Article Written By: Simon Ackland | SMI Digital (the Digital Marketing Agency division of SMI Business Impact Pty Ltd)
New Client Acquisition
When it comes to acquiring new customers, you need to build databases quickly and cost effectively.
Most business owners would not have the appropriate technology and advanced analytics you need to determine your allowable cost-per-new-client, so you know your limits as well as when to increase spending.
Technology allows you to understand and build Business Intelligence with your customer's behaviours. Please be kind to your business and the law requirements, DO NOT send marketing email with Outlook, as it is not SPAM compliant and does not provide you any business intelligence to grow your business.
For example, when you send an email would it be helpful for your business to understand in real time the following?
- Did they receive your email
- Did they open your email
- How long it took them to open their email
- How many time they open the email
- What were they interested in reading
- Did they forward the email to a friend
- Did they click on a particular link if so how many times
- Automatically track and flag invalid e-mail addresses
- and more...
Your marketing efforts on acquiring the right type of customer for your organization must be constant and focused on building a strong database containing as many as possible prospects and customers through direct mail, print media, email, online activities, telemarketing, and point-of-sale registration.
If you don't have an email database, here is a simple tip:
Step 1: organise a competition with a big prize e.g. "WIN A TRIP for TWO" (maybe work with a travel agent to promote them and get it for free...you get the idea).
Step 2: design and print a postcard and send it to your database or distribute it through your network or points of sale...refer them to your website.
Step 3: yes... you may have to use an old delivery systems such as the post services.
Step 4: develop a sign-up or registration form on your website to receive the information requested in the postcard.
Result: conversion of an address book to an online database by getting the card recipients to register online.
Et voila...you did not have to call everyone to ask them for their email address and now your digital database is growing.
PS: Today the most cost effective communication solution is email (up to 1000 times cheaper) to create and send emails than direct mail distribution, the sooner you start building your email database the sooner you will build customer acquisition and retention at a very low cost.
Customer Retention
You must know that it is equally important to retain customers, as it is to generate new ones.
When you look at marketing solutions and deep analysis into your customer data you need to focus your efforts and investment on the most productive segments.
Build a retention plan that delivers the right message and communication to your customers to keep them coming back, to improve response rates, increase order values, and develop loyalty programs that maximise revenues and profits.
You must rely on lifetime value modelling to predict future revenue streams and to determine the present value of new customers. This best practice approach ensures that money spent up front to acquire new customers pays dividends well into the future.
Customer Loyalty Programs
You may spend 5 to 10 times as much acquiring new customers as you will retaining existing ones.
You will work hard and spend a lot of money to get customers to use your services or buy your products. It therefore makes sense to put an appropriate amount of effort into retaining those customers so that your company may enjoy long-term repeat business.
Your customers have more information today than ever before. Many are Internet savvy and all are out to find the best deal for them. One proven way to improve your chances of customer retention is through a carefully constructed customer loyalty program.
Quick tips:
- Identify and retain your best customer segments
- Extract more value from your customers
- Communicate more effectively one-on-one with your customers
- Estimate the value of your customers by segment
- Derive an allowable cost-per-new-customer
- Improve your brand or company image
Develop a structured plan to communicate with your clients and demonstrate the value they are to you. Most clients that change vendor do so because they feel unloved...so share the love and enjoy the repeat business and the extra profit and business value that results.
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