Through our time together we have covered the sophisticated techniques available in B2B marketing. So far, we have only considered those on the grandest of scales. No doubt some of you will be working in smaller businesses and scratching your head questioning how it’s possible to apply these theories to maximise your more limited budgets. Therefore, this month’s column is dedicated to just that, effective database marketing for a small business on a small budget. The following steps should be applicable to any company, large or small.
1. Information management: Let’s start with the basics whether you are spending thousands or millions of pounds, there are still fundamentals. Crucially, it is all centred on how you manage your information inhouse. Companies tend to hold various pieces of information about customers in different systems, but to gain an overall picture, this data needs to be centralised. Investing a proportion of your marketing budget here is necessary and will pay dividends down the line. Although this sounds simple, consider that different departments may be storing information in bespoke databases; therefore, consolidation creates headaches, and is often a slow process.
2. Formulating a strategy: This will help you avoid data consistency problems going forward and is relatively inexpensive, but does need commitment and focus. The data strategy helps to put data and the customer at the heart of your organisation. Amongst other things, it defines what and how data is collected and how it’s maintained dynamically using all touch points and resources to build in quality. If adopted correctly, all of your business information will be held in a unified manner.
3. Hygiene: Once centralised, the data will need to be cleaned and made fit for purpose. This can be relatively inexpensive as most of it will be done by computers. Once completed, you then need to enhance your data. At this stage you can select the level you wish to work towards.
4. Enhance: Enhance this with only the information that you need to hold, for selection, segmentation and targeting. This might include SIC, GIC code, size of business or number of employees. This information is needed for the next stage of the process.
5. Profiling: Profiling developed on the attributes added by enhancement will enable you to gain a clear picture on the types of customers you have, strengths and weaknesses and, significantly, where your sales opportunities are. For example when your customers reach a certain size do they upgrade from product A to B, or is it when they reach a certain turnover?
6. Strategy: With this information you are now in a position to develop a basic strategy for your customers. I am sure you are already maintaining regular communication, but now you are equipped with the knowledge for the communication to contain the correct message. Email is a fantastic and cost-effective medium, but ensure you have permission be prepared to ask customers what their preferred channel is; not everyone likes the intrusive nature of email.
To have reached this stage, you will have made some investment in preparation and hopefully have retained some for execution of campaigns! For your business to expand you need to fill your sales pipeline; therefore, you need to invest in attracting your prospects too this costs money.
7. Segmentation and prospecting: In order to understand who your prospects are, you need to look at the information learnt from your customers. At a basic level they should sit in certain segments, for example the size of the business when it comes on board, if they are only from certain locations.
There is only a finite universe for you to work within, and when working on a tight budget, it is crucial you understand this. Spending a lot of money on buying-in data will not provide you with success. New data is important but it has to be right; it is essential that you purchase from experts as they will be able to guide you through the maze of the thousands of lists available. In my opinion, a good place to start would be the media and subscription lists.
As with your customers, place your prospects in segments (SIC, size, GIC, etc.) and create a proposition and communication strategy for each group. Try alternative channels including email (subject to the correct permissions). Prospects take time to convert; it’s unlikely you’ll do it at first hit.
8. Evaluating results: What is important when working with limited budgets is that you review every campaign. Look at the quality of the leads coming back and make sure they fit the profile of a customer. If a campaign has not produced the leads, ask why? Did the creative engage with the intended audience, did it contain the right message? Was there a call-to-action and did you give the recipient a reason for responding? All these are crucial questions and do have an implication on success.
In this day and age with customers becoming very marketing-savvy it is an oversight not to look at adopting the new approaches the industry is now offering. However, for many businesses, budgets may not be able to stretch. Obviously campaigning is important, but my advice is to view data management and quality as a must.
