How to Treat your Customers

For businesses the fact cannot be avoided that the customer is the livelihood of the entire business. One cannot put a price on the information about the customer in relation to their wants, needs, spending habits, feedback, and other pertinent information that would be invaluable to any business. The growing trend of Customer Relationship Management has shed some light on just how vital knowing the customer is to any business.

This article will explore not only how valuable it is to know your customer, but also how valuable it is to know what kind of customers they are. An overlooked fact is that often a small percentage of customers account for a big amount of business revenue (this especially holds true for small to medium-sized businesses). These customers are highly valued by businesses, but they are not the only type of customer that composites the entire customer base. There are the good, the bad, and the ugly amongst the profiles of customers, and it will be beneficial to know who is who.

Defining the Customer

Depending on the nature of your business, you may have different ways that aid you in defining a good from a bad customer. A good customer may spend loads of money, provides great word of mouth, or simply does not cause any 'waves.' A bad customer may be labeled as one who is more trouble than they are worth (speaking figuratively and monetarily). These are examples of two extremes and identification is not so easy for the rest who fall within the wide range of the customer spectrum.

Find out who the best customers are. Once you get a hold of what makes for your best customer, then you can use this information to gauge one customer from the next. You will be able to focus on formulating strategies that will produce and influence other customers to follow suit. Finding information on customers can be a tricky business, but it is not impossible. Businesses that provide CRM software will be of paramount value if you do not have the resources in-house to perform the tasks.

The Ways to Acquaint Yourself with the Customer

There are different avenues to take in order to getting to know your current customers: geographic locale, demographics, and purchase history.

Geographic Locale
Many people live in the same area as others who can be seen as comparable consumers. Purchasing behavior is highly consistent amongst people who live in nearby areas.

Demographics
Parameters that describe a consumer can be broken down into categories of sex, age, education, income, occupation, marital status, and family size. Information about consumers can be referenced and cross-referenced for marketing analysis.

Purchase History
You can more easily differentiate between the good, the bad, and the ugly by peering into the purchase history of consumers. You want to look into factors such as how much they spend, how much they spend with you, and how often they spend with you.

When you pool your information about present customers with the factors of location, demographics, and purchase history, you will gain access to a better view of who the most profitable customers are to your business. An interesting aspect that is often overlooked is that businesses with a common thread (ex: a surfboard company and surf-company) can offer to sell or exchange customer lists to expand their clientele.

"My name is Sherlock Holmes. It is my business to know what other people don't know."

Collecting Information

Depending on the nature of your business, you can collect data about customers in different ways. A smaller business with a minute sized clientele can option on meeting with them face-to-face via lunches, outings, or other business related events. For bigger businesses with larger numbers of clients this would not be practical, but the individualized approach should not be disbanded.

Customer surveys through mailings or emails can be an easy way to gather information on current consumers and potential ones. Direct mailing or sending postcards can provide a personalized touch and is often overlooked as a means of earning information. Find a reputable marketing consultants if you do not have the in-house resources to gather the information.

Characteristics of the Consumer

It is of essential importance to study the consumer. Here is a marketing anecdote performed by a small business: The business hired a local artist to paint a huge mural of the city and the surrounding areas on a wall in the store. After each consumer's purchase the cashiers had them write their name on a small cutout of a house and place it on the mural in coordination with where they lived in the city. After about a month, the business started to gain an idea of where most of their business was coming from. So they knew that this area housed their best customers, but they wanted to gain the attention of the other areas as well. What they did was send out coupons to the other areas encouraging them to come into the store. The customers that came into the store toting the coupons were easily identifiable as new consumers and were treated accordingly. To make a successful story short, the business turned a novel idea into more revenue. The purpose of relating the story is that a business should always seek to know their customer and then accentuate on that knowledge.