By Tena Hartwig
August 4th, 2009
On average, the cost of finding a new customer is five to six times more expensive than keeping a current one. So, what can a company do to ensure that their best customers stick around?
Create a customer loyalty program.
Most of us are familiar with customer loyalty programs—just look in your wallet or purse. I’m sure you have a slew of loyalty cards.
I’m personally a fan of DSW’s rewards program. This shoe retailer’s rewards program is so fantastic that I focus my shoe shopping solely (pun intended) at DSW. I actually feel GUILTY purchasing shoes elsewhere and have to put up blinders when I walk through department store shoe departments to avoid the temptation. Now that’s a powerful rewards program.
However, creating an effective loyalty program is more than just sending out punch cards. You must tailor your program to your customer base. Learn more about your valued customers—explore their demographics, behaviors and attitudes and you’ll be able to deliver rewards that resonate with them. Make sure your program recognizes, rewards and treats your customers in outstanding ways.
Don’t forget that rewarding your customers pays off for you in the long run—loyal customers spend more money and are more likely to recommend your business to others.
Do you find yourself frequenting businesses that offer rewards or incentives? What do they do to retain your business?
By Nancy Landl
August 3rd, 2009
Suggesting a strategic marketing approach won’t surprise any who are reading this post, because you know that B2B marketers need to work harder and smarter to communicate in-depth information about complicated products and processes. You’re searching for hard-to-reach prospective customers that want to buy your not-so-glamorous products.
What you need is “smart marketing” from an agency that understands your business and can help you develop good strategic marketing direction, not just ads.
It’s not necessarily the vehicles or design that get you in front of new customers; it’s how they work together strategically that gets results.
Part of your “smarketing” strategy could include advertising, but a marketing assessment may point out that you could get better return on investment using other communication methods such as publicity, direct mail, outbound calling or online.
And lest we forget, your budget is limited too, so you have to do more with less. That’s where the right smarketing can help.
Have you managed successful campaigns that were ad-less? What’s the most unusual product you’ve smarketed? Call me to chat about it.
By Jared Bodnar
July 31st, 2009
I’m fresh off a stint of conducting focus group moderation duties for one of our B2B technology clients on the East Coast, and it went extremely well. We were able to gather some valuable feedback from our group of technology reseller subjects and, as usual, some of our suspicions were confirmed and a few intriguing surprises were revealed as well.
Although focus groups are an excellent way to gather qualitative information from customers and prospects, there are several other ways to uncover this information. The research methods we utilize for our clients will all depend on what our client is trying to find out, the audience, budget, timeline and a variety of other factors.
In addition to focus groups, we typically recommend online surveys, telephone surveys, secondary research review, mailed surveys and ‘virtual’ focus groups that are deployed online using web-based meeting software. The most important thing to consider when gathering multi-channel market research is combining the results and using that information to improve your products, processes, marketing support programs and other aspects of your business. At the end of the day, that’s what it’s all about.
What market research methods have worked well for your business? Do you have an ongoing customer service research program? What’s the most interesting or surprising fact you’ve discovered using market research? Do you want to find out more about how conducting market research can help you improve your business and relationships with customers and prospects?
By Sabrina Sherrell
July 31st, 2009
Strategic Planning
Bursting with information
Gets you ROI
It’s time for a little 5/7/5 (Haiku) dissection. Ahh, |R|O|I| the most appreciated 3 letters in the business, and the 3 letters we work hardest to produce. But where does it start? It starts with |stra|te|gic|plann|ing|.
Strategic planning doesn’t just take into account the 4P’s (Product, Price, Promotion, Place), but also:
- the Process of how consumers obtain your product or service,
- the People who represent your business (hello sales team!)
- and the Physical environment or how your product or service is delivered.
Remember this from marketing 101? It’s the Extended Marketing Mix and it’s a whole lotta fun for the account team!
I would get into how to create a plan, but there’s no need to bore you when you can just Google or Bing your way to other fancy sites that dissect planning.
But, consider the common ground for Haiku and strategic planning. Creating syllable arrangements in lines of 5/7/5 takes a lot of brainpower, writing and rewriting (it is also helpful to have two different colored pens). Strategic planning takes a lot of the same in order to get the plan just right, to make sure the messaging is resonating with the audience, and the client gets ROI (something crucial in the current economy).
So next time you are wondering why that plan cost you your right arm, think of it as turning a 5/7/5 Haiku into a 5,000/7,000/5,000. Now that would be difficult!
Take a stab at creating a B2B marketing Haiku on a topic that you want the Think Tank to discuss. Submit it in the comments and we’ll address it in an upcoming post.
