Integrating Internet of Things (IoT) with Marketing Automation Platforms: Use Cases

It’s estimated that by 2020 nearly 75 billion devices worldwide will be connected through the Internet. They would range from consumer devices like home appliances and cars to industrial machines such as cargo containers and wind turbines. The volume of data generated and used by all of these devices will be astronomical but analyzing the right data quickly and efficiently to make smart decisions will be the main challenge.

Internet of Things, or IoT, is the key technology that makes the interoperability among these devices possible. Oracle already offers a robust IoT Cloud Platform that is used by hundreds of companies like Gemü worldwide. Although, currently the majority of IoT applications are for industries like transportation and manufacturing, great opportunities are fast emerging for integrating IoT with marketing automation platforms, like Oracle Marketing Cloud. This article briefly explores a number of use cases for integrating IoT with a marketing automation platform to create better user experiences.  You may also like to read a related article by Oracle’s Austin Miller titled How IoT Can Help Marketers Increase ROI. 

Behavioral data collection

Just like mobile devices that transmit data about user interactions with mobile apps, IoT-enabled consumer devices, e.g., home appliances and automobiles, can be used to collect behavioral data. Behavioral data collected from IoT-enabled devices can in turn be combined with other customer data in a marketing platform for segmentation, personalization and reporting. For example, information about how often a consumer uses a washing machine, how long and on what settings, could help an automated marketing system to send personalized coupons for specific types of detergents or scheduled maintenance service. Also, real-time events coming from IoT-enabled devices could control the flow of a consumer through a multi-stage orchestration program. For example, discovering when a consumer starts driving a new car could initiate a series of personalized messages based on the consumer’s profile and her driving patterns in subsequent weeks. Data privacy is certainly very important and consumers must explicitly allow collection and usage of their behavioral data. 

Alerts or promotions based on usage

Consumers or businesses may specifically request to receive alerts or promotional messages based on how their IoT-enabled device is performing or used. For example, a consumer may like to be notified if the air filter in their home furnace needs to be replaced or if her car is due for an oil change. Similarly, a large enterprise may need to keep track of their office printers worldwide for ink cartridge replacement. Interestingly, Johnnie Walker in 2015 developed a prototype for their Blue Label bottle to use extremely thin, electronic sensors that can tell if the bottle has been opened or not and where it is in the supply chain. These sensors can also be used to send promotional messages to consumers who scan the bottle with their smartphones. 

Messages pushed directly to IoT-enabled devices

An IoT-enabled device could potentially be another channel to which a marketing platform can send personalized messages. Smart TVs already are able to display personalized messages to consumers based on what shows they have been watching. So, it’s quite possible that appliances, automobiles, office equipment, or even “smart” active wear can receive relevant, personalized messages to create a greater customer experience. Such messages can be displayed either directly on the device (e.g., a printer) or sent to the consumer’s mobile phone tethered to the IoT device (e.g., “smart” shoes send messages to the runner’s iPhone).

An ecosystem of IoT applications

Oracle Marketing Cloud already has a compelling framework for enabling third-party applications to be integrated within its platforms, like Responsys and Eloqua. The same framework can be extended to include applications integrated with IoT-enabled devices. For example, in a Responsys Program, there could be a specific stage within an orchestration to execute a task on an IoT-enabled device, like display a promotion for leasing a new car on the car’s dashboard if the driver has been looking for a new car and is in a “new car lease” orchestration program.

Marketers, if you are looking to benefit from the unlimited potentials of IoT to delight  your customers with highly personalized and relevant customer experiences, make sure your marketing automation platform allows for integrations with IoT technologies. 

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