Report: 70% revenue increase for orgs that invest in customer engagement

Digital-first experiences and customer engagement have exploded over the past two years, creating massive, overnight shifts in how the world works and does business. A new report by Twilio analyzes how both consumers and businesses have embraced digital engagement and where the biggest gaps exist between what brands think they are offering and how customers are experiencing.

The report reveals the major trends shaping customer engagement today and finds digital customer engagement is a revenue accelerator. On average, companies that invested in digital customer engagement reported a 70% increase in revenue and expect their investment to double by 2025. 

Data is the currency of an accelerated digital age, and the battle over the data is reshaping the internet right now. Business leaders recognize this – 95% say fully owning and utilizing customer data will be their biggest growth lever over the next three years.  B2C companies across the globe say that the pandemic sped up digital transformation by 6.5 years, and 17% of companies say that they’ve leaped 10 to 14 years into the future. 

As businesses focus on how to use data to understand their customers, they’re facing another challenge: the cookie clock. With Google joining Firefox and Safari to officially ban third-party cookies in 2023, companies need to break their addiction to third-party data. The report finds that 55% of companies are not fully prepared for the impending cookieless world, with 81% of companies reliant on third-party cookies, while 85% of consumers want brands to use only first-party data. With third-party cookies serving as a traditionally key pillar of advertising and social media, companies need to shift their approach to first-party data. This means collecting and relying on first-party data won’t just be a competitive advantage anymore – it will be table stakes for survival. 

For its report, Twilio engaged Lawless Research to conduct blind surveys of 3,450 business leaders and 4,500 consumers across 12 countries between December 2021 and January 2022. Additionally, the report reflects aggregated, anonymized data from the trillions of interactions on Twilio’s platform, revealing the patterns in how over 250,000 organizations around the world are engaging with their customers across digital channels.

(Source: VentureBeat Report: 70% revenue increase for orgs that invest in customer engagement | VentureBeat)