017 financial year (Burberry, 2019). Its revenue in 2018 is estimated as £2,732.8
million and overall operating income of £410.3 million. In addition to this, its net operating
income in the financial year 2018 is £293.6 million. Burberry is constantly making use of Big
Data for boosting its overall sales while nurturing its connections with customers in the market.
Devising Big Data Strategies
Big Data is defined capability that supports the business organizations to extract valuable data
from larger volume or bulk data. Several organizations collect data with the help of their daily
transactions and preserve the same in databases for future use. With the changing trend, business
organizations like Burberry now rely on collecting click stream data that relates to customer
interaction with the organizational website (Gandomi and Haider, 2015). In addition to this,
marketers also pay attention on collecting information about perception of people related to the
brand. Such type of sources supports business to collect insights about existing customer base as
well as current position of their products and services in the market. The process however
requires new technology, processes, as well as governance mechanisms which are combined
together and is termed as Big Data. Development of big data strategies is linked with inclusion of
number of elements which are as follows:

Business or Marketing strategies
Big data plays an important role in leveraging the consumer information related to their behavior
and interaction. Organizations now days have higher focus over collecting the information with
the help of digital media. In this context, organizations like Burberry make use of advanced
marketing analytics that revolves around using big data so that business can appropriately collect
critical insights so that business can gain competitive position in the market by providing its
fashion product in an intelligent and effective manner. For an example, Burberry use tablets for
collecting feedback of customers at their outlets. In context to Burberry, big data support shaping
marketing strategies in following manner:
Targeted advertising: Analysis of big data supports Burberry to have better understanding of the
target audience (Archana Dhankar, 2019). Marketers within the organization must focus on
average ages, income brackets, geographical locations as well as ethnicities that will certainly
impact the organization sales by catering more effectively to specific markets. In addition to this,
advertising campaigns must be based in all such elements. For an example the use of social
media for collecting the insights will enhance the business marketing.
Better understanding decision making of consumers: It has been identified that consumer now
days access digital media to collect varied information for making decisions. Therefore it is
essential for Burberry to understand the decision journey of customer in terms of prices, types of
clothes, etc that further supports increasing customer engagement, loyalty and business revenue.
Big data support all such activities by optimizing marketing investment across various platforms.
Content and improving sales: Marketing strategies must aim to produce results by creating
appropriate content that resonates with the customers for enhancing the overall sales of the
organization. With the help of big data can support Burberry to analyze consumers with the help
of social media (Hashem et.al.2015).
Therefore it is essential to collect data of higher quality for developing data driven and effective
marketing strategies.

Business Initiatives
Identification of needs of business is one of the foremost requirements for devising Big Data
strategies. It is essential for Burberry to identify the needs that are to be accomplished, or what
are the desired business outcomes. For devising the appropriate big data strategies, Burberry
must focus on identifying supporting decisions, data and analytics, along with technology
requirements and big data architecture. In this context transformation of organizational
capabilities plays an important role. Therefore Burberry can make initiatives of transforming the
existing organizational culture, emerging tactics and capabilities so that analytics can be
exploited successfully (Zaharia et.al.2016). Burberry is fashion provider and therefore for
devising big data strategies there is greater need of taking initiatives in terms of organizational
change.
It has been identified that big data and analytics mostly fail as it does not align with daily
processes as well as decision making of the organization. For an example, it is essential to have
understanding about the type of business decision making so that managers can effectively align
their actions relevant to organizational goals. Burberry aims to provide fashionable clothing
product with higher quality so that customer satisfaction can be attained and therefore it is
essential for managers to make decisions related to use of analytical tools that further
complement decision making process.
Further it is crucial to develop capabilities for exploiting big data. Managers of the Burberry
must focus on enhancing their analytical skills so as to resolve business related issues and
determining opportunities. Adjustment of culture as well as mindset requires multifaceted
approach that involves training, incentives, etc for reinforcing the behavior of individuals.
Experts within the organization must pay attention of targeted efforts for sourcing the data and
transforming the organizational culture (Lv et.al.2015). In addition to this, big data can be
accessed to identify current trends and patterns that support decision making of customers while
selection the clothing products from Burberry. The data insights further support business to bring
creativity in its existing products and other accessories.
Outcomes and Critical Success Factors

Business organization now days facing number of issues related to the identifying customer
behavior and in such situation big data plays an important role in determining the success of the
business in terms of sales, profitability and revenue generation. In addition to this, Big Data also
supports business to develop stronger customer base so that business can gain competitive
position in the market. For fulfilling the critical success factors, there are certain capabilities that
are to met in an effective manner (Erevelles et.al.2016). One of the major challenges that is faced
by the business organizations while using Big Data is related lack of human resource skills. Lack
of skills and knowledge is essential for dealing with data analysis. In this context Burberry has
undertaken several methods to address the issue such as internal training, formal education, etc.
In addition to this, big data strategy essentially needs to be linked with organizational strategies.
There is also the greater need of taking decisions on how resources can be utilized. Therefore in
context to Burberry it can be said that factors related to strategy, leadership and processes are
crucial for appropriate business outcome. Top management involvement also plays an important
role while gaining approval and support from executives while endorsing the big data.
Big data is responsible for raising unsettling issues related to ethics in terms of what data is to be
utilized in the analysis. The data used might put negative impact on users perception and
therefore it is essential for Burberry to make debate on which data is to be utilized in Big Data
Strategies. It is important to follow ethics related to the use of data, its collection, storage and
control and accessibility (Assunção et.al.2015). Technology is another important critical success
factor and therefore it is important for business organization to be aware of recent developments
related to big data analysis. Adoption of new technology will result into faster performance and
appropriate delivering of outcomes.
Tasks
This focuses on conducting activities such as marketing analytics, allocation of resources as well
as measuring the performance of ROI so as to have better understanding of the customer value
and market segmentation. Burberry deals within the fashion industry for fulfilling the needs of
customers, Big data is required for undertaking operations of various functional units. In addition
to this, resource allocation framework can also be altered using application of big data.

Burberry must pay attention on to reach over a common understanding on how big data is to be
used. Using of big data depends upon the approach that relies on structured and unstructured data
and in current scenarios, business data strategies largely relies upon unstructured data that
supports resolving the problems in a business to greater extend. Further development of big data
value proposition is another important task while devising the big data strategies (Bello-Orgaz
et.al.2016). It has been discussed above that big data largely depends upon unstructured data and
therefore the main question arises on how massive data collected from social media is to be
converted that it effectively contribute towards increasing revenue. Another essential task is
related to organizational readiness for changing the business process that is driven by Big Data.
After establishment of link between big data and business processes, Burberry need to assess the
detailed information about the business process that is essential for leveraging the big data.
Data Sources
Big data is used by the business for the analytics purpose. For extracting valuable information
and insights from Big Data, it is essential to have knowledge about appropriate data sources.
Burberry must focus on extracting the data from the data sources based on relevance and
usability.
Figure 1: Sources of Big Data
(Source: Naveen Joshi, 2017)
Media is one of the most commonly used data source that supports providing valuable insights
related to consumer preferences as well as changing trends. The source is highly valuable for

Burberry as fashion industry largely depends upon changing market trends (Naveen Joshi, 2017).
This further support business to get in depth overview of existing patterns, target audience, and
therefore it supports the process of decision making. Media makes use of interactive and social
media platforms such as Instagram, Facebook, etc. Organizations now days are also making use
of cloud for storage of data. Cloud supports accommodation of structured as well as unstructured
data that is used by the business for collecting real time information and insights. One of the
main important characteristic of cloud computing is scalability and flexibility.
In addition to this, machine generated content from Internet of Things (IOT) is considered as
valuable source of big data. The data using this source is generated from sensors connected to
various electronic devices. Another important source is databases that can be used as a big data
source that requires comparatively low investment as well as infrastructural costs (Hartmann
et.al.2016). Well known databases that can be used by Burberry include Amazon Simple, SQL,
MS Access, Oracle and others.
It has been identified that the process of extracting data is very complex and time consuming at
the same time. Such complexities can be resolved if business encompasses necessary
considerations related to Big Data while considering appropriate data sources.

Identification of supporting big data requirements
Big Data and Business Intelligence are popular and important technologies that support driving
the business success. It has been identified that Big Data accumulates massive amount of data
and therefore it is essential for business organizations to analyze properly so valuable insights
can be collected. Handling such an enormous data is critical to handle and therefore in such
situations Business intelligence is used for accomplishing the task of acquiring insights.
Figure 2: BI with Big Data Architecture
(Source: clearpeaks.com, 2019)
With the changing situations such as market trend, technology, etc larger amount of data is found
to streamline online and integrates into Business Intelligence (BI), ERP and other business
systems. These support business organizations to enhance the attention of customers. Big Data
support BI to become more useful and valuable tool for business like Burberry. It has been
identified that Business intelligence supports the business to look over the past data but with the
integration of big data, business can also undertake deeper analysis about the performance of the
business.
Integration of Big Data with Business Intelligence will also support business to identify whether
results at the initial stage are proved to be effective in future or not. For an instance, Customers