Marketing

Know Thy Customer.
By Ray Boucher

If you've been in business for any amount of time you have hopefully developed a database of customers who have bought from you or used your service. This is a resource that you should be tapping into on a regular basis for information about what your customers want. Look for trends such as:

What products are most customers purchasing?

If you sell mostly car radios - you could be marketing add-on accessories to the people who have purchased a radio, or an upgrade to a new speaker system. You can think in terms of what products you sell to enhance the products your customers have already purchased from you. Or, are they due for an upgrade to the latest version? Does their product require scheduled maintenance?

What is the average amount customers are spending on each purchase?

If you know the average amount that customers are spending then you can develop sales and promotion based on those numbers. If you know that customers are willing to spend $500 on a product and competitors are having success with the same product and price; then chances are if you did a promotion selling the product for $449 you would have an increase in sales. You can do this because you have the information to base that assumption on.

How many customers are repeat customers?

Let's say that half of your customers are repeat customers and half have only purchased once. You can create different promotions geared specifically towards the two different targets.

When are the majority of your sales happening?

Looking at sales data you may realize that most of your sales happen at the end of the month or on weekends. Maybe you have peaks in sales at certain times of the year. You can use this info to adjust the amount of marketing you need to do to increase sales in the slower periods. Remember though, you need to continue marketing in the busy periods so they continue.

Where are the majority of your customers coming from?

If you are a local business you might notice that most of your customers are coming from within five miles of your office or maybe they tend to be from more affluent neighborhoods. Maybe you have a larger audience and notice that most of your sales happen online. Well that's important information to have when planning your marketing.

When you have the answer to questions like these you can be more effective with your marketing. You can differentiate which promotions are more effective and what targets are giving you the best response. You can evaluate your campaigns more efficiently and design better promotions that more specifically reflect the needs and interests of your customers.

About the author:
Ray Boucher is a marketing professional, author and the founder of inthinktive.

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