What is UpStream? | Integrated Marketing Performance Management

UpStream is a suite of cloud-based software to manage big data problems: customer level revenue attribution and multi-channel optimization, event-triggered marketing, and planning and reporting. But what does that really mean? It means that there is finally a comprehensive set of tools for direct marketers to manage their businesses and make decisions using the whole picture!

Customer Level Revenue Attribution

Most marketers find themselves with messy data. They have multiple marketing and order channels, disparate databases, and various execution platforms. One retailer’s method: manually attribute weekly sales to the marketing channels using metrics from various tools (web analytics, ad server, affiliate portal, search and email providers, and internal customer database) and any remaining sales go to catalog. This appeared to work – until they ended up with a week of negative sales using this method!

UpStream uses a patent-pending time-to-event methodology borrowed from biostatistics that accurately attributes all of a marketer’s sales to the appropriate marketing channel. In addition to all of the typical marketing channels, UpStream measures the impact of Customer Driven (loyalty), Calendar Effects (seasonality), and Store Area.

Multi-Channel Optimization

Great. Attributed revenue is interesting, but what do I do with it?  Marketing mix models and other attribution tools provide an analysis that is not actionable and out of date as soon as it’s released. UpStream’s Revenue Attribution goes beyond that by feeding its Optimization module – it simultaneously identifies the most profitable channels for every customer and the most profitable customers for every channel. The marketer inputs a few variables such as upper spend limits for each marketing channel and frequency of marketing treatments, and UpStream identifies which customers to market to and generates a customer list for the marketer.

Event-Triggered Marketing

Automated marketing programs are a great way to build top line revenue with minimal IT support. Using the same data used for Revenue Attribution, marketers can create Event-Triggered Marketing campaigns. These campaigns target the right customers at the right time with the right message, using flexible triggers based on customer behavior online and offline (web activity, customer purchases, etc.).

Triggers can be used to encourage purchases, engage repeat purchases, nurture prospects, drive to store, and support customer service. Read more about Event-Triggered Marketing: Real World Examples.

Planning and Reporting

Most marketers create marketing plans and reports in Excel. Version control, importing result data from multiple platforms, and the complexity of multiple channels are just a few issues they run into.

UpStream’s Planning and Reporting solution replaces the spreadsheet nightmare with an intelligent and useful planning database. The tools effectively plan and track numerous campaigns across multiple platforms, link campaign performance, control costs, and ensure marketing treatments are executed to maximize results. From predicting response rates based on historical data to easily running custom reports to read the results – it’s never been easier than now using UpStream’s integrated planning and results database.

Using the right tools can make all the difference.  Learn more about UpStream’s integrated marketing performance management system.