B2B 101

Hugh Bessant

Databases get stolen. Data gets stolen, captured, misused, repackaged and regurgitated so often you often cannot tell what the source of it really is, or was. Out of date, out of order, out of the CD drive and into the car. Spend a happy hour surfing for data suppliers and you will lose count of the market leading databases you can find, or the companies that claim access to them.

And, somewhat surprisingly given the apparent ease with which it can be done, some of all this data on the market has not been stolen at all.

Some of it is legitimately licenced, matched, merged and buggered about with, until it is unique, or whatever clever USP can be plucked from the Thesaurus.

One example of this brought to my attention this week was use of the 2001 electoral register. Boy, I bet the client got a great price on that! Was that a CD that walked from somewhere?

Another example, which I personally discovered, concerned the name of a supplier I had never heard of before, mentioned in a competetive sense by a client. I Googled the name, and found out that this small outfit no one has ever heard of had the logo’s of four household name data suppliers displayed prominently on their website. I will not name and shame today, because I have not proved beyond any doubt that this is incorrect, but I am pretty sure it is – since the logo’s have now magically disappeared.

Only a year or so ago, a new supplier started placing adverts in the trade press offering high quality business data for £15 per thousand on a lifetime basis. Again that proved to be of dubious parentage. Then this morning I came up against a quote of £500 for 40,000 records. Yes, a mighty £12.50 per thousand from a company that trumpets on it’s website about being a Premium data supplier!

This sounds like a long whinge. And of course it is, but it is also an illustration of what we within the industry...and more importantly our clients...face day in and day out.

I have no solutions. As the desk sargeant in Hill Street Blues used to say, ‘Be careful out there.’

If you have any stories along these lines, I would love to hear them...