Your 80/20 marketing plan

November 5, 2015

Your 80/20 marketing planOne of the age-old rules in business is that 80% of your revenue is generated through 20% of your customer base. While the numbers may not align perfectly – the axiom is accurate. Your best customers generate the lion’s share of your earnings.

In fact, over the lifetime of your relationship, your most loyal customers will spend 10x what the average customer will spend. They’re also responsible for over 70% of the total visits to your business.

Even if you didn’t know the numbers – you know how important your best customers are. Yet – 63% of marketers believe that new customer acquisition is the most important advertising goal.

A recent study of over one retail million customers looking at both their behavior and their attitudes revealed some very compelling data.

  • VIP and loyalty program members are 70% more likely to spread the word about your business
  • 65% actually want their favorite stores to frequently email them coupons and promotions
  • The probability of making an additional sale or up selling a loyal customer is 60-70%

I’m not suggesting you stop chasing new customers but based on what we know in our gut and the data in this study, we sure need to focus a little more attention on those best customers too. Keep in mind that the average conversion rate (a new sale) from efforts aimed at new customers is less than 1%. The new ones are more price conscious, less likely to come back and pay full price and are going to require a lot of wooing to earn their return.

On the flip side, you have this group of people who has already made it clear that they choose you. They’re already in the habit of spending money with you and like how you conduct business. These are people worth investing in.

Whether you call it a loyalty program or just put together a marketing plan aimed at making your best customers feel your appreciation and love – it will pay off. This shouldn’t be a generic effort. You need to do a little homework so you actually create something of value.

First, identify who your best customers are: This sounds silly. Of course you know, right? Actually, I’ll bet there will be some surprises. Crunch the numbers to identify your best customers.

Spend some time thinking about them: Don’t just assume you know what perks or added value would mean the most to your loyal clients. Or better yet – ask them. Come up with a list of options and find out which would really put their buying into overdrive and make you their only choice of vendors.

Keep it simple: Don’t make them carry a card, memorize a customer number or jump through hoops to take advantage of your program. The average American belongs to 18 rewards programs, so your goal is to make yours the best in terms of value and the easiest in terms of use.

Do some testing and tracking: Don’t assume you’ll get it exactly right the first go around. You absolutely need to track which aspects of your effort are gaining traction and which are falling flat. Adjust accordingly.

Spread the word: Once you have it working well, you want to invite others to join. A loyalty program has two core benefits. First, it rewards your best customers and encourages them to spend more. The other benefit is that it can entice your average customer to increase their activity level.

One of the biggest marketing mistakes most businesses make is they don’t pay enough attention to their best customers because they’re too busy chasing new ones. Don’t make that mistake – it could cost you more than you want to spend.

 

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9 Keys to Wicked Awesome Landing Pages

May 5, 2012

Note from Drew:  Every once in awhile I like to open up the blog to a guest with a depth of expertise that I think you’ll benefit from.  Here’s Jason Well’s take on landing pages.

A few weeks ago I spoke at SES New York about mobile PPC and SEO. I touched briefly on mobile landing pages.

After the presentation one of the attendees walked up to me and said, “thanks for covering mobile landing pages, but most people still need help on their standard landing pages.”

He was right.

Especially in the B2B world, ‘regular’ landing pages are still critical.

While keeping in mind that no landing page is perfect, there are a few simple (and not so simple) rules to creating wicked awesome landing pages.

  1. Goal – When you create a landing page what is your goal? Do you want people to download a White Paper, schedule a demo, or call you on the phone? This goal should be clearly defined and obvious to the visitor at-a-glance. Everything on that landing page should work to accomplish that goal.
  2. Headline – The headline of your landing page needs to be short and precise. That is all.
  3. Brief Copy –There is a rule that journalists use that marketers should also apply. The rule is this: use the fewest words necessary to get your point across.
  4. Call-to-Action – What do you want a visitor to do on your landing page? (Remember our discussion about goals above). This call-to-action should be crystal clear. (Think blatant, obvious and simple).
  5. Options – You don’t want to necessarily mandate that your visitors fill out a form. Give them options. Place your phone number in prominent locations on the landing page so they can call you, if they prefer.
  6. Fields – The other day I visited a landing page that stunk. It was terrible. Why? Because they wanted me to fill out 16 information fields! 16! Now, there is no perfect number for form fields. But one thing iscertain: 16 is way too many.
  7. Testing – You should A/B test every element of your landing pages. Place phone numbers in difference locations. Change and tweak specific form fields. Change copy and headlines. Test and refine. (Everyone knows they should do this, but most people don’t).
  8. ‘Retreat’ Offers – If someone doesn’t want to sign up for a demo on your landing page, for example, give them the option to download a White Paper when they leave.
  9. Metrics – Most marketers know what percentage of visitors to their landing pages are converting. (i.e. how many people are filling out a form to download a product or see a demo). But does your conversion rate include people who called you as a results of your landing page? Does your conversion rate count those people who +1 you after visiting your landing page? Including those ‘other metrics’ in your conversion rate will give you a more complete picture of how effective your landing page actually is.

Bio: Jason Wells is the CEO of ContactPoint. Their new product, LogMyCalls, represents the next generation of intelligent call tracking and marketing automation. Prior, Jason served as the Senior Vice President of Sony Pictures, where he led the creation and international expansion of Sony’s international mobile business line from London.

Jason holds an MBA from the Wharton School of Business at the University of Pennsylvania.

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