Category Archives: Driller Q & A

Relationship Marketing in Manufacturing

DataBase Marketing, Driller Q & A, Marketing thru Operations, Newsletters

Jim answers questions from fellow Drillers
(More questions with answers here, Work Overview here, Index of concepts here)

Q: Do the principals in the Drilling Down book apply to manufacturing? I was first introduced to Relationship Marketing in an MBA course years ago. I have been looking for an opportunity to test these ideas and now find that chance in this job (I was and still am a foot soldier, but now have more responsibility in these areas).

Manufacturers typically look at the highest revenue-producing customer, then pull out the manufacturing directory and start calling every company in the same business. Not really marketing. Can CRM be used to mine the data we need to be predictive and focused on the value of customers and retention?

A: Sure, same core issues and metrics apply:

1. Retention: Identify best customers, determine order cycles, set up a report that tells you who “should have” ordered but did not based past on past history, either market to them or send this info to sales, depending on the value of the customer.

2. Recapture / Defection: Identify best customers who have stopped purchasing and find out why, take action aligned with the value of the customer. You may not get these customers back, but you will learn critically valuable information that will help you retain customers in the future – is there reason in common why these customers left you? Was there a common Salesperson? A common Product line? A common type of Machine used? A common Material? Take these findings back into Operations and find out if the issue can be corrected.

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Visitor Retention Mapping

DataBase Marketing, Driller Q & A, Measuring Engagement, Newsletters, Web Analytics

Jim answers questions from fellow Drillers
(More questions with answers here, Work Overview here, Index of concepts here)

Q: The research folks in my company are trying to convince me that measuring sessions and Page Views per Session is more effective than using Recency and Sessions, as you advocate in your book, for a retention metric.

A: For a content site, the Page Views / Session measure can be used as a measure of visitor quality and appropriate marketing to the right audience – a customer acquisition idea – not retention. And it really needs to be broken out by Source – the average has little actionable meaning. You want to know the Visitor Sources, and then look at this metric by Source. This is still Frequency though – what about visitors who don’t come back?

Q: I am having some difficulty in making a decision regarding this. They want to give me a matrix with Page Views per Session on the Y axis and Total Sessions on the X axis as the “customer retention map”.

Continue reading Visitor Retention Mapping →

A Budget for Discounts?

DataBase Marketing, Driller Q & A

Jim answers questions from fellow Drillers
(More questions with answers here, Work Overview here, Index of concepts here)

Q: For the first time ever, we have a Discount budget built into our financial plan. We’ve been told this number in the budget is less than we used last year, but our Sales target is a bit higher. We’re supposed to hit our sales targets while at the same time not going over budget with our Discounts to generate those sales. This directive comes from Finance.

A: You have just been offered the opportunity to graduate from Advertising to Marketing!

Q: We are fairly sure if we reduce the discounts we give, response is going to fall and so are sales, especially from best customers. Or we could keep the same discounts but do fewer discount promotions, with probably the same effect on sales. Are there any other alternatives, any ideas on how to manage this discount budget issue?

We’re an online only retailer.

A: Sure, ask an easy one over the holidays!

Seriously, I hope you did not take my comment about graduating from Advertising to Marketing the wrong way. This is really an opportunity for you to shine in so many ways, and to learn a lot of new ideas in the process – if you want to take advantage of it.

Continue reading A Budget for Discounts? →