First-party data

First-party data is the data a company collects first-hand from customers and leads through their normal browsing and shopping behavior on the company’s site. 

First-party data includes:

• Customer behavior - what people search for on site, add to cart, abandon, order, reorder, return, read, emails they open, etc.
• Customer details - all that a customer shares with the company for the sake of the transaction like name, address, email, etc.
• Any feedback collected
• All sales numbers, product performance stats, marketing metrics

It’s not data collected from browsers, social media tracking or purchased from third-party vendors that anonymize people and put them into ready segments. First-party data is what people do on your site, how they interact with your brand and only you have it, for free. No-one else has access to it or can use it for marketing purposes.

First--party data is not anonymous, you know exactly who did what (if you have an ecommerce CRM and analytics like Metrilo). And the best part is people know and consent to you using this info to communicate with them. It’s not like ads, which most people find intrusive, irrelevant or creepily informed. 

First-party data gives you a competitive edge because it’s all about the interaction between people and your brand, and lets you guide and optimize the shopping experience from within.

Some of the things first-party data lets you do:

• Hyper targeted campaigns by behavior
• Personalized post-purchase engagement
• Optimize for metrics like retention rate, average order value, customer lifetime value
• Improve acquisition and budgeting
• Manage products better