Challenges of Dirty Data

Author

mirketarrd

December 10, 2024

We are working in a data-driven world and are required to make data-driven decisions. Now-a- days managers are regularly bombarded with loads of data via dashboards and reports. As business tycoon, Mr. Mukesh Ambani says, ‘Data is the new oil’ and as with oil, data also must be transformed to be of real value to the organization and in larger terms to the society.

The role of data scientist is in hot demand and they are constantly trying to make sense of data by building data models that can provide crucial insights necessary for organizations to grow and generate more value. However, the data professionals face many challenges that prevent them from building powerful models. According to a study conducted by Kaggle titled the “State of Data Science and Machine Learning”. One of the questions asked in the survey was, “At work which barriers or challenges have you faced this past year?” Following are the top results:

Therefore, we can clearly inference that data cleanliness or data scrubbing is clearly a big issue and data scientists spend 80% of their time cleaning data. But first, let us understand what is dirty data.
According to TechTarget, a database that contains errors, whether via dirty data, dirty data sets, duplicate information, incomplete or outdated materials, or troublesome transferals from other systems are considered dirty. Dirty Data sets, Duplicate information or incomplete records fall under the umbrella of dirty data. Therefore, information that cannot be used can cause an issue for organizations.
Now let’s look at negative situations that businesses face when dealing with dirty data, dirty data problems, or dirty data sets.

1. Revenue Loss
Almost all organizations depend on their consumer base to purchase their goods and services to keep their revenue moving. And when the data the organizations use to get in touch with their prospective customer base is dirty, the bottom line can take a serious hit. So, failing to get in touch with the right customer at the right time results in revenue loss. And this loss mounts up depending upon how long it takes organizations to clean up and manage their database. According to Experian Quality Data, the average company wastes 12% of their revenue due to inaccurate information in their records and despite increased knowledge about this problem, the figure has not changed since a long time.

2. Bad Customer Experience
When customers are interested in purchasing a product or a service from an organization, they want their experience to hassle-free. You expect organizations to handle critical client account information diligently. Customers tend to lose patience very quickly when the organization is not able to pull up the correct and latest information history of the respective customer. A diminished client experience can be very detrimental to organizations, affecting relationships negatively over time, according to IT Business Edge.

3) Under-Informed Business Decisions
As dirty data is readily available these days, company management has heavily relied upon a lot of data points to make crucial business decisions rather than totally depending upon their intuition. This has in a way lead to a lot of dependency on data, but it’s impossible to conclude on an informed decision if the data is all over the place. Smart and data-driven decisions are impossible when company records or data are incorrect or out of date. As per business 2 Community misinformed or under-informed decisions can be dangerous and leave businesses scrambling to compete within their industry.

4) Wasted Marketing Efforts
Marketers rely a lot on data without duplication to constantly think about new ways of engaging with their audiences. They use various forms of outreach like Targeted Promotions, email campaigns, Social media campaigning. When vital customer information is wrong, the time, money, and dedication that is put to strategize campaigns and attract customers is wasted. All parties are negatively affected if the organizations continue to their hard-earned resources using inaccurate information.

Dirty data or Dirty Data sets is problematic for companies of all sizes and industries. Therefore, it is imperative for businesses to be cognizant of the steps they have in place to maintain organizational and customer data. As the data volume is growing rapidly through data collection at various points, the quality is somewhat compromised, posing serious questions on the sanctity of databases. Though, it may seem a trivial issue, it has a huge and lasting impact on the businesses.

Quality data or Data cleansing (data cleansing is the same process as data scrubbing) acts as a driver of high productivity and good decision making, therefore Mirketa offers DSM a leading product on Salesforce to get rid of duplicate data, dirty data, and incomplete records. It makes managing duplicate data easy in Salesforce. It is a deduplication application that cleanses the duplicate records in a simple yet powerful 5 steps wizard-based approach.

DSM runs natively on Salesforce, so data does not leave Salesforce org. As there is no data transfer at any point, data remains safe and intact. You can create custom queries to search for duplicate data in your org, select a master record, and merge duplicates.

Check out ‘Duplicate Search and Merge – Your Personal Data Doctor’ and clean your database in an easy step by step manner.

Implementing CPQ Solutions for Subscription-Based Businesses

Imagine your business has a groundbreaking product ready to transform the market through subscription sales. Harnessing the power of Salesforce CPQ can catapult your sales efficiency to new heights. This guide walks you through the essential steps to turn your product into a subscription powerhouse, seamlessly integrating with CPQ to enhance customer experience and drive growth.

1. Setting the Foundation: Installing Salesforce CPQ
  - Installation Overview: Salesforce Install Salesforce CPQ from the AppExchange, choosing between a sandbox for safe testing or your production environment for immediate use. A sandbox is ideal for exploring CPQ features risk-free.
  - Configuration Essentials: After installation, Salesforce CPQ requires initial setup to tailor the solution to your business’s unique needs. This includes defining product rules, pricing strategies, and quote templates that align with your subscription model.
  During configuration, it is essential to define your organization’s Subscription Term Unit within Salesforce CPQ. This setting is pivotal as it establishes the default duration for your subscriptions, such as monthly or daily. By setting your package’s subscription term to a specific unit, like monthly, you create a foundational measurement for all subscription durations.
Tailoring CPQ for Your Subscription Product and pricing
Tailoring Salesforce CPQ to accommodate your subscription product is pivotal in harnessing the full potential of the platform. Here is how to customize CPQ for your subscription offerings:
- Creating a Product Record: Start by establishing a product record within Salesforce CPQ. Ensure all relevant information that defines your product is accurately captured, setting the stage for a seamless subscription setup.
- Configuring Product for Subscription: With your product record in place, the next step involves tailoring the product to fit your subscription model. This includes configuring attributes like subscription terms, subscription pricing.
  - Subscription Term: Defines the standard duration for a product’s subscription which can be overridden. For a quarterly subscription, enter “3”; for an annual subscription, input “12”. These numbers correspond to the subscription term unit option selected in the package. If you have chosen days as the unit, then for quarterly subscription, enter “90”; for an annual subscription, input “365”.
  - Subscription Pricing: This is the pricing strategy applied to your subscription. Pricing can vary, some subscriptions may have a fixed price, while others might use dynamic pricing models. For instance, you might charge different rates for products bundled with a warranty, applying higher prices to more expensive products and lower prices to less expensive ones to reflect the value and cost of the warranty coverage appropriately.
  - Setting the Pricing: Finally, determine and set your product’s pricing strategy within CPQ. Subscription pricing can be intricate, involving various models such as flat-rate, tiered, usage-based, or a combination thereof. Salesforce CPQ allows for the configuration of these pricing models directly within the product record.
  To initiate, establish a standard price book record to capture your product’s list price. This is achieved by navigating to the product’s related tab and selecting the “Add Standard Price” option within the price books related section.
  Additionally, for enhanced pricing flexibility, consider implementing price dimensions. This powerful feature enables price customization over time, accommodating adjustments like discounts or price increases across different periods of a subscription. For instance, if a subscription spans four years, price dimensions allow you to modify the price for each year according to strategic pricing plans or promotional offers. This level of customization ensures pricing strategies can be dynamically adapted to suit business objectives, customer engagement tactics and make you sales effective.
  This is achieved by navigating to the product’s related tab and selecting the “New” option within the price Dimension related section. And then Choose type as year or according to your specific subscription term.
  Additionally, you can establish rules for discounts, promotional offers, and other pricing adjustments that might apply throughout the customer lifecycle. This flexibility ensures that your pricing strategy not only supports your business goals but also adapts to market demands and customer expectations.
Creating Quote and add Subscription ProductsTo begin, create a quote on the customer account record. Fill in all the necessary details and then click on the ‘Edit Line’ button to add products to the quote.Next, locate the ‘Add Products’ button and select your subscription product from the available options. The CPQ application will automatically calculate the price based on your standard pricing.
If you have created price dimensions, you can also edit each term accordingly. And you can simply switch between the terms using the ‘Desegment’ and ‘Resegment’ buttons (marked with red circle) located at the end of the item line.Make any necessary adjustments to the subscription terms based on the customer’s commitment level. Once everything looks good, click ‘Save’ to finalize the quote with the added subscription products.
create order and Contracts
Once you have saved the quote and ensured that all your products are ready in the line item, you can click ‘Edit’ on the quote object and check the ‘Ordered’ field. CPQ will automatically create an order for that quote.Navigate to the order record from the related tab on the quote.Activate the order and then proceed to edit the order record, checking the ‘Contracted’ field on the order object.CPQ will automatically generate a contract record and link it to the account.
Renewing opportunity and Modifying contracts
- Renewing Opportunities
  After creating the contract, you can edit it and check the ‘Renewal Forecast’ field. This field will automatically create an opportunity, helping your sales team make faster sales and predict upcoming revenues.
- Replacing Products with Another
  If you need to make changes to your contract after a certain duration from its creation, CPQ can assist you. Whether it is modifying quantity, price, offering discounts, or replacing a product with another, CPQ has you covered.
  - Enter the date of change in the ‘Amendment Start Date’ field, indicating when you want the changes to take effect. Then, click on the ‘Amend’ button.
  - This action will generate a new quote record where you can make the necessary changes. The modifications will only apply from the Amendment Start Date to the contract end date. CPQ will automatically calculate all changes for the net price, streamlining your sales process.
  - Once you have saved the quote and created an order by updating the ‘Ordered’ field on the quote and after activating the order, check the ‘Contracted’ field on order. You will find that the changes are reflected in the original contract. CPQ does not create two contracts.
Billing against your contract and orders.While Salesforce CPQ optimizes the order and quote creation, use Salesforce Billing to manage financial aspects, streamlining your sales cycle and enhancing revenue tracking.This guide aims to simplify Salesforce CPQ’s subscription management, from setup to billing, ensuring your sales processes are as efficient and effective as possible.

Limitations of using Salesforce CPQ

Certainly! While Salesforce CPQ offers numerous benefits for subscription-based businesses, like any platform, it also comes with certain limitations. Here are some notable limitations of Salesforce CPQ:

Learning Curve: Salesforce CPQ can be complex and may require considerable time and resources for teams to become proficient, potentially delaying initial implementation benefits.

Customization Complexity: Advanced customization within Salesforce CPQ may require deep technical knowledge or assistance from Salesforce experts, which can add to the cost and time of deployment.• Cost: For small businesses or startups, the cost of Salesforce CPQ, especially when adding advanced features or requiring extensive customization, may be a significant consideration.

Integration Challenges: While Salesforce CPQ integrates well within the Salesforce ecosystem, integrating with external systems or legacy software can sometimes be challenging and may require additional tools or custom development.

Limited Support for Extremely Unique Business Models: While highly customizable, there may be extremely niche or unique business models that Salesforce CPQ cannot accommodate without significant custom development.

Pranshu Goyal, Director of Products at Mirekta, states: “We envision DSM to be used by every small to a medium-sized organization dealing with bad data and want to get rid of duplicates easily with no cost. We have faced issues dealing with duplicates in our organization. That inspired us to make a solution that is not only simple to use but can be used widely to make the organization’s data clean to make them more efficient and productive. We want DSM to be a solution for every organization looking for duplicate management capability better than the Salesforce out-of-the-box solution with no additional cost.”