Interview with Heinz Lorenz, Head of Global Demand Management, NTT DATA Business Solutions AG
The volume of data available to Sales and Marketing teams is growing rapidly. Yet in many organizations, this data remains scattered across isolated silos, where it is only used for limited, standalone initiatives.
To unlock the full value of this extensive knowledge for demand generation, SAP consulting company NTT DATA Business Solutions has taken the use of data in Sales and Marketing to the next level by establishing a globally coordinated, data-driven demand management approach.
Why did NTT DATA Business Solutions AG introduce a cross-departmental and cross-country, data-driven demand management approach?
The overarching goal is to create the greatest possible customer value by delivering highly relevant, timely, and personalized content. This is not about generating as many leads as possible and processing them one by one.
NTT DATA Business Solutions operates through its own subsidiaries in 30 countries. A cross-country, data-driven demand management approach enables the company to identify and leverage global growth opportunities by answering key questions: Which markets are most attractive for us? Which products or services are the best fit for specific customer segments? Which target accounts offer the greatest revenue potential?
As a result, Sales and Marketing work in much closer alignment and with far greater precision. The focus is not only on acquiring new customers, but also on unlocking the potential within the existing customer base. By identifying new opportunities to help customers accelerate their digital transformation in a value-driven and sustainable way—and by enabling them to leverage the latest technologies—NTT DATA Business Solutions strengthens their long-term competitiveness.
What conditions do companies need to establish in order to implement up global demand management?
“Essentially, it’s about fostering a new mindset regarding the use of data in sales and marketing and establishing a shared foundation. This involves, for example, recognizing that global demand management relies heavily on the interaction and coordination of all teams involved. NTT DATA Business Solutions already employs over 12,000 professionals worldwide, each with deep expertise in their respective fields. However, a cross-departmental perspective is also crucial. When sales and marketing collaborate closely, sales success can be proactively planned. Demand management operates across departments, providing a reliable data foundation and regularly bringing all stakeholders together. The “plan-do-check-act” approach is an effective method for evaluating the execution of jointly planned campaigns and making swift adjustments when necessary.”
What challenges might arise from implementing this approach?
“A certain amount of persuasion may initially be necessary to show that there is significant untapped potential that has not yet been seen and addressed. It must also be made clear that a clean data structure and high data quality are the essential backbone of successful demand management. To achieve this, all departments and divisions involved must pull together to create a “resilient”, analyzable database that everyone can use.”
What key success factors determine whether global demand management can generate measurable benefits?
“It is essential to achieve a high level of acceptance among the departments and employees involved. This includes, for example, using concrete and practical analyses to show sales how existing market potential can be made visible with the help of a strong database and the right analysis tools. Building on this, a highly pre-qualified sales approach can be developed. The reproducibility of successes also plays an important role. By reusing proven success patterns, for instance across comparable sales regions, the efficiency of cross-country and cross-departmental demand management can be noticeably increased. NTT DATA Business Solutions AG’s revenue has grown continuously in recent years. In the 2020 financial year to around EUR 1.072 billion and for the 2021 financial year, which ends for us on March 31, 2022, we again expect a significant increase.”
What benefits could NTT DATA Business Solutions AG realize by establishing Data Driven Demand Management?
“Today, we are not only able to fill the sales pipeline with more leads, but also to accurately determine the potential of individual leads and prioritize our activities accordingly. This gives us greater predictability with regard to the sales pipeline. We now also have a much more concrete idea of which customers are ideal for our company and how we can acquire and develop them. We can see which gaps in our portfolio we can fill with existing customers. And we have increased our flexibility in the implementation of campaigns, meaning we can test the success of individual measures more quickly and optimize our activities accordingly.”
What features must a data analytics solution offer in order to provide the best possible support for global demand management?
“We use MODELYZR for our data analytics. The platform enables us to seamlessly combine internal and external data sources within a single environment. One of the key capabilities for us is its data mining functionality, which allows us to identify patterns across our data and translate those insights into concrete actions.
A simple example is Amazon’s recommendation engine: customers who bought this product also frequently bought another product. We believe that an effective analytics platform should also be intuitive to use. With MODELYZR, even users without a data science background can create highly meaningful analyses with ease.
In addition, bookmark functionality makes it simple to share analyses with sales colleagues in other regions, who can quickly apply the same analysis to their own data. Supported by efficient machine learning techniques, MODELYZR enables us to identify market opportunities quickly and precisely—both within our existing customer base and among prospective customers. This allows us to steer Sales and Marketing activities in a highly focused and data-driven way.”
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