AMiable Solution #176: Is Your Relationship Dead?

You know who they are: the accounts on your contact list who haven’t responded to your marketing in months, maybe years.  But you keep marketing to them because you know it’s easier to get a previous buyer or donor to give you money than a prospect.  And because sometimes you know, no matter how long it’s been since you’ve had contact from them, it’s hard to say goodbye to a client.

So how do you know when it’s over?  How do you know if a customer or donor or former member is just waiting for the right offer or if they’ve already moved on?

Like many answers in marketing, it depends.  It depends on your market.  It depends on your organization.  And it depends on your industry.  Here, however, are five points to consider when you evaluate the viability of inactive accounts:

1.      Your competitors.  Take a look at their offers, their new products and services, and their leadership.  Have they made changes that could be drawing your customers away? 

2.      Your offers, products, and services.  Are you marketing the same old stuff?  If you haven’t dangled anything new--new services, new benefits, new features, new products, etc.--in front of your previous buyers, then you haven’t given them any reason to buy lately.  An updated product, a new service, or a new group to help could reignite the buying fever.

3.      What type of buyers they are.  Look at your inactive accounts’ previous purchasing habits.  Were they strictly transaction buyers?  Were all their orders made at discounted rates?  If so, you may want to send them your best, discounted offers only.  If they have a history of regular purchases, however, you may have relationship buyers--your most loyal customers--at stake.  Before removing them from your mailing list, call them!  Find out what changed for them and what you can do to improve or win them back.

4.      Current events.  Sometimes, particularly with donors, the urge to contribute to a cause is driven by current events.  If the benefactors of your charity haven’t experienced a disaster or well-documented need in some time, then your “inactive” donors may be missing the desire and urgency to help.

5.      What you can afford.  Realistically, you can’t mail, email, or call your entire universe with every campaign.  You have to pick and choose which buyers--and how recently they were buyers--for each offer.  At some point, you almost have to treat unresponsive former buyers as prospects.  And that means applying that same line of reasoning when it comes to deciding how much you want and financially can invest in marketing to them.

Saying goodbye to a customer shouldn’t be easy.  Make sure you know the facts.

AMiable Solution #175: Are Your Customers Faithful?

You pour as much love on your clients, customers, members, and donors as you can.  You refer to them by first name.  You not only personalize all of your communications with them, but you also hand-select the products and services you offer them.  You make sure you call or write at least twice a month.

But is that enough to keep them faithful?  Do they love you as much as you love them?

It depends on the customer.  Paul Wang, co-founder of the Database Marketing Institutes, classifies buyers into three categories: program buyers, transaction buyers, and relationship buyers.

Program buyers are rarely influenced by marketing.  They follow set procedures to make purchases for their business and usually use one of several suppliers, as dictated by their manuals or processes.

Transaction buyers care less about brands and loyalty and more about prices and deals.  They respond to sales and discounts but will abandon one company for another at the drop of a price.

Relationship buyers, however, not only respond to marketing, but they thrive on it.  They want to build a history with you and develop a trust in you.  They don’t want to waste time or energy finding an organization they can count on every time they need to make a purchase.  When they find a company or organization that provides a quality product or service, employs friendly and helpful people, and supplies them with information when they need it, they’ll make that company or organization their go-to.  Relationship buyers will stay with you for a lifetime if you treat them right.

If relationship buyers seem to be the best type of buyers, does that mean you should focus all of your attention and budget on them?  Not at all.  But it does mean that you need to understand which customers fall into each category and market to them appropriately.  And marketing to relationship buyers, when done right, is something everyone will love.

AMiable Solution #174: How to Write a Great Love Letter

Nowadays, it’s easy to express your love in five minutes or less.  All it takes is a trip to the greeting card aisle and, voila!  Instant affection.

But if you really want to capture someone’s heart, you need to put your own heart into the effort.  Taking the time to make it personal can do wonders for any relationship, including the one between you and your market.

So how do you write a great direct mail letter?  The same way you write a great love letter:

·        Address the recipient by first name.  Everyone likes to see their name in writing: to know that a message was intended just for him or her.  This is true in relationships and in marketing.  Get personal.  Be on a first-name basis.

·        Be honest.  Most people, whether in love or in a business transaction, know a load of baloney when they hear it.  They know when something sounds too good to be true or when someone’s feeding them a line.  Don’t play games or try to manipulate your words.  Be honest.  Show your customers—and your love—that you understand them and their needs.

·        Be specific. Just as your loved one will be moved when you recall the details of your first meeting, the first time you realized you had feelings for him/her, etc., your market will be moved to respond favorably to your marketing when you provide specific information about your offer.  Show them that you understand their problems and can provide concrete solutions.

·        Speak your recipient’s language.  Every couple is unique.  They have their own histories and stories and inside jokes.  Your markets aren’t much different.  To be able to communicate effectively with them, you need to know their histories.  How they communicate.  What motivates them.  Whether they’re persuaded by benefits or features.  You need to know how they think and speak to them accordingly.

Everyone loves a love letter.  Make yours great. 

AMiable Solution #173: Love Lengths

Love is in the air.  This month, as you try to woo new or existing customers, remember one thing: no one likes a stalker.

Communicating frequently with your customers and prospects is more than a good idea: it’s essential.  But it’s also important not to overdo it.  You don’t want to leave your customers feeling trapped or powerless. 

So how much is too much?  Unfortunately, only you can determine (through testing) what your market’s threshold is: the frequency that they not only tolerate, but also respond profitably to.

Whether you’re testing out your frequency schedule or following a carefully timed plan, make it easy for your recipients to opt out of phone calls, emails, mobile marketing, and direct mail, and make instructions for doing so obvious.

When a customer does want to “break up,” follow-up on opt-out requests quickly.  But don’t just hit “delete” and move on.  Figuring out why individuals opt-out can make it easier to determine how to keep them.  If you offer an online option for opting out, take the opportunity to ask questions.  Prepare a very brief questionnaire and ask for feedback.

Learning how and how often to communicate with your market will make everyone happier and your relationships stronger. 

AMiable Solution #172: Make 2016 Mixable

For years we’ve heard the predictions.  Direct mail is dying.  Digital marketing is the future.  Mobile marketing will change the way businesses operate.  And with so many options to choose from--print, email, websites, social media, public relations, content marketing, SEO, etc.--trying to decide which channels to invest in and how to distribute the marketing budget among them can be overwhelming.

The problem is, marketing is not a single-channel operation.  Most organizations benefit from a mixture of mediums. 

Just how many approaches you take and just how much you invest in each will vary depending on your specific audience, your offers, and your industry.  However, the following facts and statistics, obtained from Tom Pick’s December 2, 2014, business2community.com article, “104 Fascinating Social Media and Marketing Statistics for 2014 (and 2015),” may help you determine the right mix for you.  At the very least, they’ll give you something to think about:

·        91% of people have unsubscribed from company emails they previously opted into.

·        89% of 18-29 year-olds are active on social media, as are 43% of adults 65 and older.

·        Each month, 329 million people read blogs.

·        Articles with images get 94% more views than those without.

·        Posts with videos attract three times as many inbound links as plain text posts.

·        Facebook accounts for 15.8% of total time spent on the Internet.

·        There are nine times as many marketing emails sent each year as direct mail pieces delivered by the U.S. Postal Service.

·        Email marketing delivers the highest ROI (about $44 per dollar spent, on average) of any digital marketing tactic. SEO is #2. Banner ads have the lowest ROI.

·        Emails with social sharing buttons increase click-through rates by 158%.

·        Almost half--48%--of all emails are opened on mobile devices, yet only 11% of e-mails are optimized for mobile.

·      

           Despite all the hype about online, 67% of B2B content marketers consider event marketing to be their most effective strategy.

Should you base your entire 2016 strategy on the statistics above?  Certainly not.  But you should consider your audience carefully in light of them and then do what marketers do best: test.

AMiable Solution #171: Make 2016 Measureable

It may seem ridiculous to remind marketers to make measuring and tracking their marketing efforts a priority.  Marketers are generally obsessed with codes and return rates and bottom lines.  However, sometimes it’s worthwhile revisiting things we assume are a “given.”  Things we need but don’t nurture.

We’re talking about the relationship between your organization’s marketing and customer service departments.

How often does your marketing team, or at least a few members of it, meet with the customer service team?  If the two departments operate out of separate buildings or even different cities, the answer is probably “infrequently.”  That’s a problem.

Your customer service department is a key component in measuring your marketing efforts.  You could create a perfect offer, provide a clever tracking device, and package it in the most beautiful and eye-catching way, but if you don’t communicate well with customer service, arming them in advance of upcoming promotions, providing them with answers to questions they’ll likely field, and reinforcing or explaining to new reps the importance of identifying the source of all inquiries, donations, and sales, your promotions are going to fail.  At the very least, you’ll never know just how well they did.

You must arm your customer service reps with the tools they need to be successful in their jobs and to help you do yours better.  If they understand the importance of tracking promotions; of asking questions and noting common or unusual concerns, complaints, or problems; and of understanding not only how the products or services you’re promoting work, but also how their roles fit into the system of the entire organization, you’ll get the best possible measurement of your efforts, and you’ll set them and your organization up for success.

Meet with your organization’s customer service reps regularly, whether in person or over the phone.  Discuss upcoming or current promotions.  Provide them with the information customers will need, including where on the website to find a particular promotion or how to log into a webinar.  Encourage reps to share customer feedback with you--good, bad, and ugly--so that you can improve products as necessary or promote them in ways you hadn’t considered before.  Let them help you understand how your customers prefer to receive and request information.

The more your marketing departments and customer service departments are in sync, the more you will learn about your customers, their buying habits, and their promotion preferences.  It’s a relationship more valuable and more accessible than any software system, and it’s only a phone call away.

AMiable Solution #170: Make 2016 Manageable

We’re one week into the new year: what’s your outlook?  Are you optimistic about the possibilities this year holds, or are you already overwhelmed by the workload that carried over from last year?

Whatever your attitude, you can help make 2016 more manageable than 2015.

Start by taking a look at your schedule.  How often do you give yourself a break?  If you’re not building down time into your schedule, you’re probably not really giving yourself a chance to recharge from the stress, strain, and time spent while working or thinking about work.  Planning at least one activity or block or time with family or friends each week will give you something to look forward to, help improve your overall satisfaction, and force you to manage your time at work and at home a little better.

Next, take a good hard look at your schedule.  Are your plans realistic?  Is it really feasible to include so many activities--whether at work or outside of work--successfully?  If your workload includes more tasks than you can realistically accomplish, talk to your supervisor about setting priorities, shifting timelines, combining or eliminating meetings, or sharing responsibilities with someone else.  If your home life activities have you stressed, consider which ones are the most important to you and your family or the ones that you can make the most difference with and get rid of the others. 

Finally, remember that time and stress management is largely a mindset: sometimes you have to remind yourself that you can’t control everything.  To make your life more manageable, consider what you can control and focus your energy on those areas only.  You can’t control how your co-workers operate or what’s going on with the economy, but you can control how you get things done, how you spend your time and money, and how you handle different situations.  Focus on the things you have control over.