Loyalty programs were designed to understand purchase behavior and reward customers. Now they’re a tool through which retailers and customer-centric service providers can form a more intimate relationship with consumers. Internet of Things (IoT) devices combined with analytics capabilities (including AI) promise to make this goal more achievable by adding real-time contextual awareness to products and services. From wearables to cars to in-store beacons, IoT data becomes a rich source of information about consumer preferences and behaviors. Combining traditional and IoT data helps companies get much closer to each consumer so they can deliver unique, value-added services and targeted offers.

Analysts expect the IoT to soar to tens of billions of devices by 2020. But it’s not enough to simply collect data from connected consumers, sensors, systems or products. IoT presents many challenges due to the complexity of capturing and analyzing extreme volumes and varieties of data from ever-increasing numbers of things. It’s critical to understand which data is relevant so you’ll know what to store versus ignore. A trusted, automated solution gives flexibility about where, when and how to manage and analyze IoT data. So you can capture value in real time – whether customers are walking down store aisles or driving to their favorite restaurants.