We need clients, we need enquiries about new opportunities. We don’t need piles of pointless data, we don’t operate that way.
We regard data as a bit of a liability, in much the same way as one might view oil in in the ground. Data has no intrinsic value, only when you start you process it does it liberate value. The cost to process data is tiny in real terms but can cause damage (like fossil fuels) if the process goes wrong.
Data loss and misuse have seen some of the worlds largest data-hoarders facing billions in fines in 2019. It feels that everyone has been accused of leaking or storing data in a haphazard and potentially damaging manner.
When Wetherspoons decided to junk their customer database back in 2016 to avoid the impending nightmare that was GDPR, most folks thought they were nuts. But maybe not, they saw the data as a liability, or probably just not worth the risk/reward to mine effectively.
And that is what it comes down to. Do you see your client database as a thing to protect, love and nurture? Or do you see it as an asset to be mined, and to be plundered for wealth?
Quite clearly one cannot operate without any data, but we regularly and thoroughly clean house – removing obsolete data objects as they fall out of current use. It’s called data minimisation and it’s one of the underlying principles in how we run our business.
