The customer data you gather can be almost as valuable as your company's product, or even more valuable. CIO, Jeff Neville, of NextWorth Solutions explains how gathering customer data helps guide NextWorth's business decisions.
The Enterprisers Project (TEP): Tell us about the NextWorth Solutions business model and how you work with consumers and retail partners. A lot of phones in the United States end up unused in the back of people's drawers. How is NextWorth Solutions seeking to change this?
Neville: We work with both retailer partners and directly with consumers on mobile devices, wearable and other electronics trade-ins that benefit all parties involved. We purchase quality electronics and pay the seller cash. Really, it's that simple. What we do is help people trade up, gear up, or simply cash in and move on by providing an open, fair exchange either in a retail location or online.
Our model is based on the philosophy that we want to fundamentally change the way people buy, own, and disown consumer electronics. We not only extend the life of consumer electronics by promoting reuse, but ensure electronics that are no longer usable are recycled responsibly through our certified partners.
Simultaneously, we are helping to address e-waste, which is a global concern, by offering fair value and convenience for consumers with options for how to sell and how to receive the value of their trade-in. The mobile devices that are repurposed down the line often end up in markets around the world. So before people throw their old phones into a drawer, or worse, in the trash, we want them to consider what they may be able to get for that device they don't plan on using anymore.
TEP: How do you work with retailers to encourage consumers to upgrade their mobile devices?
Neville: It's about empowering consumers to get value out of their current electronics and better enabling retailers to make that transaction seamless and painless. Often times, our retail partners will run specials where customers are incentivized to trade in their old device in order to upgrade to the latest and greatest for less. Payment can be made in many forms, from a store gift card to a coupon to an instant rebate. In all cases the customer is being given added value for a used device which translates into savings off the new device.
TEP: What type of data do you collect from these transactions? What is the biggest value of that data to NextWorth?
Neville: The data collected from these transactions has tremendous value for NextWorth and, in turn, its retailer partners. Retailers can see what percentages of new sales were facilitated by a trade-in, commonly referred to as the attach rate. This metric can help retailers better plan promotions and forecast sales, and help NextWorth forecast the inflow of used goods. Retailers can also learn from the types of devices being traded in. This data can help them secure additional promotional funds from OEMs by demonstrating key customer behaviors like brand switching.
A final benefit for both NextWorth and retailers is being able to determine the elasticity of trade-in values. Understanding exactly how much needs to be offered in order to influence customer behavior provides important insight that drives both pricing and promotions.
TEP: How has having this data changed decisions your company has made?
Neville: On the promotions side, giving our account managers access to the data generated by promotional activities helps NextWorth identify and highlight opportunities for our retail partners. From an operational perspective, our pricing teams use data generated by the inspection process to learn and adjust how we trade in items and what prices we offer for different conditions of devices. This information ultimately provides benefit to our retail partners through increased sales of new devices, and their customers through better prices and to NextWorth through higher profitability.
TEP: What's the future for these kinds of analytics?
Neville: The future lies in the ability to show data visually. It's helpful to visualize data for both non-technical and technical users because it's an immediate, high-impact way to show what's working and what can improve or be changed.
TEP: How do you use data to create and maintain a good business relationship with your retail partners such as big box stores and mobile phone providers?
Neville: The data we share with our partners is more than just a catalog of transactions. It has value in many ways for our retailers from measuring performance of various campaigns, to giving greater value that creates more loyal customers, to informing logistical issues like shipment windows or loss prevention.
All of this data has value, depending on how companies want to use it. We can also use data to show where opportunity exists to expand their trade-in offerings to include things outside of mobility, like video games and wearables.
TEP: Do you foresee NextWorth Solutions as a broker of data in the future, where sharing raw information with business partners becomes a part of the business model?
Neville: NextWorth already trades in data to an extent. As the company grows and there is a larger appetite for data among our partners and potential clients, we expect to refine our data sharing capabilities.
In the future, we could offer data services to both our current clients and potentially other companies in related businesses. For example, by looking at pricing elasticity across partners NextWorth could be in a position to provide guidance on secondary market values, effectively functioning as a Kelley Blue Book for used gadgets. Offerings such as this would allow people to understand how to fine-tune their own trade-in environments within the context of broader industry dynamics and pricing.
Jeff Neville is CIO of NextWorth Solutions, a leader in online and in-store electronics trade-in programs including NextWorth.com. Throughout his career, Jeff has focused on helping companies understand and respond to the strategic impact of technology. Before NextWorth, Jeff held the positions of CIO and VP of eCommerce at Eastern Mountain Sports. Jeff received his BS in Computer Science from The University of Massachusetts in Amherst, MA.
