Big Data finds connection between the weather and consumer habits

Posted by Justin Hesser on June 18, 2013

Businesses that want to better understand customer habits, so they can create and develop more fine-tuned advertising campaigns, can benefit from custom database software systems. With tools such as FileMaker development solutions, organizations can sift through large amounts of information and draw conclusions on customer habits. From there, the right marketing approach can be taken to ensure that a company finds success while still meeting customer needs.

Giovanni DeMeo, VP of global marketing and analytics for Interactions Marketing, explained to InformationWeek that his company was able to use Big Data to gain insight on the connection between weather patterns and consumer shopping habits.

Specifically, Interactions studied which products had the most significant sales increases and decreases during specific weather events. The company also took into account how geographic location, time of day, day of the week and a retailer's proximity to competitors' locations had an effect on shoppers' habits. The results showed that one day prior to statistically similar weather events, sales in 28 product categories jumped from 20 percent to 261 percent over the same day one year earlier.

"Anything with more than 20 percent or greater increase in sales, over sale-day [the] previous year, gives us the opportunity to identify those categories, and have enough time to communicate with retailers and manufacturers," DeMeo said.

Having information like this allows businesses to create campaigns that educate customers. Depending on the type of product or services sold, they could be more useful depending on what type of weather patterns are occurring, DeMeo explained.

Weather is just one of many details that could affect consumers' purchasing habits, which is why custom database software could be so critical to an organization's advertising campaigns' success.