This article originally appeared in the Sept. issue of CUSTOMER magazine.
During these tough economic times, it’s not enough for a direct marketing partner to just answer the calls or send mass mailings; it takes creativity to generate ROI. Today, more than ever it’s critical for a company to partner with a company that has the ability to use Business Intelligence and technology when managing customer retention, acquisition and customer service programs to generate a greater ROI for your marketing dollar.
Leveraging your call center’s data
There have been great advances in the way consumer information is collected and applied, especially in the contact center environment. Every time a customer contacts you, makes a purchase or responds to a direct mail campaign, they are telling you something. Through data acquisition, you have the unique opportunity to listen to them.
The more data you collect, the better you can pinpoint customer need and use it to enhance the customer experience.
It’s not enough for a call center partner to have the data; it’s knowing what to do with it that produces a higher ROI. Using demographic, psychographic and transactional data is critical to maximizing the possibilities for creativity in a phone call or direct mail campaign.
On the phone, using data and technology to determine service level differentiations and boost conversion rates, improve customer service and customize real-time scripts will increase customer value and drive long-term growth. Transactional data, which is the historical purchase and call data on a household, can be used to determine best time to call strategies, up-sell and cross-sell opportunities as well reduce churn.
In direct mail, you can use data to create customized messages that speak directly to the individual. Online, you can generate personalized URLs so every customer receives a one-to-one Web experience. The opportunities to positively enhance the consumer experience by leveraging data are endless.
Capitalizing on your resources
During this economic downturn, customers are careful how they spend their money, so it is important to know what they want. With a little creativity from your direct marketing partner, you can create a message that is relevant to your customer and produces a higher ROI for your company.
A perfect example of how applying consumer data can drive ROI is a program InfoCision (News - Alert) worked on with a leading wireless provider that was looking for a more cost-effective way of recognizing and retaining customers. Their existing strategy was sending a single-channel, direct mail piece to almost all of its 30 million customers, which was leading to increased cost and diminishing retention rates.
They turned to InfoCision for suggestions on cost savings and increased retention.
With the client spending $130 to save just one customer, InfoCision knew there was plenty of room for improvement. InfoCision’s account management team, along with our Business Intelligence Group, designed a three-tiered retention strategy using text messaging, direct mail and phone. The goal of the program was also threefold – to increase retention, increase ROI and decrease renewal traffic to their retail stores, which are primarily used for acquisition.
Long story short, by using the big data already at our disposal, our Business Intelligence Group developed a criteria and an application to accurately identify and filter the client’s customer database.
We were able to save over 150,500 customers, nearly 60 percent more customers out of those who would have abandoned the provider. With a dramatically lower cost to save each customer – $14.65 compared to $130 – the return on investment increased significantly. The increased sales revenue realized from the saved customers was an impressive $161,837,687 compared to $96,130,800 prior to the campaign.
The bottom line is that customer care will continue to expand in scope and grow more challenging as we move into the future. By integrating consumer data and technology, you can build outstanding interactions that will enhance brand value and drive a higher ROI.
The bottom line is that customer care will continue to expand in scope and grow more challenging as we move into the future. By integrating consumer data and technology, you can build outstanding interactions that will enhance brand value and drive a higher ROI.
Edited by Braden Becker
