Your Rogers example clearly illustrates the value of keeping tabs on the customer. If so much insight can be generated from a one-page phone bill, imagine how much of your lifestyle and values and be deciphered from a combination of bank statements, phone bills, loyalty programs, store receipts and so forth.

Ironically, Data mining’s greatest strength can also be its most crippling weakness. Automation. Using a software to crank out customer patterns seems efficient, but is it effective? As I was going through your phone transactions, numerous outcomes came to mind; you might be getting married soon, you could have broken a leg and seeking treatment at the local hospital, there was a family feud, you are on vacation and taking a break from work, etc… However, a lot of the options can be eliminated by combining your phone bill with other sources of data such as cable and internet usage.

During my years in retail, I’ve tried to build customer relationships by keeping track of purchase data and drawing conclusions with regards to buying patterns. One time, as I was calling a customer to remind him of his wife’s birthday and hint a potential visit to our jewellery store, I was confronted with the embarrassing revelation that the lady he had listed in our store file is not actually his wife, but his mistress. This goes to show that while keeping track of data points may be effective, it is by far not a substitute for face to face conversations with real people.