ON ADVERTISING
January 2007 issue
BALANCE VISIBLE AND HIDDEN RELATIONSHIP PROGRAMS.
Companies may be judged initially by their
visible programs (advertising, Web site, public
relations), but ultimately they are judged by their
hidden programs (loyalty programs, discounts,
incentives).
While relationship marketers have come to rely
more on hidden programs, successful marketers
must learn to meld the two approaches.
Why? Because customers can’t see or get access
to a hidden program until they respond to a
visible program.
Marketers must create an incentive or a clear
value proposition to bring customers in for the
first time. Only after they identify and track
a customer can they determine if there is an
opportunity for a deeper and more profitable
relationship.
Once a customer is in the fold, the relationship
marketers take over, finding ways to increase
response, frequency, and overall customer value.
These programs can stay hidden, testing ideas
on small sets of customers, expanding successful
tactics, and eliminating poor ones. Return to top
TURNING PR INTO SALES.
Getting great recognition in the media does not
automatically translate into new business. You
need to:
Promote your news
Add to an online newsroom on your company
Web site.
Blog with a link to your online newsroom.
Send reprints to your sales staff and customers.
Include in your newsletters.
Compile into binders to show off at company
meetings, events,
and trade shows.
Create a book of media articles (clippings) for
your lobby.
Add credibility to sales materials
Include in literature, sales presentations,
marketing kits, and
proposals.
Pump up your direct marketing
Distribute as direct mail, e-mail, and fax
campaigns to prospective
customers (opt in, of
course).
Send reprints with invoices and other
correspondence to reinforce
your customers’
beliefs that they are working with the best.
Position your executives for success
Include in your packages and proposals for
future speaking
engagements.
Add bylined articles and source quotes to key
executives’ bios to
help demonstrate their
experience as a published, industry expert.
Include your company’s media successes in
award submissions.
Keep your employees informed
E-mail or post on your Intranet; line hallways,
conference rooms,
and waiting areas; and post
in the employee break room with
highlight
references to employees and company
accolades.
Contact us for more ideas
We’ll work with your internal staff to ensure
you cover all the
bases. Return to top
DETERMINING CUSTOMER
VALUE:
A 5-STEP APPROACH.
Calculating customer value should be approached
as an evolution.
1. Focus on the basics.
Calculate the revenues that you have generated
from each
customer in the past and present.
2. Incorporate variable costs.
Those that you are able to attribute to the
customer level. The two
core costs are service
and marketing.
3. Extrapolate up...
to the household or company level. While each
customer has their
own individually calculated
value, their purchasing decisions are
often tied
to that of a larger group.
4. Calculate a lifetime value (LTV) score.
This is an extrapolation of the current value
already calculated in
the previous steps. LTV
scores project the future profits that you
can
reasonably expect without additional investment.
5. Develop a customer potential score.
Use all available customer attributes to calculate
their potential to
become more profitable
through the purchase of additional goods
and
services.
Customer potential tells you precisely where
to invest sales capacity, marketing emphasis, and
advertising dollars in order to have the greatest
impact on profitability. Call us for further insights
into customer valuation. Return to top
WHEN FEWER IS BETTER.
Purchasers can become confused by too many
options and too many choices.
Harvard Business School professor John
Gourville reports that confused consumers tend to
defer purchases or run to the arms of a competitor
with a less cluttered offering.
Simplifying your message, emphasizing brand
image, and focusing on consumer needs can all
help.
Dell, for example offers a bewildering array
of computers and options. Their marketing
communications simplifies and guides purchases
by identifying computers in terms of who they
are intended to serve. The results are computers
for “gaming,” “home office,” “Internet ready,”
etc.
By reducing the number of choices and by
helping your consumers through the decision-making
process, you can reduce the complexity
of the purchasing process and reduce the
anxiety of making the wrong choice. Return to top
PERSONA CREATION –
WHO
YOU KNOW IS WHAT YOU KNOW.
Visualize the typical person visiting your Web site
right now.
Are they applying for a job, looking at a
product spec sheet, or comparing your product
against a competitive product?
Are they self-directed or do they need to be
told what to do?
Are they in a hurry at their desk or do they
have some time at the coffee shop?
Are they retired, working, urban, suburban, in
college, in mid-life, male, female?
To create effective sites, it really helps to
identify and create a representative person from
your key audience groups. That representative
person is a “persona.”
Visualizing and empathizing with a persona
will help you think like that user. And thinking
like a user will lead to Web sites that are
satisfying and pleasurable to use.
If you are reworking your Web site or building
a new one, give us a call, and we’ll help you
identify your user types. Return to top
