Ten steps in a customer management plan

comtov travel L

Step 1

Understanding customer behavior. This stage is divided into two parts :

  1. A. Understanding the reasons for choosing/preferring – what are the reasons and motives that influence customers to choose or prefer one brand over the other. Here it is customary to examine several options:
  • Innovation – creates a sense of quality and up-to-dateness. Some customers are very impressed with these types of signals.
  • Personalization – a personal offer at the price or product level favorably affects the perception of the exhibitor company
  • Lack of information about alternatives – Some segments start the selection process with very little information about alternatives.
  • Brand affinity – In many cases, customers come to the selection process with a sense of sympathy and closeness to a particular brand. This phenomenon is usually due to long-term and continuous switching activities.
  • Unique marketing – smart market moves – mainly on social networks – influence preference or choice.
  • Unique UI/UX – Companies that manage to create differentiation at the users interface and users experience level in a good position in the battle for attention level and a struggle for the preferences of potential customers.
  • Pricing – A certain cluster of customers will always put the price parameter at the top of their priority list. This high-price-sensitive segment will be affected by the price more than any other parameter.
  1. Understanding the consumer ecosystem. Customers are affected by environmental changes that must also be considered in building the work plan.

– Consumers now have a lot of supply options

– Environmental noise of content and suggestions

– Limited attention level

– All this on a given budget

Step 2

Tracking consumer changes on the timeline can be very helpful in building an effective work plan:

Customer expectations and triggers – change over time and influence brand preference and selection.

Changes in the situation and competitors’ offers – the market and product evolution of competitors should be constantly monitored.

Changes in the way consumers gather information and are affected (new platforms) – this figure is dynamic and changes over time. For example, the migration of peoples of young people from Facebook to younger networks (Instagram, TikTok, etc.) requires brands to update their set of activities and media strategy.

– Changes in factors affecting consumers – location, brand speed, service

Step 3

Defining a customer management strategy

Option 1: Conquest strategy – continuous attack on competitors’ customers and the conquest of “newcomers to the market” (usually young people). This strategy requires significant investment in advertising, search engine optimization, demand harvesting and personal sales offers to a predetermined target audience. This option is characterized by a media mix based on “fast” media/vehicles of marketing (performance-based advertising on social networks, Google and mobile)

Option 2: Developing long-term relationships with existing customers. This option deepens the activity with existing customers in the hope of reaching the social circles surrounding those customers. The resonance box strategy is based on the creation of content and attractions that are addressed to our customers and regularly distributed on social networks. We hope to get most of the distribution from our customers. This strategy is based on deeper and slower marketing vehicles – investing in organic marketing, investing in original and dynamic content, long-term activity with micro-influencers, etc.

Option 3 : A combination of  Conquest strategy  and relationship (expensive option)

Step 4

Before starting the stage of the activity itself it is useful to define for yourself in which category you operate , and this by creating a DNA profile of the category based on 7 parameters:

– Low / high engagement – what kind of engagement your category is characterized by, is it possible to improve engagement or create an emotional connection to the brand or shopping experience – emotional connection

–Does your category tend to preliminary research / or consumers do not tend to study before purchasing

How will you help the consumer learn? What type of content? What platforms will help you in this task?

– What is the engagement frequency that characterizes your category – high / low

How can I crowd touch frequency? This is not a buying frequency but a frequency of contacts / exposure

– Is your category characterized by spontaneous / planned purchase

What is the market plan for harvesting demand? How do we create long-term preference among customers who purchase in a planned format.

DNA Map will help you produce a long-term plan that takes into account the characteristics of the category :

For example: Categories with low engagement frequency can improve performance by creating content that is relevant to customers for the period between touch and touch. The more frequent the contact, the more significant relationships with customers can be reached.

Step 5

Setting goals on. It is customary to examine five goals on possibilities.

You can choose several goals and focus on activity components that should support your chosen goal/goals.  

  • Building a base of potential customers with a high level of attention (Build audience)
  • Building a customer base on which to gather purchase-based information (Build users base)
  • Build relationships
  • Focus on measurable business parameters (Build consistent revenue AOV/APF)
  • Building a group of brand promoters (Build promoters’ group)

Step 6

Components of the program and the content of the activity:

  1. Continuous dialogue to support a long-term relationship

–Instant gratifications personal offers.

3.Micro-segmentation and customer hierarchy

  1. Extreme conservation activities to prevent abandonment (closing back door defense activities).
  2. Product strategy – including personal products and selection of supply tactics:

Choice (super selection) and convenience (grab and go

Step 7

Enhancing program performance by creating a five-dimensional persona profile

Demographic-gender, age, marital status, location,

Professional – workplace, specialization, experience, income

Psychographic–approaches, perceptions, brand affinity, brand loyalty, goals, interests

Step 8

Improving program performance through the use of existing customers. This stage considers that the visitors to our digital store or the brand’s digital assets in social networks, generate a depth of information and data that may be the basis for the activity of reaching and persuasion with our customers.

It is advisable to divide our digital store users into four groups

Visitors, interested, near buyers (those who added a product to the shopping cart but did not complete the purchase) and the last group, is the buyers – those who have completed at least one purchase (you have information about their purchase history) each group of segmentation you have made, will receive different messages, different products and different offers.

Step 9

Improve program performance through the use of interested customersin Market Audience

They are consumers and potential customers who actively at a given time are looking for and/or comparing different products and services in your category. The search process is usually done through search engines (Google, Amazon), clicking on ads and during dialogue on social networks. This audience can be divided into three clusters:

– Interested – in general in the field of your category

– Hesitate – usually between several alternatives before buying

– Ready for a decision. they are doing a more in-depth evaluation of your product. This is the most contemporary audience and where most of the attempts are made to “harvest demand” – mainly through search engine marketing activity.

Step 10

In-depth activity with loyal customers

There are a number of indications by which we can locate these loyal customers:

  1. Repeat Purchases – Consumers who return to buy your products organically, without new Marketing efforts on your part. At the same time in this area it is worth producing a work plan that will improve the frequency of shopping in other words a set of activities for improving APF – Average Purchase Frequency

The average buying frequency per customer is a necessary condition for business success but also extremely important for the field of consumer loyalty. Loyalty studies indicate that consumers do not perceive themselves as loyal to a brand unless they have shopped at least five times from that brand’s catalog.

There are a number of its activities that may be integrated into a work plan for this purpose:

– Valuable content that stimulates consumers to come to your store and reduces the gaps between purchases.

–  Group purchases

– Family promotions

– Transportation products such as personal coupons and long-term loyalty programs with attractive stairs

  1. Low price sensitivity – One of the things that predicts consumer loyalty is the inverse relationship between your market share and the price of your products. Consumers who insist on buying your product or service despite your relatively high price are consumers with loyalty potential

In order to maintain this kind of inverse relationship, it is advisable to create for consumers a value that goes beyond the product itself. Usually it is about creating branded, personal, dynamic and continuous content. Content and value build the foundation for a real relationship that allows the brand to skip the difficulties resulting from a high relative price

  1. SPOQ – Social Proof Of Quality . How much your consumers are involved in promoting your brand by sharing their experiences and distributing their recommendations and opinions about your products.

To improve this index, it is necessary to stimulate the users of your assets to write and share.

How to do it? Develop inviting and user-friendly response areas on your website and app, offer customers attractive rewarding programs for active brand advocates, and no less importantly – use customer comments and recommendations as the main content in your campaigns. Spread their experiences on social media and in your advertising activity. It’s the kind of messaging that works best for brands in the short and long term