How data can help track your customer's lifecycle
The rapidly changing economic and geopolitical situation is prompting companies to review not only their credit risk management and sales processes but also to take a closer look at the business situation of their partners and clients. There is a lot of open data available in the market that companies can use to increase sales and reduce credit risk.
Data search
Business growth is important for every company. Open data can help find companies that meet both simple and more complex criteria. For example, instead of searching only for companies that are active, older than a year, and operating in a specific field, include criteria that could verify their reliability: information about debts, credit ratings, credit limits, financial indicators, etc.
Analysis: is your future business partner or client reliable?
Before starting new business relationships, you need to do your homework – gather all possible data about your new partner or client. When assessing a company's reliability, it is important to check not only financial indicators but also business connections or even the company's presence in public sanction lists (EU, OFAC, UN, etc.).
Financial indicators may be weak, which might prompt you to decline collaboration. However, checking business connections might reveal new opportunities and threats. Your potential business partner might belong to a large business group with great potential, or it might have a dark shadow in its past, such as bankruptcy threats, which could bring you headaches and risks instead of business opportunities.
Potential client analysis
Typically, companies evaluate their clients based solely on their internal data (mainly payment history), but external data can provide broader insights. You will learn whether the partner is involved in litigation, has unpaid debts to government institutions or private companies. Meanwhile, changes in turnover and employee numbers can indicate business growth or, conversely, decline.
Closing collaboration
Typically, there are two scenarios for closing collaboration with a client:
- both parties are satisfied – one received the service or product, the other – payment,
- one ends up on the debtor list. Debt recovery is not an easy process, and open data can be very useful in deciding whether you should go to court or try to negotiate debt repayment. Financial, business obligations, debt, and litigation data can help assess your partner-debtor's situation and make a decision.
Our partner Okredo's open data platform helps manage the entire customer lifecycle: find new clients, assess reliability and sales potential, foster growth, and recover debts thanks to debtor data published on the platform.