I’ve been doing a lot of thinking about change. A friend and former colleague recently said in an email, “isn’t this an incredible time to be in the business of marketing. The entire game is changing right before our eyes!!!!”
He is absolutely right. There has never been a more exciting time to be in marketing. There has also never been a more important time to be cautious of getting swept along by the emerging technologies. We need to let the analytics drive where we need to incorporate new media, not the other way around.
Many marketers are realigning the mix of tools and the money allocated to each. There is nothing wrong with that. In fact, as marketers, it is our job to constantly use analytics to assess the effectiveness of each tool in our arsenal.
The need for caution is to not forget your customer. What segment of your audience provides the bulk of your revenue? Your net income? Who are they? Where do they get their information? How do they make their buying decisions? How can you engage them?
Analytics takes you half of the way there. We all should have demographics and even psychographics on our customer base. And it should be updated frequently. But more important, how well do we know our customers on an individual level? Databases give us the opportunity to craft our message on an individual basis.
Is Jane Smith a retired teacher that prefers to receive a nicely crafted letter with her favorite charity’s request for donation? She is in a rural location and doesn’t have high speed internet access.
Or has she indicated that she prefers to receive her renewal request via email because she would rather you not waste the paper? Anyway, she has been paying her bills online for years.
As a marketer, how do you tell the difference just knowing her age and gender? You don’t. But you can ask her. She will be happy to let you know. When you honor her request, you have solidified your relationship by asking the question, and taking action on the answer.
The emerging technologies will only get stronger with the coming years. That’s a given. But the old technologies of snail mail and email will still be with us for many years to come. Let’s not forget where we make the bulk of the sales/donations/redemptions in all the excitement.