Core review CRM:

Chapter 3
1. What are the four key components of CRM strategy? Briefly describe each
component.
2. What are the key steps in implementing CRM?
3. What structural changes must an organization undertake to switch from a product
to a customer orientation? Should companies start investing in such structural
changes?

1/ Explain the rise of CRM ? What are key driving forces behind the Use of CRM ( rise of
Data Driven Marketing) Why we need to manage Customer relation?
2/ Which Technology influence strategic CRM, on both consumer and the company
sides ?
3/ Why Does A Company Need CRM programs?
4/ What are the business case ? Reasons to adopt CRM strategy in your Companies ?
5/ How CRM act as s strategic marketing tool?
6/ State the areas of CRM focused?
7/ Different level of CRM . Briefly explain the CRM applications in Sales / Marketing/
Customer services.

Chapter 5& 6
1. How will you use lift charts to determine future marketing action?
2. What is the link between customer lifetime value and the profitability of an
organization?
3. What is the Past Customer Value?
4. What is the basic lifetime value (LTV) model?
5. How to calculate the acquisition rate?
6. How to calculate the Average Inter-Purchase Time?
7. What is the Survival Rate?
8. What is the Size of Wallet?
Read 1:

10 Steps to a Successful CRM

Migration
Sandy MooreApril 13, 2021
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Have you decided to move to a new customer relationship management (CRM) platform
and want to ensure the migration process is successful? This is smart thinking, and
knowing that you aren’t the first person to go through this process can be quite helpful
and reassuring. In addition, you may have heard horror stories about a CRM migration
process that didn’t go very smoothly, and you want to avoid the same pitfalls with your
project.

Let’s discuss the steps to executing a successful CRM migration and all the angles to
consider throughout your project.

1. Buy-In
Before you get started with your CRM migration project, get buy-in from your executive
team, key stakeholders, the sales team, and anyone else who may need to be involved
and that has decision authority for the project. It is easier to ensure the success of your
project if you have internal champions and collaboration from your team members. In
addition, gaining buy-in and approval from the leadership team is the key to receiving
budget approvals and the team’s time commitment to complete the project.

To gain buy-in, you’ll want to have conversations about and answers for the following
topics:
  What is the reason for change?

 What are we gaining from the CRM migration?

 Will there be a cost savings?

 Can we bundle software solutions?

2. Analysis
After you gain buy-in from key stakeholders, start to interview users of the CRM (this is
typically the sales team). Ask them questions about the current CRM to determine what
is currently working and what isn’t. Examine their pain points within the current CRM,
and dive into why things aren’t working as they should. From there, you can start to put
together a wish list of features for the new CRM.

3. Planning
For a successful CRM migration, it is important to plan, plan, and plan again. Start
comparing CRM solutions that make sense for your company based on the wish list you
developed from interviewing team members. Create a document that details the
potential CRM solutions, with pros and cons for each one.

As you narrow down your selection to the preferred CRM, outline who needs to be
involved. You should be able to determine who will be involved, what they will need to
do and why they need to do it.

4. Preparation
Once you select the new CRM solution, begin the data cleansing process. Keep in mind
that if you have incorrect data in the current CRM, you don’t want to carry that over to
the new CRM. Now is the time to begin the data clean-up process.

Work with your team to correct errors and remove outdated and duplicate information
in the old CRM. Find ways to create data standardization, and make sure you fully
understand field mappings, data differences (e.g., number versus string fields, single line
text versus multi-line text), and the difference in data storage between the old and the
new CRM. Doing the prep work before the CRM migration will make the transfer of data
easier and less time-consuming to clean up after the migration is complete.

5. Customization
It can be rare to find an out-of-the-box CRM solution that meets all the needs of your
organization. Customization of the CRM is usually inevitable. As you evaluate the new
CRM capabilities, determine what may be missing within the platform. This could include
non-standard fields, contact/dashboard views and team permissions.

Start to set up the custom fields and any additional items needed before you begin the
migration process, to avoid errors. It is important to note that you can always add
additional customization at a later stage, but outlining immediate needs for the migration
will be key to successfully transferring the data.

6. Tools
There may be several tools and resources available to make the CRM migration less
tedious. Look for options to help you bulk update data when possible.

In addition, determine how the data needs to be transferred. Will you need to do an
export/import of data, or is data transferred at the code level? By utilizing the right tools,
you may make the CRM migration run smoothly and secure the integrity of the data.

7. Test
It is a smart idea to test the data within the new CRM before you do the complete
migration. Choose a sample size of data and see how it works within the new CRM. This
is usually called a trial run. By performing a trial run, you’ll have the ability to correct any
issues with a smaller data set. You may also choose to change data mappings, field
customization, or anything else needed at this time.
8. Migration
The next step is to execute and complete the migration process. Select a day and time
that won’t cause issues for your organization. Typically, this means selecting a down
period for the organization (i.e., evenings, weekends, or holidays) when there won’t be a
lot of users within the CRM. Choose a date, communicate it to the team and then stick
with it. As the migration is in process, continue to audit the data to ensure everything is
transferring correctly.

9. Implementation
Once the migration is complete, it is important to train your team on how to use the new
CRM. Plan on several training sessions and provide one-on-one support. Make sure your
team is comfortable with the new CRM, and continue to gather feedback to see how
things are working or if anything is missing.

Consider this the user acceptance testing (UAT) phase of the project. It may be a good
idea to run both CRM systems in parallel for 1-2 weeks, until everyone is up and running
on the new CRM.

10. Management
Plan for ongoing maintenance and updates to the new CRM after the migration is
complete. As with any CRM solution, it is best to assign someone as a CRM
administrator to assist with ongoing support and updates to the platform. This could
include software updates, enhancements, communication with team members, and
documentation of updates and changes. The CRM administrator should also be
responsible for communicating with the CRM vendor on behalf of the organization.

Hopefully, these 10 steps will help you complete a successful CRM migration, and you
can gain value from your decision to move forward with a new CRM for your
organization
CRM: Why Does A Company Need It?
April 26, 2021 / By ACE Microtechnology / CRM Software Selection Tips

Customer Relationship Management (CRM) refers to all those strategies and tactics used
by businesses to attract and retain customers. CRM software is responsible for
managing the relationships between an organization and its customers, both existing
and potential. It does this by centralizing all business data for the management's
convenience, developing new techniques to increase sales, and prioritizing customer
satisfaction and welfare above all else.

Two Types of CRM Systems

Before implementing a CRM system in your business, you need to familiarize yourself with
the two types of software that you can use, along with their benefits and drawbacks.

On-Premise CRM

In an on-premises CRM system, there is no involvement of a third party in the workings of a

business. Once a license has been purchased and the software installed, the company
completes continued maintenance and updates. The company can retain complete
ownership and control over its data. While this may take an additional toll on the company's
IT resources, it is suitable for those organizations where data security is of great importance.

Cloud-Based CRM

Cloud-based CRM is where all company data is stored on a server provided by a vendor
who takes full responsibility for managing the system's operation, security, and updates.
Also, employees can access data with a reliable internet connection.

Importance Of CRM

Now that we've covered the basics of CRM let's dive right into what makes this
management software an essential tool for your business.

For starters, CRM helps in streamlining the entire process of interacting with your current
and future clients. It stores vital information, such as scheduled appointments,
communication points, and customer profiles, and helps create sales quotes and business
proposals. This leads to efficiency in the sales and marketing department of your business.

Furthermore, you'll observe a significant improvement in your company's customer service

skills once you implement a CRM system. With only a few clicks, you can explore any
customer profile and gain access to exclusive information, including their personal
preferences, history of purchases and communication, and much more.

CRM is also exceedingly beneficial for the employees of your business. As all the data will be
centralized, different departments will easily access vital information to help them in their
operations. Moreover, the management team will also make effective and informed
decisions to help your corporation efficiently achieve its goals.

Choosing the Right CRM Software

There is a constant debate in the corporate world regarding which CRM software you
should use in your business. There are numerous important factors to keep in mind while
choosing which software you want to invest in.

First, you'll need to look out for the features in various CRM software that are tailored to the
requirements of your organization. Aside from the generalities in each CRM package, there
are different specific functions in some that might be better suited to your business's needs.
As these kinds of software tend to be more expensive, you need to set a realistic budget
beforehand.
You'll also need to choose between the two types of CRM systems we previously discussed:
on-premise and cloud computing. There are several advantages and downsides to both
types which may affect your final decision. If you're interested in the features of both these
systems, you can also deploy a combination of the two. Finally, make sure that the vendor
you acquire your CRM software has a good reputation in the industry.

Best CRM Software for Your Business

With all that being said, what exactly is the best CRM software for your business? One that is
highly recommended by industry professionals and is widely used in the corporate world
is Microsoft Dynamics 365 Customer Engagement. This software is best known for its
advanced features, which give users an in-depth view of customer relationships and
business performance. Here are some of the reasons why you'd want to choose this product
over its competitors:

Integration with Other Microsoft Programs

A vital feature exclusive to Microsoft Dynamics 365 Customer Engagement is its ability to
merge with other Microsoft tools to provide users with optimal functionality. By integrating
with Microsoft Outlook, this software allows you to conveniently carry out your sales or
customer service activities directly from the Outlook application.

Dynamics 365 Customer Engagement also works with Office 365, allowing the use of your
data within Word and Excel, and view your Office, SharePoint, and OneNote documents
alongside the relevant customer data in Dynamics. You can even utilize LinkedIn efficiently
with this software as it allows you to observe and save the LinkedIn profiles of your
customers. It can also generate new prospective client profiles for you based on your search
history.

Displays A Live Sales Dashboard

Microsoft Dynamics 365 Customer Engagement also exhibits a live sales dashboard that
includes revenue and sales charts, graphs, important statistics, and key performance
indicators. With all this information, your sales team can stay up-to-date regarding their
progress and can, consequently, make data-driven decisions that can help them in
establishing a vast, loyal customer base.

Analyze Your Competitors

Great businesses focus not only on their development but also on their competitors'
progress and activities. Microsoft Dynamics 365 Customer Engagement produces detailed
profiles for your competitors, including their strengths and weaknesses and any sales
opportunities you might be competing with - your business can develop a comprehensive
strategy to stay ahead of the competition.

Closing Thoughts

To sum it all up, CRM plays a vital role in establishing and maintaining long-term
relationships with an organization's customers. If you're looking to drive up the sales for
your products, introducing CRM software into your business is going to be a worthwhile
investment. Contact our team at ACE Microtechnology to see a live demo and discuss
how Microsoft Dynamics 365 Customer Engagement can help your business

How CRM Analytics Work

Max Freedman
Business News Daily Contributing Writer

Nov 16, 2020

CRM analytics give your business insights into your customer service and sales
operations. Use this data to make better decisions and maximize customer lifetime value.

 CRM analytics gives you insights about your customers and how well your sales and customer
service teams are reaching them.
 CRM analytics helps you monitor your customer service efforts, validate your customer data,
analyze your customers’ habits and generate better leads.
 You can divide the most important CRM analytics into three larger classes of key data.
 This article is for business owners and marketers looking to understand CRM analytics, what
they track and why they should be tracked.

Even if you believe you’ve come up with the best product or service in the world, you’ll need to
find people who agree enough to buy what you sell. With customer relationship
management (CRM) analytics, you can figure out who’s buying, who might buy soon and how
you can retain your customers. Below, learn more about CRM analytics and why and how your
company should collect them. 
What are CRM analytics?

CRM analytics are data that demonstrate your company’s sales and customer service
performance. CRM analytics also presents customer data that you can use to inform smarter
business decisions. Typically, you’ll use CRM software to obtain CRM analytics and automate
all your data collection and report generation.

Key takeaway: CRM analytics provide insights into your customers and the performance of
your sales and customer service teams.

Benefits of CRM analysis

The primary benefit of CRM analysis is that you can use it to inform your sales, customer service
and marketing processes. You can use your CRM analytics to improve your methods via:

 Customer service evaluations. CRM analytics fill you in on your customer service team’s
performance. If you see figures that your team could improve, implement practices that push
your team toward these goals.

 Accurate customer data. Whether you’re using your customer data for demographic
marketing or email marketing, you need to know whether you’re reaching the right person. CRM
analysis ensures you’re doing just that.

 Thorough customer analytics. How much does your customer usually spend per quarter with
you? Are they buying the same products time and time again, or does it vary? With CRM
analytics, you’ll get firm answers to these questions, and you can use what you learn to refine
your marketing strategies.

 Efficient lead generation. Your CRM analysis can tell you which of your marketing efforts most
strongly correlate to purchases. If you see one approach correlating strongly to purchases but
have only targeted a sliver of your customers with that approach, try that method more – your
sales might increase.

Key takeaway: CRM analysis is beneficial for evaluating customer service, confirming
customer data, analyzing customer behavior and generating leads more efficiently.

What types of CRM analytics should you track?

CRM software platforms offer a wide breadth of measurable analytics. The below metrics are the
most important.

Pre-sale CRM analytics

Much of your relationship with your customer is built before their purchase. After all, how often
does a customer make a purchase without learning about the product (and sometimes your brand
as a whole) first? That’s why the below pre-sale CRM analytics are important to track:

 New leads. Your sales team likely spends lots of time calling potential new customers or, if
applicable, sending proposals. You should track these activities to see how well they convert to
sales.

 Prospects. Even before your sales team identifies leads, they identify prospects. Chances are
they call and email these prospects often as well. Track these activities to determine what is and
isn’t working.

 Personal interactions. It’s one thing to make a call or send an email. It’s another to actually
reach someone. Track data about how many calls or emails actually lead to conversations, how
often these interactions happen and (for phone calls) how long they last. If these conversations
lead to immediate customer action, track that as well.

 Website engagement. Some CRM programs include tools for identifying people who visit your
company website, sign up for your newsletter or engage with you on social media. With this
information in hand, you obtain a whole new batch of potential leads to target. After you first
reach out, you can begin developing a customer relationship and gathering customer data.

 Additional engagement. Free samples and product demos can be great for obtaining first-time
customers. So too is inviting potential new customers to online or in-person events. You should
track how often these approaches convert to sales – doing so can inform future decisions. You
may also want to track this metric per sales rep to determine what underperforming reps could
learn from higher-performing ones to improve.

Post-sale CRM analytics

Once a lead becomes a customer, you can’t guarantee that they’ll stay that way. That’s why
gathering post-sale CRM analytics matters too. The most important post-sale metrics include:

 Problem tracking. Record the problems that your customers raise with your products and fix
recurring ones to achieve maximum customer satisfaction. The fewer active issues a customer
has with your products, the more likely they are to keep buying from you.

 Additional purchases. If you push one product with a lead, they might buy other products too.
In this case, you can use the information you obtain about your customer’s other purchases to
determine which products you’ll market to them in the future.
  Purchasing patterns. If your customer buys your products or services on a subscription basis,
look for consistency or variance in their orders to infer how likely you are to retain them as a
customer. If you sense that this customer might stop purchasing from your company, try to
retain them by offering discounts, promotions or other customer loyalty benefits.

 Segmentation. After a sale, you can analyze just one customer or you can extrapolate your
activity to all your customers. Use post-sales data across many customers to divide your
customers into those most – and least – likely to keep purchasing your product or, better yet,
buy additional products.

 Spending. No two customers spend in exactly the same way. A customer on a monthly
subscription plan worth $10 per month might not impact your revenue as strongly as a customer
who makes an annual $1,500 purchase. Determine each customer’s impact on your revenue to
decide how much resources to allocate to each relationship.

 General project management. When one sale is over, another can begin. Use your CRM’s
project management capabilities to identify key activities such as successful sales so that you
can target your current customers for future purchases, whether of the same product or
another one.

CRM analytics reporting

Alongside your CRM analytics tracking, you should run several reports that compile your
analytics into actionable insights. These reports include:

 Profitability. Turn your spending analytics into reports that show you which customers make the
biggest impact on your revenue and remain the most loyal.

 Sales forecasting. Now that you’re tracking your customers’ purchase activities, you might be
able to predict how many sales you’ll make in future months. For budgeting purposes, this
revenue knowledge can be paramount.

 Sales conversion. How many of those pre-sales leads and prospects actually bought your
products? Find out with sales conversion reports and refocus your sales efforts based on what
your reports tell you.

 Sales cycle. Most sales aren’t made overnight. Use sales cycle reports to learn how long your
team needs to make sales. Once you know how long the process takes, you can structure your
sales and marketing activities accordingly, but keep in mind that your sales timeline may
fluctuate by customer, time of year and other factors.
  Sales pipeline. Speaking of sales cycle reports, the very similar sales pipeline class of reports can
tell you exactly where along the sales funnel your leads are currently located. With this
information, you’ll know who needs what kind of push to go from a lead to a customer.

 Goals. It’s not a complete sales or marketing plan without goals. If you set up your CRM
software to compare your progress to your goals, you can identify gaps and redesign your
campaigns to address these discrepancies.

Key takeaway: You should track several types of pre-sale, post-sale and reporting-based
CRM analytics.

How to track CRM analytics

The many moving parts of CRM are virtually impossible to track without software. That’s why
there are plenty of CRM software platforms available for all kinds of businesses. In addition to
CRM analytics, you should look for CRM software platforms with workflow automation,
extensive third-party integrations and other features mentioned in the Business News Daily list
of features to look for in a CRM solution.

We also name some of our best picks in our guide to choosing CRM software and our reviews of
the best CRM software of 2020. You might encounter a lot of terms that are new to you even
after reading this article’s explanations of CRM analytics – when that happens, consult our CRM
software glossary to make sense of it all. With these resources, you should be well on your way
to easy CRM analytics collection and a stronger, more fruitful sales and marketing approach.

Key takeaway: You should use CRM software platforms to track CRM analytics, and as
you choose the right program for your company, you should look for the factors common
among trustworthy options

Read 2:

6 Steps to a Successful CRM

Implementation

Jordan Beier
Business News Daily Staff

Dec 31, 2020

Learn how to implement CRM software with these six steps to have a successful launch
for both your team and your customers.

 The improved features of CRM software have increased both its complexity and necessity.
 Nearly half of CRM implementation campaigns suffer from improper preparation and misaligned
objectives among internal stakeholders.
 A properly conceived CRM implementation strategy covers the breakdown of its goals, research,
strategy, development and future.
 This article is for small business owners who want to make sure they are taking the right steps
when implementing a new CRM system.

Customer relationship management (CRM) software has evolved from a tool that
helped sales teams store customer data into a multifaceted hub that drives the
technology suite of an entire business. It can add tremendous value to your
company, but how well you integrate it with your preexisting processes will dictate
its effectiveness. The best implementation practices include focusing on your
established goals, employing a dedicated team to lead the implementation, and
offering training opportunities that help employees understand how to use the
software when it launches.

How to implement a CRM system

A CRM platform is an overarching system overhaul, and the scale and detail of its
implementation must match its intended reach. These six key concepts clarify the required
investment and strategies businesses can follow for a successful CRM implementation process. 

1. Set realistic, actionable goals.

You should have a clear and simple vision for your CRM directly related to your most essential
business functions. List your macro targets, write down your overall vision for the CRM's
impact, and pinpoint which CRM features and tools provided will help you achieve them.

A common mistake in seeking out these systems is viewing the platforms as accessories –
extensions, rather than integrations. CRM systems do add new processes and functionality, but
those are perks, not goals. They may even distract from the primary mission. Ask yourself
several guiding questions when considering whether CRM software is appropriate for your
company: Will the new system match the way you do business? Are you trying to streamline a
process, or change it altogether?
"Put the process into the technology," Barton Goldenberg, president of ISM and author of CRM
in Real Time: Empowering Customer Relationships, told Business News Daily. "The software is
nothing more than a … tool that writes the story."

His golden rule? "Process first, people second, technology third."

2. Do your research to find the right CRM solution.

 As the fastest-growing business software, CRM offers an immense field of options. Your
specific mission statement is the most helpful constraint, but cutting down the top three CRMs to
your final choice is far more difficult than narrowing down an oversized list. There is no single
right or wrong answer – this isn't a math test – but some answers are still more correct than
others.

The most important factors in your decision could include pricing, the relevancy of the CRM's
tools to your process, ease of use and available integrations. Keep the initial implementation
simple while maintaining awareness of what future upgrades could entail. A basic but successful
launch is more beneficial in both the short and long term than an overly ambitious
implementation that expands past your scope.

Editor's note: Looking for CRM software? For help finding the right solution for your
business, fill out the below questionnaire to have our vendor partners contact you with free
information.

3. Select a CRM team, with department champions. 

Once you have selected the CRM platform that most closely aligns with your company vision,
you can mobilize the creation unit. This requires a specialized team to complete daily tasks and
steer progress. The team should include these members:

 Project manager (leader)

 Systems developer (installation)
 Data analyst (data migration)
 QA engineer (testing)
 Champions (representatives)

Depending on the scale of your business and CRM implementation, you may need more than one
person filling each role.

Alex Haimann, partner and head of business development at Less Annoying CRM, recommends
a team of champions to vouch for the product and act as intermediaries between upper
management and its daily users.
"At least some representation on that small, exploratory team should be an end-of-the-line
salesperson," he said.

Your champions are well-regarded leaders of each team that will primarily use the CRM.
Haimann considers them one of your best assets in promoting adoption of the CRM among your
full staff, some of whom may be reluctant to alter their daily habits and processes.

"It needs to be communicated that the CRM is a tool that will help all levels within the
organization," Haimann said.

4. Forecast the costs and benefits.

Work with your various teams to forecast the specific effects this CRM will have on your
business during the implementation process, the initial six months after launch as your team
acclimates, and the following 12 months once the CRM is a fixed part of their daily use. 

Some of the most useful reports are cost-benefit analyses and implementation timelines. Be
mindful that production may dip during various stages of the rollout. Resources will be focused
on installation while employees learn new practices, and general expenses can increase
depending on the training and consulting services you select.

These concrete numbers will provide you more exact expectations to help you modify your
actionable goals and achieve buy-in from your executive team. Metrics that demonstrate how
much you expect to improve customer retention and conversion rates will convince even the
most skeptical. But don't dismiss their feedback – they may catch a hidden detail, and that
reluctance could carry over to the other staff when inevitable pain points arise during the
learning process.

5. Migrate and integrate data.

Cleaning your data and migrating it into the new CRM platform will be the longest element of
the implementation. Even an ideal data set of your customers, finances, and messaging services
that contains entirely correct and current information requires several weeks to transfer. Missing
or incorrect data needs to be acquired and fixed, or it will reduce the effectiveness of your CRM.

Goldenberg says to first decide which data is necessary to migrate for you to minimize the costs
and time of working with irrelevant information. He has found that too much data, especially at
launch, becomes a burden on its users.

6. Train the team and test the system.

Once the CRM platform is operational, trust your champions to spearhead training initiatives
with their general staff. By this point, the champions should be familiar with the system, its
benefits, and how to use the tools.
Most CRM offerings include training and consulting programs to enable businesses to get the
most out of their platforms. During this testing phase, assign your IT team to perform quality
assurance tests. Some bugs are inevitable, but you don't want the opening launch to be marred by
many urgent IT fixes while the system is live.

Key takeaway: Follow this six-step plan focused on realistic goals and actionable data to
successfully launch your CRM software with full buy-in from your team.

Importance of CRM implementation

A new CRM system will overhaul many established processes for your team, so your plan must
naturally integrate this new system with your current workflow to prepare employees for its
launch. A proper implementation process minimizes the time needed for employees to become
comfortable with its tools and also mitigates risk.

An unprepared team will be less productive as they juggle learning the system with completing
their daily tasks. Compounding mistakes while employees use the software, such as losing data
or miscommunicating with their team, could harm your revenue and customer relations.

The more segments of your business the CRM touches, the more extensive an implementation
strategy you require. Nearly half of CRM implementations fail to meet expectations, and
installing a CRM system without a detailed strategy can lead to confusion, corrupted data,
unhappy staff, and crippled productivity as employees work backward to understand an
unfamiliar system.

Key takeaway: Your team may use the CRM system incorrectly without the necessary
training and resource investment to learn its features and practices, which limits the value
of the entire purchase, if not outright damaging your bottom line.

How long does CRM implementation take?

The timeline for the implementation of a new CRM system depends on the size of the business
and its various departments. However, most small businesses can expect implementation to last
one to three months. Other key variables include which CRM solution you choose, whether you
hire outside assistance in data migration and system testing, any training or consulting programs
the CRM provider offers, and the quality and quantity of data you currently possess.

Resist the temptation to attempt the different tasks concurrently. CRM can bring sweeping
changes to even the most basic processes of your business, and missing any steps could sabotage
the entire process. Map out exactly when and how the steps and training should occur to hit the
ground running at launch – after what will likely be a period of slower productivity as resources
are spread.
Key takeaway: CRM implementation usually takes between one and three months.
Complete each step individually, without rushing any aspects.

Common CRM implementation mistakes to avoid

Doing too much too soon

Overcomplication can alter the focus of a CRM so that it solves the wrong issue. Haimann
suggests a narrow scope. "Put serious emphasis on your top three or top five significant
priorities."

Don't attempt to achieve the primary goal of every department or user. There will always be
opportunities to upgrade your system in the future if you start the right way. Changing course is
much harder after losing time, resources, and potentially your team's trust after a difficult launch.

Losing team support

Although you see the bigger picture, you are probably less involved in the system's day-to-day
use than your team is. Listen to feedback and appreciate it. Empathize with employees reluctant
to change practices they may have used for years.

Goldenberg emphasizes a "3X factor" to show daily users the effectiveness of a CRM. Whenever
a user inputs a piece of data, "that user must get three valuable pieces of information back to be
motivated to use the system." A user who consistently sees the advantages of using the software
will recognize its usefulness. 

Forgetting the purpose of a CRM

A CRM platform is a tool to help your team solve problems; it can't solve the problems itself.
Remember that the purpose of a CRM is to empower the team, not for the team to empower the
software. Adherence to that golden rule will keep your decisions throughout the process focused
on the proper objectives. [Check out our recommendations for the best CRM systems for
small businesses.]

Key takeaway: Avoid common mistakes such as overcomplicating a launch process and

forgetting that the goal of CRM is to function as a solution for the team, not for the team to
power the CRM

8 Steps to Creating a CRM Strategy for Your

Business
 

What is a CRM strategy?

A Customer Relationship Management strategy is a plan to grow sales and improve customer
service through a combination of processes, actions, and technology. It typically involves the
sales, marketing, and customer service functions of a business.

What was once the traditional buyer-seller model has shifted from transactional to
customer-centric. Customer relationships today require higher levels of maintenance,
which is why businesses now have entire CRM strategies dedicated to managing them.
One of the reasons is that consumers have bigger expectations than ever when it comes to
customer service. They’re not going to think twice about going elsewhere if yours isn’t up to
scratch.

When we hear the words ‘CRM strategy’, we’re inclined to think about CRM software. But
software is only one piece of a much larger puzzle.

The best customer relationship management strategy incorporates both people and software.

Stay tuned for our comprehensive 8-step guide to developing a CRM strategy for your business.

What will CRM strategy do

for my business?
There a number of reasons why your business needs a CRM strategy.
A good CRM strategy will help you:

 Provide an enjoyable customer experience at all touchpoints of the customer journey

 Strengthen collaboration between sales, marketing, and customer service teams
 Clearly and quickly identify the most worthwhile leads and opportunities 
 Keep track of your leads and customers as they move through the buyer funnel
 Carry out targeted marketing campaigns 
 Produce concrete figures and data insights to inform and guide your future business strategies

How to create a CRM

strategy from zero
There are 8 essential steps to follow when creating a CRM strategy from scratch. 

Step 1: Define your CRM strategy vision and

goals
The first thing to do before creating a CRM strategy is to revisit your overall business strategy
and high-level business goals.  

Create a vision of what you want to achieve from the CRM strategy. That way it has a clear
purpose from the very beginning. 

Think about how you want to contribute to the success of your business.

Increased customer satisfaction, higher productivity and efficiency, and decreasing customer
churn rates are all examples of common CRM strategy goals.
Remember, your CRM strategy is not an end in itself. It exists to drive business goals. So you
need to integrate it into the overall strategy of the business.

Step 2: Define your target customer with

buyer personas
 Source
Create a buyer persona that represents your ideal customer. Make it as detailed as
possible. Include information such as demographic and behavioral characteristics, as well as
interests, challenges, and aspirations.
Here are some research methods you can use:

 Interview your sales and customer service teams 

 Study different customer profiles and even interview customers directly
 Send customer surveys
To maintain strong customer relationships and attract quality leads, you need to understand
exactly who is purchasing from you and why.
Having a clearly defined buyer profile is essential to becoming a customer-centric business. It’s
key to ensuring your teams are focused on the true needs and expectations of your customers.

That’s not all. Knowing exactly who to target will also ensure your sales and marketing don’t
waste time on unsuitable leads.
Step 3: Define your customer journey

Customer journey example from GCH Hotel Group (source)

To master customer relationship management, you need to know each and every step of the
customer journey. Then you need to ensure a top notch customer experience at each of those
touchpoints.

Start at the beginning.

Map every single customer interaction from the moment they first discover you. It might be
through digital ad campaigns, email marketing, direct contact with team members, or other
processes.
This is where you’ll highlight areas for improvement and establish who is responsible for what.

When mapping each stage of the buyer journey, ask yourself:

 Which team/process is interacting with the customer at that moment?

 How can these interactions be improved?
  Look at the buyer personas developed in Step 2. Based on what you know about your customer, is
this his or her preferred means of communication? Could there be a more effective way to get
your message across?
 What’s the customer trying to achieve?
 What challenges does the customer face? How can you offer better support?
 What content is the customer coming into contact with?

Step 4: Establish the processes for a 360°

customer experience
Your CRM strategy planning so far should have highlighted the areas that need improvement.

Now you’re going to look at the structure of your internal processes. Do you have the resources
in place to provide a 360-degree customer experience?
Do an audit of roles and responsibilities to check all the necessary bases are being covered .

Here are examples areas to optimize processes:

 Presales: How are you doing when it comes to analyzing customer needs, gathering information,
and putting together business cases?
 Sales processes: What sales tasks can be automated to increase efficiency?
 Customer relationship management: Are your offers tailored to your customers’ needs? Are
your communications personalized and relevant?
 After-sales: Have you got the necessary support systems in place to resolve customer problems
quickly? What feedback do you receive on the quality of your customer service?
In short, ask yourself ‘How can I do it better?’ and then make the necessary changes within your
organization.

Step 5: Study the market and know your

positioning
It’s always a good idea to look to the competitive landscape for inspiration when developing
CRM strategies.

Ask yourself:

 Where does your company fit into the market?

  What is your unique selling proposition (i.e. what makes you different from others in your
space?)
 How do your competitors differentiate themselves?
 What opportunities exist?
 Can you learn anything about how your competitors handle customer relationships?
 What are the trends in your industry right now?

Step 6: Knowing your product or service

Take the time to revise and develop your product/service narrative and elaborate your value
proposition.

What are the messages you want to transmit? What benefits do you want to highlight? Why
should a customer choose you over your competitors?

Communicate this narrative internally and implement employee training where necessary.

Everyone needs to be on the same page, relaying the same message.
This is also a good opportunity to define your brand tone of voice and put in place best practice
guidelines for communicating with customers.

Step 7: Invest in CRM software

One of the best ways to drive forward your CRM strategy is to invest in a CRM software for
your business.

It’s great for collaborating between teams, storing customer data and keeping track of all
interactions between you.
Define your CRM software needs by evaluating your existing business processes and getting
input from teams.

The main factors to be considered when choosing a CRM software are price, capabilities, and
ease of use. It’s also important that your CRM can integrate with your existing tools. 

Marketing integrations aren’t an issue with Sendinblue’s CRM as it’s part of the all-in-one
marketing platform. If you already use Sendinblue for marketing, campaign history will appear
in contact profile along with engagement metrics.

You can also set task reminders and send emails directly from the contact profile page.

Good news – Sendinblue’s CRM feature is now available on the free plan! ? Sign up and test-
drive it today. No credit card required.

Once you have the software, you need to define rules for using it. Designate an admin to manage
user access. When and how will your teams use this software?

You also have to define what constitutes a lead, prospect, or opportunity, etc.

It’s a good idea to put in place a pilot committee that’ll be responsible for training people how to
use the CRM software.
Remember to clean your contact list before importing it so that you’re starting off with an
organized and up to date database.

Further reading: 5 Ways CRM Software Boosts Customer Experience for Small Businesses

Step 8: Setting Key Performance Indicators

(KPIs) for each team

All strategic actions need to be backed up by figures and data – and your CRM strategy is no
exception. You need to be able to measure its progress.

You outlined your CRM strategy goals back in Step 1. Now you’re going to give your team some
concrete targets to work towards. 

When setting objectives for your teams remember to make

them S.M.A.R.T (i.e. Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic, and Time-bound).
Examples of performance metrics you may wish to include are:

 Customer satisfaction
 Customer retention
 Customer churn (when a customer leaves the company)
  Profits (overall total, totals per customer/account)
The success of your CRM strategy depends on the levels of engagement and collaboration of
your teams. 

Get your employees on board from the beginning. Keep them informed, educated, and up to date
on all aspects of your CRM strategy.

Read 4:

The Ultimate Guide to

Boosting CLV With a Loyalty
Program
Tamas OsziMarch 10, 2020
TwitterFacebookLinkedInFlipboard0

Customer lifetime value. CLV. Lifetime customer value. People call this metric by many
names, but they all mean the same thing: the predicted net profit of the entire
relationship with a given customer. Buyers with a high lifetime value are desirable for
any business, and understandably so, as it indicates strong brand love, as well as a long-
standing commitment to spending money in your stores.

This guide is meant to help you better understand how your customer retention strategy
influences CLV, as well as show you a diverse list of loyalty program features that can
improve this metric.
How Can You Calculate Customer Lifetime Value &
Why Does Loyalty Influence It?
Finding the perfect formula for CLV is not as easy as it seems, because it can be
calculated in a multitude of ways. Most concisely, lifetime value is found by multiplying a
customer’s purchase frequency with average basket volume, then dividing it by their
retention cost.

So how do loyalty programs factor into all of this? As a study

from Motista shows, customers with an emotional connection to brands have 306%
higher lifetime value. This is most likely due to the fact that a comprehensive rewards
program can simultaneously enhance all three elements of the lifetime value equation.
Customer lifetime value ramps up when buyers reach their second or third purchase, but only a dedicated few are loyal enough to
buy exclusively from you.

Increasing Purchase Frequency

There’s nothing more heartbreaking than seeing a promising customer come into the
shop, buy something, then never come back. Enticing people to stick to your brand and
continuously choose you over the competition is one of the main strengths of a loyalty
program. Gifts, incentives and free services all give customers a reason to keep
returning. And unlike a standard discount, a loyalty reward feels much more personal,
yielding an emotional high.

1. Personalization

A surefire way to appeal to your customers’ interests is to show them relevant

information. In this sense, loyalty programs help you collect a wide range of customer
data which can be used to fuel your marketing automation.

By offering a small token of appreciation, customers are more likely to fill out quizzes
and surveys, sharing their product preferences, clothing or shoe size, favorite colors,
lifestyle, spending habits, etc.

Incentivizing customer profiling is a one-time investment, yet you’ll learn valuable

information that can be used to give personalized product recommendations in emails or
on site for years to come.
Antavo’s Gamified Profiling module turns the notion of filling out quizzes into a fun experience. It also works in stores too, thanks to
the innovative  Loyalty Experience Kiosk.

2. Point expiration

Adding a ticking clock to the reward system is a well-known method to encourage

people to increase their purchase frequency. Just set an expiration date for each
member’s point balance, and reset the timer if they decide to buy something.

Finding the sweet spot for your expiration window is the key to success. Customers are
willing to make a low-value purchase just to avoid losing their points every now and
then, but if they hear about expiration too often, they’ll lose interest.

If you wish to run point expiration without causing frustration, you need to notify your
loyalty members in time via email, which is a great opportunity to showcase your
personalization capabilities.
Starbucks shares a loophole with its customers to help them avoid point expiration: using the brand’s prepaid card shields them from
losing their Stars. It’s a clever move, which helps to promote the company’s own service.

3. Badges & challenges

Gamifying the loyalty experience is an intuitive way to get customers more invested in
your brand. These are small, but meaningful achievements that reward members for
their continuous engagement.

For instance, after reaching the milestone, like making five purchases in a year, give
customers a unique badge, alongside a handful of points or a small gift, which appears on
their membership page. Challenges work much like badges, but they require the
customer to complete a series of tasks.

The motive behind badges and challenges is to cultivate repeated behavior, which is
why it’s recommended to create multiple levels for each badge or challenge. The level-
one badge, for example, may be granted for making just one purchase. This would
instantly give members a sense of accomplishment. However, to reach the level-two
badge, they should make three purchases.
In addition to increasing purchase frequency, badges and challenges can also be used to drive other important metrics. For instance,
you can encourage members to visit your site several times a week or share product pages on social media.

4. Birthday rewards

Emotional attachment is the bedrock of high customer lifetime value. If you’re looking to
generate true brand love, consider giving customers a reward when they least expect it,
such as special occasions like birthdays or membership anniversaries.

The formula is simple: send a highly personalized email to a customer on their birthday,
letting them know they received a small gift for their big day. This reward can be a points
bonus, or a small gift that will be shipped with their next purchase.

Upon seeing the pleasant surprise, people feel appreciated and are compelled to go to
your website immediately and buy something, just to make good use of the free gift,
inspiring a purchase that would not have been made otherwise.
Sephora really puts on the ritz when it comes to loyalty program birthday emails: the company not only sends members a free gift,
but that gift is always from the customer’s favorite brand.
Increasing Basket Value
Back in the day, traditional point collection schemes were only good for increasing
purchase frequency. People received points for their purchase, which eventually lead to
a discount or a freebie; nothing to be overly excited about. But modern loyalty programs
now have exciting incentives that encourage customers to go out of their way and put
as many products into their basket as they can.

5. Tiers

Customers love tiered programs. They are easy to understand, easier to manage, and the
concept of climbing a ladder to unlock permanent benefits is very exciting for most
shoppers.

In order to increase customer lifetime value with tiers, each rank should be associated
with outstanding rewards: something people desire having. Instead of doubling the value
of the discount coupon at the Gold tier, add a new benefit, such as an invitation to brand
events, VIP customer service, or spectacular birthday rewards.

Once your tantalizing goals are set, customers will work hard to reach them as quickly as
possible. This may mean putting more products into their cart, because getting more
points with a single purchase will help them progress faster.

Find out more on how to run a successful loyalty program from this episode of Customer
Loyalty Minutes, starring Zsuzsa Kecsmar, CCO & Co-founder at Antavo, and Jörn Roegler,
VP of Strategy & Insight at Antavo.

6. Rewards with a high perceived value

If there’s something people love more than free shipping, it’s fancy rewards. Deep down
in their hearts, everyone dreams about spending their points on something memorable,
like a free weekend at a wellness spa.

When it comes to loyalty rewards with perceived value, you have two options. One is
to offer luxury benefits that are open to anyone who is willing to pay the price in points
(luxury weekends, first line ticket to a fashion show, gourmet dinners etc). The other is
to promote limited-edition items, or products designed by influencers or celebrities.

Either way, people will need a large quantity of loyalty points to claim such rewards for
themselves. And just like with tiers, the best way to earn points quickly is by increasing
purchase volume.

Luxury fashion brand Saks Fifth Avenue  brilliantly combines tiers and experiential rewards: by spending money on the SaksFirst
Credit Card, they unlock better and better gift packages, featuring deluxe cosmetics.

7. VIP Clubs

Also called limited access groups, VIP Clubs are small, thematic communities within your
loyalty program. Just like in a real-life VIP Club, members have to buy their way in by
paying an entry fee with points. In exchange, they’re offered a series of exclusive
privileges, such as early access to up-and-coming products.

Customers will gladly spend a sizable amount of points for entry. And the best thing is,
benefits like early access are purchase-related, indicating that they plan to keep buying
from you in the future.
VIP Clubs allows you to set up an inclusive loyalty program that anyone can join, but at
the same time reserves some of the most desirable benefits for your most dedicated
spenders.

Italian-born luxury fashion retailer  LuisaViaRoma set up a VIP Club called the Sneakers Club. After the launch, members spent  2
million points in just one month in order to be a part of the club.

8. Offer management

Linked offers are a tried-and-tested marketing method that convinces customers to buy
multiple products. These can be bundled offers, where buying a toothbrush and a
toothpaste together is 10% less expensive, or the popular ‘Buy 3 burgers for the price of
2’ deal.

Offer management is the system that helps you organize such promotions, because
deals come in all shapes and sizes. With the right tools and creativity, you can set up
offers that apply exclusively to your latest shop to open, to a certain region, or even to a
specific customer segment.
Antavo’s Prime Steel Winter Product Release  is all about the enterprise-grade offer management: why it is important, what offer
types are available, and how to create a synergy.

Reduce the Cost of Customer Retention

Last but not least, loyalty programs boost the efficacy of your customer retention
campaigns by giving you more bang for your buck. This can be done either by running
the loyalty program in a cost-effective manner, avoiding unnecessary discounts,
or driving other business KPIs that affect your bottom line.

9. Partner rewards

Having a loyalty program unlocks countless possibilities to network and branch out to
partners from other industries. In the past, companies banded together to form coalition
programs in an attempt to reach new audiences and new platforms.

Still, your brand can manage on its own with a loyalty program where you offer partner
rewards. This can be a mutually beneficial relationship: these kinds of incentives will cost
you very little, since your company isn’t responsible for manufacturing or distributing
them. On the other hand, your partner receives exposure from your customers.
Women’s fashion retailer JD Williams  has a full list of dedicated to showcasing the members-only rewards, some of which come
from partners. This helps the brand engage lifestyle-conscious buyers.

10. Members-only services

Another way to save money with a loyalty program is by making services you’d offer
anyway members-only. For instance, if free shipping is available by default, it makes
sense to turn it into a baseline loyalty program feature.

Putting certain services behind enrollment won’t turn devoted customers away, since
anyone who is interested in such benefits will be willing to take an extra step and
register.

And what does this strategy deliver? More information about your customers, such as
contact data, credentials, or anything your personalization strategy requires, as well
as plenty of additional eyes that will want to check out the other benefits your program
has to offer.
Don’t want to make services like free shipping permanently available? Follow  DSW’s example and add it as a members-only feature
during Christmas to increase enrollment rates for the holiday season.

11. Contests

Organizing a social media contest is a proven tactic to establish brand presence and
encourage the submission of user-generated content. The rules are simple: ask people to
enter by submitting their content to your forums or your social media platform. Then
pick a winner either by vote or a jury.

Contests come in a variety of forms. You can set up a hashtag contest, asking members
to post stories about their experience and tag your brand at the end. Instagram
contests work in nearly the same way, but customers should upload an image of
themselves wearing or using the product they bought from you.

The reason contests help customer lifetime value is because you only need to give one
reward, despite having a large group of participants who all eagerly compete. Plus,
competing in a contest is a thrilling experience for most.
Plus-size womenswear retailer Simply Be asks its loyalty program members to post images wearing their favorite looks. Seeing their
fellow customers enjoy Simply Be’s products feels authentic for buyers, which helps to spread word-of-mouth.

12. Churn prediction

One last way to increase the efficiency of your loyalty program – and directly boost
customer lifetime value – is to prevent buyers from churning. For this, Antavo offers an
enterprise-grade machine learning framework that helps you predict which customers
are in risk of leaving in the next three months.

Once you managed to pinpoint customers who are at the verge of churning, you can
create a special segment and proactively convince this segment to stay by offering
higher discounts, personalized emails, or even special gifts that are unavailable to other
members.
Using churn prediction helps you save money in two ways. First of all, you’re only using
the expensive rewards on customers who are churning. Secondly, winning those
customers back increases their CLV.

Antavo’s Loyalty AI  framework also includes the Smart Audiences tool. This feature helps you understand correlations between
customer actions and predicted values, giving you valuable insights on those who are most at risk of churning.

Increasing Customer Lifetime Value With a Successful

Loyalty Program
As you can see, customer lifetime value is influenced by a variety of factors. This gives
you a level of freedom, because you can mix-and-match features in your loyalty
program and really serve your business KPIs – as long the program itself is built
proficiently. If you’re ready for the next step, Antavo has a similarly in-depth guide about
designing a successful customer loyalty program guide from top to bottom
Read 5:

Data-Driven Marketing: All You Need To

Know In 2021
12min read
Data-driven marketing refers to the methodology of extracting actionable insights tied to
consumer behavior from large data sets in order to predict consumer behavior in relation to new
products, marketing positioning and users’ likelihood of interacting with a brand.

With the increase in popularity of Big Data, and the technological advancements that allow for
massive amounts of information to be collected, organized and analyzed, data-driven marketing
is emerging as the next generation strategy to effectively create personalized and relevant
consumer experiences.

Modern marketers know that going on gut instinct is not enough in the digital world.

Clients have high expectations and want to see immediate results. Data-backed metrics can help
marketers maximize success and transform the way business is conducted online.

As 2021 comes into focus, the importance of a data driven strategy is even higher than it was
before. The COVID-19 pandemic has changed so much about how people spend their time and
money online. Changes in user behavior that were expected to take years have instead happened
in months, meaning that having a data based marketing solution is even more vital to success.

In this comprehensive guide, we will explore the concept of data-driven marketing by looking at
the history of data-driven challenges, the benefits of using this approach, and its limitations. We
will also cover a few tangible examples of data-driven marketing and the results they produced.

Data-Driven Marketing: The Business Case

Here are some interesting facts about data-driven marketing.

A study by Forbes showed that 64% of executives “strongly agree” that data-driven marketing
provides a competitive edge in deciding on how to compete with other companies in the same
field.
According to Media Math, 53% of digital marketers said “a demand to deliver more relevant
communications/be more ‘customer-centric’” is one of the top driving factors for companies who
are investing in data-driven marketing.
Furthermore, eMarketer reports that 90.7% of US advertisers and marketers segment data to
better target and engage with their customers. In fact, over half said that they were more
advanced in that area than even five years ago. eMarketer also reports that 92.3% of
organizations maintain databases to host information on customers or prospects, at least to some
extent.
Finally, this report shows that marketing teams who regularly use integrated marketing
technologies are 57% more effective and productive at delivering positive ROI through their
work.
All these facts and figures are pointing in the same direction: data-driven marketing is the way
forward and the key to satisfying and creating loyal customers now and into the future.

How Did It All Begin? The History of Data-driven Marketing

The humble beginning of a Data-driven marketing approach dates all the

way back to the invention of the first Customer Relationship
Management (CRM) system. CRMs represent databases that are
leveraged to gather, record and store customer information which can be
leveraged to increase sales, up-sell or cross sell a specific product or
service.

V12 data statistics show that 52% of consumers (and 65% of B2B buyers) say they’re likely to
switch brands if a company doesn’t personalize communications to them. CRMs are vital to the
tracking, collecting and usage of data that can lead to personalized approaches to marketing.
For a full history of the CRM, there is a great article over at FinancesOnline but for the purposes
of this piece, we’ll summarize it here.
The first CRM systems were first launched in the ‘70s, and the mass adoption of
marketing techniques like sales force automation, consumer information records
and hotline numbers. Yes, it’s hard to believe, but we’ve been harassed by
unwanted calls from telemarketers for almost 50 years now!

By the 80s, database marketing started to become a thing. It was during this period
that marketers realized that connecting on a personal level with their customers
could lead to higher conversions. So instead of cold calling each potential
consumer with the exact same message, marketers started to create different call
scripts for different customer personas.

In the 90s, this evolved into sales force automation that became the first real CRM framework.
One database which could manage a company’s contacts, leads and potential opportunities in a
single platform. By the end of the century, the first mobile CRM was launched, however, mobile
use was limited due to the constraints of technology at the time.

And of course, over the last two decades, with the rapid growth of social media platforms
(remember hi5 and Myspace?), marketers adopted their strategies to better engage with
consumers at a personal level.

Today, CRM is integral to social marketing so content can be sent straight to the correct targets –
so much so that social analytics is becoming just as important as ‘standard’ analytics.

This slowly paved the path to personalization.

Automation and the introduction of cloud-based CRM systems accelerated the collection of
relevant data, therefore paving the way to the emergence of data driven marketing techniques.
Nowadays, marketers can easily devise new strategies based on data driven marketing concepts
to connect with customers at a personal level based on behavioral patterns shown in the data
collected about current and potential clients.

The Current State of Data-Driven Marketing

Today’s CRM is significantly more powerful than at any point in the

past (just think of the first generation iPhone versus an iPhone XR!).
CRMs lie at the heart of business with the aim of engaging with
customers with tailored messages.
Previously, marketing messages had one message for everyone. With the collection of relevant
data, this approach changed dramatically.

With this came personalization and targeted advertisement techniques – the foundational value
add behind data-driven marketing.
Nowadays, the best example of data-driven marketing is how consumers surfing the web or
‘chilling’ on social media see super-targeted ads that are relevant to them, and engage with new
brands as a result of these relevant ads.

Here are some effects that data-driven marketing has had on marketers all over the world:

First Names In Emails

While this seems standard now, this personalization technique was not commonly used back in
the day. Marketers need to be using their recipients’ first names in either the body or the subject
line at the very least. This is because it instantly connects them with the content, making them
more likely to purchase a product.

Marketing Automation
Marketing automation has helped tailor the customer experience for visitors as it gives them
exactly what they are looking for at the right time. For example, automation software can be used
to send specific emails based on where a customer is in the purchase funnel if they haven’t
replied in 2 days, sending them a follow-up. The first marketing automation emails are believed
to have been sent around 2001.
Content
Data-driven marketing also enables marketers to understand the type of content their audience is
looking for, allowing for a more personalized service.

They can pinpoint the topics that each demographic requires and create a specific marketing
campaign.

The Next Stage – Data-Driven Marketing Personalization

Personalization in data-driven marketing refers to the combination of creative (the ad) media (the
channel) and data (about the customer).
Systems have become more complex now with each of these three components becoming a
collection of multiple sub-components, each informing ‘parallel-track’ marketing campaigns
based on the specific traits of each demographic targeted by a marketing team.

What Are Data-Driven Creatives?

Data-driven creative uses insights and machine learning to create personalized ads to boost the
return on investment for a specific media campaign. These ‘smart’ creatives provide actual value
to the customer that leads them to take action.
At ComboApp, we use ‘smart’ creatives all the time.

The simplest example is this. Say we’re launching a new social media ad campaign against a
specific demographic for a dating app.

We will launch the campaign against 30-40 different creatives where we test both images and
text. Based on the engagement levels with these ads we see in our programmatic ad platforms,
we remove all non-performing ads and focus on the ones that perform the best. Platforms like
Facebook, Linkedin or Twitter all make it very easy for agencies to test, in real time, the
effectiveness of their various campaigns and optimize them on the go.
Ultimately, the data we have about specific consumers and the creatives we create determine the
types and number of creatives that we design.

A single creative can now come in multiple formats depending on the media and customer data.
Let me show you how!

First, there’s behavior data.

Based on past campaigns or market research we conduct on a specific demographic, ComboApp

targets a customer group based on their online activity and how they interact with ads.

For example, with the usage of browser-based cookies we collect anonymized information about
page clicks, downloads and page level engaged. Then, with the help of tools like google
Optimizely and Google Adwords, we can extend retargeting campaigns for users who visit other
websites that support Google Adwords.

Additionally, some advertising platforms also tell us demographic data points about users, such
as their age, location, interests and more.

So what do we do with all this data?

There are two ways that marketers can become more targeted and relevant with their ads: testing
to optimize and testing to inform.

Testing To Optimize

Testing to optimize involves designing a test where the results can be used in a creative to drive
performance.
For example, A/B testing is a form of optimization. Marketers wait for the data to come back
from the experiment and analyze the results. Based on the data collected, we figure out which
variation of an ad performs best and then we use that moving forward.
A very simple A/B test can have a tremendously positive impact on the creative’s performance.
Font size, copy, images and more can all be A/B tested in a campaign – and then optimized
accordingly.

Testing To Inform

Testing to inform is a method to add more value to the advertising budget.

It provides insight into the creative assets, as well as insights on the campaign as a whole.

For example, marketers may want to test how certain creative categories of products are selling,
such as creative assets containing the newest products or creatives containing sale products.

While there may be a lot of work to implement properly, there is great value for the marketing
team. For example, if creative assets are performing better for the new products rather than the
products on sale, the insight can be used and applied to other channels.

In a nutshell, data makes marketing more nuanced and complex, but with better results.
How Beneficial Is Data-Driven Marketing?

Personalized Content And Campaigns

First and foremost, let’s go back to the common theme around data-driven marketing in this
article: it’s all about personalization.

Data-driven marketing gives businesses the opportunity to reach the right people at the right time
with the right message.

Marketers must be able to deliver content, products, and relevant recommendations to customers
that need it, rather than sending blanket information to the masses and expecting auto-magical
conversions.

Personalized messaging is critical to creating valuable relationships with your customers. And
the insights created from data-driven marketing methods can produce a holistic picture of every
customer – both current and prospective.

Strategic Decision-making

The more actionable data available to marketers, the better insights they will get into their
customer’s likes, dislikes, online behavior, engagement and more.
When marketers know their consumers at the individual level, they can predict how customers
are going to react to a certain message as part of the campaign. As Brian Solis from the CMO
Network expertly wrote: ‘extreme personalization is the new personalization.’
When you have actionable insights at your fingertips, as a marketer, you can make strategic
decisions based on providing users with the best possible experience. Personalization should be
smooth, hassle-free and offer one-to-one engagement.

With data-driven marketing, decisions can also be made faster, enabling marketers to discard
what is not working and optimize what is.

Data-driven Marketing Informs Product Development

Businesses can develop relevant products that take into account what customers really want. It
will reduce the chances that the product fails when it goes to market.

With actionable user data, you can easily define features and functionalities that would be loved
by your customers. Be it a website or mobile app, data-driven marketing insights reframe the
conversation around what users need from your brand – and how to best provide your customers
what they want.

Again, it comes back to ensuring total customer satisfaction.

Real-Time Interactions

With data-driven marketing, customers can access information from a variety of sources while at
home or on-the-go with their smartphones.

It’s important for marketers to understand where users hang out online so they can start
connecting with them in real-time.
Advancements in machine learning capabilities can now scan through incredibly large data sets
at a fraction of the time it would take for a human to do the same work.

This gives marketers the information they need to see where consumers are most likely to
convert into a sale.

Data-driven Marketing Provides Consistency And Longevity

Data-driven marketing ensures that, in the event that there is a significant change, such as a
valuable team member leaving the company, processes remain consistent.

When everyone understands the purpose of the data being collected, they can take the
appropriate action. In turn, this helps with knowledge transfer and onboarding new marketers on
a team.
Paves the Way for Marketing Automation

It’s easy for marketers to become overwhelmed with the sheer amount of data they collect across
different marketing channels, especially since not all data is equally useful. Since data-driven
marketing is all about extracting actionable insights from large data sets in order to predict the
future, it paves the way for marketing automation and algorithmic advertising.

With the help of the right marketing automation tools, it’s possible to turn actionable insights
into marketing tasks and workflows. Marketing automation has been demonstrated to have a
significantly positive impact on marketing ROI, making it an easy choice for all companies that
would like to make every last dollar count.

Multi-Channel Optimization

It’s impossible to run a single marketing campaign across multiple channels with the same
success. The same marketing techniques that work great on Facebook may not work at all on
Instagram, and social media marketing in general follows completely different rules than email
or data driven content marketing. Data-driven marketing helps identify which marketing
strategies and formats work for which channels—be it social media, email, blog posts, or video
content.

Many companies that implement data-driven marketing quickly discover that most of their leads
come from just one or two channels. In those cases, multi-channel optimization becomes all
about sensible marketing budget allocation and prioritization to get the maximum return for each
dollar invested.

Prevents Egos from Getting in the Way

When marketing intuition and reality clash, the results can be quite ugly. Not all marketers can
recognize their own mistakes and own up to them. For companies that depend on marketing and
spend a lot of money on it, it’s essential to prevent egos from getting in the way of results. Data-
driven marketing both relies on and produces objective metrics that can serve as unquestionable
arguments during heated debates.

Data Driven Marketing Has Its Own Challenges

So far, we’ve covered the benefits of taking a data-driven marketing approach to marketing. To
be completely fair and transparent though, we should also examine some of the challenges and
pitfalls tied to data-driven marketing.
Businesses generate a lot of data every day.

However, this doesn’t mean that all of it is useful. As many have argued before, a lot of
marketing data collected is a total mess and really difficult to turn into actionable insights.
Filtering the right data to make informed decisions is key to successful data-driven marketing.
High-quality data is accurate and ‘clean’ (aka collerations and deductions can be made with a
reasonable amount of confidence). When data is ‘clean’ it allows decisions to be based on factual
information rather than educated guesses or interpretations. To make the most out of data-driven
marketing, marketers need to create a process that prevents inconsistencies creeping in and keep
data up-to-date.

Knowing What To Ask

Wrong questions lead to irrelevant answers, resulting in incorrect information used to make
business decisions. Businesses need to pay attention to the overall marketing goals behind a
product and ask the right questions that will get them the data they really need. Asking the right
questions leads to the right insights.
Normalizing Data

No two people are the same and neither is their data. The challenge here is unifying it to generate
actionable insights. This will require a lot of managing and analysis due to the constant
advancements in the marketing industry. Defining the right normalization data strategy is critical
to creating relevant data sets.
Interpreting Data

While the collected data is great, knowing what it all means is just as important as finding the
right data.

Analytics tools and services can help with this challenge, enabling businesses to make quick and
informed decisions. They can also help to understand which marketing activities are having the
greatest impacts on customers.
Linking Data

While technology can help, data is usually stored in a single location. Integrated analytics tools
are essential for linking data to create a cohesive picture. Big data gets increasingly bigger every
day. Ultimately, being able to bring everything together will determine how successful the
campaign will be.

Unsuitable Technology

This is one of the most serious problems that data-driven marketing runs into. Unsuitable
technology can contribute to all of the challenges listed above, such as providing the wrong data
and not transforming it into a digestible and actionable plan. Marketers must find the right tools
that will give them the results they need to meet department and business goals.

The Building Blocks Of Data-Driven Marketing – The Technology Stack

The marketing technology stack focuses on measuring the impact of activities for more efficient
processes.
With many marketing technologies available across an ever-growing number of industries,
marketers need to stay ahead of the curve and take advantage of these solutions while they can.

At the same time, it is essential that marketing teams know which technologies are best suited to
their business or clients.

A standard data-driven marketing stack is made up of 3 foundational building-blocks:

1. Campaign management

2. Analytics and reporting

3. Attribution and optimization

Campaign Management

This technology refers to the creation of campaign groups targeting specific user types and
tracking how effective different campaigns are at a given moment in time. Send personalized
content, reminders, updates, special offers, etc to the people that require each variation. One of
the most common forms of marketing is through email campaigns and there are lots of
technologies that can help.

For example, MailChimp can be used to manage email marketing campaigns. It allows marketers

to sync data and content from third-party services and learn how each campaign is affecting the
business. It will also provide tips for improving ongoing campaigns, as well as insights into their
effectiveness.
Another useful campaign management tool is Aweber. A great feature of this technology is its
autoresponder. Its analytics capabilities are some of the best around and overall, the tool is very
easy to use.
Analytics And Reporting

Analytics tools provide granular information about the groups targeted by various marketing
campaigns, such as how users behave and how they interact with a specific campaign (likes,
shares, sales, social shout-outs etc).

This information is useful to marketers because they can optimize the customer experience and
develop relationships that last to create loyalty to the brand.
Robust analytics reporting creates a logical output of the data to enable marketers to make
informed decisions. But it also helps with data visualization techniques which can be distributed
among internal stakeholders via such as graphs, tables and pie charts. Standalone reporting
solutions aggregate activity and performance into one place. For reference, reporting software is
also referred to as marketing dashboards.

Again, there are a lot of analytics tools on the market.

Perhaps the most common analytics tool out there is Google Analytics. GA is free to use and can
help businesses develop a better strategy through campaign tracking and customized data reports.
GA also allows for goal settings and monitoring various funnels on a website/ mobile app.
Additionally, Google Analytics can be synced up to a lot of reporting software like Google Data
Studio, as well as the campaign management tools like the aforementioned Aweber.
For businesses that are keen to utilize social media for their campaigns, it may be useful to
leverage specialized marketing analytics tools like Sprout Social. This technology allows teams
to see the keywords their brand is being linked with across various social channels, including
data collected from the number of competitors on each platform.
Optimization

Once marketers have access to the right data, they can refine various marketing campaigns and
make improvements over time. When a business understands the contributions to marketing
activities, they can begin to deploy their budget more effectively.
For example, Jive is collaboration software that connects users and team members together. It is
used to optimize engagement online and identify influencers.
Analytics services like Amplitude can be used by marketers to measure conversion rates and
customer behavior.
One of Amplitude’s unique features is that it maps out the exact route that customers take to
achieve specific conversion goals.

Another key feature Amplitude is famous for refers to a web analytics concept they pioneered:
cohort analysis.

Amplitude was the first analytics provider which understood that different users behave
differently on a website. And they provided the functionality to marketers and product leaders to
define specific audiences which can be segmented and analyzed on their own. Through cohort
analysis, marketers can make better decisions about their digital products and optimizing various
digital campaigns over time.

Invest In SEO As Part of Your Data Driven Marketing Strategy

SEO is a key strategy for increasing organic through search engines to the website. SEO works
well with data driven content marketing and there are many tools that can help with keyword
research, such as Ahrefs, which we often use in our own SEO campaigns for our clients.
As we wrote in the past, SEO and content strategy are some of the most effective strategies to
attract new customers, see how customers interact with your website or mobile app and test out
various conversion campaigns on your platform.
Invest in A Robust Content Management System

A Content Management System (CMS) powers websites and blogs where marketers want to
engage with their customers, such as WordPress, Hubspot or Sitecore.
A robust CMS allows for the easy creation and management of content which is why we
consider it a pivotal data-driven marketing foundational building block.

Examples Of Data-Driven Digital Marketing

Now that we know what data-driven marketing is, let’s review some tangible examples of how it
is used today.

Data-Driven Email Marketing

We have already seen that email marketing is one of the most popular strategies. However, data-
driven email marketing can take it to another level and tailor it to each and every customer,
rather than just groups of customers.

Marketing teams can create content based on an individual’s preferences, making it the perfect
way to build relationships.

On some of the most complex projects we’ve worked on, we’ve created up to 50 different
variations of emails based on specific marketing personas identified for our clients. The more
relevant an email becomes, the higher chances it has to convert a user.
Retargeting

Marketers can use retargeting to advertise to potential customers even if they leave your website
or mobile app. Many online visitors tend to browse the internet for more than one reason so why
not appeal to them after they leave your website?

This data driven advertising method gives consumers a gentle reminder about the product or
service they had previously looked at. It can be particularly effective across social media
since 30% of all time spent online is on these platforms.
In addition, consider these amazing stats from Invesp about retargeting:
 4 in 5 consumers notice retargeting ads.
 1 in 5 marketers now has a budget dedicated to retargeting campaigns.
 46% of SEM professionals say retargeting is the most underused marketing technique.
 The average clickthrough rate for regular ads is 0.07% versus retargeting ads which is 0.7% (a
900% increase in CTR!).
 Retargeted customers are 3x more likely to click on your ad than those who see your ad for the
first time.
Retargeting can also be combined with technologies to create hyper-specific marketing
campaigns for certain customers.

For example, if a current customer purchased a cellphone, retargeting could be used to offer that
customer, accessories like a case, screen protector or charger.

Retargeting is one of the most famous – and effective – data-driven marketing techniques ever
invented! And we have Google to thank for that!

Data Driven Advertising

Data driven advertising can be used by marketers to reach their target audience, regardless of
their location.

Data insights and automation technology can create personalized adverts that increase click-
through rates and conversion rates.
Each individual has different needs. The data collected about these needs allows marketers to be
really precise with their efforts by selecting content that will have the greatest impact. Actionable
insights allows for targeting specific buyer personas which, when combined with machine
learning and other data marketing technologies, can produce more effective data driven
advertising to drive better clicks and conversions.

Again, social media is a great channel to implement data driven advertising, with Facebook
proving to be effective for advertising in particular.

Facebook users are clicking on ads more and more every year, with data-driven ads being the
primary driver behind this increase in engagement with Facebook ads.
Acting Based on Marketing Trends

Businesses can feel cautious testing new channels when an existing method is working well.
After all, why take the risk?

Using marketing trends from various channels leads to building a more efficient and optimized
marketing process. This is done by running PPC campaigns for a short amount of time until the
keyword search volume is known.

PPC campaigns can also be used to determine if specific keywords have a commercial intent.
This gives marketers a better estimation if the keywords are worth going after. At ComboApp,
we use the Ahrefs content explorer functionality.

But you can also use SEO marketing trends to decide on how to market specific demographics.
Let’s look at how we used Ahrefs’ to determine writing this article on our blog.

Here’s a data extract about ‘data-driven marketing’ keywords. This is an amazing example of
data-driven marketing in action!

As you can see from the screenshot above, it was a no-brainer for us to write an article about
data-driven marketing. The data collected by Ahrefs makes it super clear that we should take the
time and create an article on this topic.

ComboApp is a data driven marketing agency. Our clients are companies that need data
driven marketing solutions. Who other than professional marketers would ever look up ‘data
driven marketing’? Sure, there are exceptions to every rule, but let’s be serious here!
Secondly, we see a decent search interest. 1,300 searches in the US alone and 3,800 globally.

Third, we see a huge bidding war over this keyword. Competitors of ComboApp spend $18
dollars for each click they get via Google Ads (which is huge!). If they spend this much money,
it means it’s worth it to attract new customers.
Lastly, we also see that despite companies spending $18 per click for this search term, the
overwhelming majority of Google users DO NOT click on an ad. Over the last month, Ahrefs
estimates that only 52 out of 1,300 users clicked on an ad.

When taking all these data points into account, it made sense for us to create this ultimate guide
to data-driven marketing!

All Is Not Great With Data-Driven Marketing

While data is great, decisions should not be just made based on what customers do, they should
also factor why customers do it. That is, the qualitative aspect of things.

There are some suggestions that data-driven marketing is not driven by data at all. This is
because it’s based on the assumption that because something worked in the past, it is going to
work now and in the future.
After all, the marketing and advertising industry know all too well that trends and customer
preferences can change in the blink of an eye.

Furthermore, data-driven marketing is, in some ways, killing the creativity that fueled earlier
generations of marketers. Fostering creativity can enable companies to make 10% more revenue
than their peers.
But focusing on creatives doesn’t mean that businesses should ignore data altogether. The best
data marketing teams strike a balance between the science of data-driven marketing and the art
of creativity to see optimal results.

Over 50% of marketing campaigns are attributed to the creative element. Businesses can have
data of the highest quality but it will fail if it doesn’t resonate with the end consumer.
The Importance Of A Data Driven Marketing Agency

Odds are that someone reading this article will be trying to figure out what to do with all of this
information and how it applies to their business. Taking all of this information and trying to
develop your own data driven marketing strategy from scratch is a difficult task unless you have
experience doing so. This is one of the reasons why it is so important for a business to outsource
this work to a data driven marketing agency.

A data driven digital marketing agency will benefit their clients by giving them access to their
experience with big data marketing. Partnering with an agency also means that businesses can
focus on the running of their day to day operations, without having to try to learn how to use all
this information for themselves. They will craft data driven marketing solutions that are tailored
to their clients needs and help them put a data driven strategy into action. Trying to run
everything in-house can seem tempting, but can leave a business behind the curve. You need to
have both the tools and the knowledge of how to use them properly, and an agency has the
resources and skills that your business can benefit from.

ComboApp is one such data based marketing agency, they are full-cycle and help companies
develop a data driven strategy from start to finish. This means that from crafting data driven
advertising campaigns to building an app, and everything in between; ComboApp is there to help
businesses succeed. We will put our experience with data driven digital marketing to work for
businesses. Contact us today to find out more of how big data and marketing can come together
to boost your business in 2021 and beyond.

Summary

Data-driven marketing is here to stay. In fact, the use of big data in marketing will only continue
to rise in importance as we move into 2021. The place of big data in marketing is solidified and
growing, it is up to businesses to decide if they will put it to use for them or fall behind the
curve. COVID-19 means more people than ever are spending more time than ever online,
knowing their habits and interests can help businesses to grow and thrive through this accelerated
online growth phase.

Success will come from fine-tuning the data and getting creative on how to use big data
marketing to reach out to customers. The challenges a marketing team faces need to be addressed
first and a robust data driven marketing strategy can then be created following that. Partnering
with a full cycle marketing agency such as ComboApp is vital, as they can put their experience
with data based marketing to use in helping a business develop a successful data driven strategy.
This article covered:
  Where data-driven marketing came from and how it has evolved over time;
 How marketers can take advantage of data-driven marketing;
 The challenges marketing teams face;
 Real-world examples of data driven marketing concepts being used.

Read 5:
11 Benefits of CRM Systems

Kiely Kuligowski
Staff Writer

Business News Daily Staff

Jan 15, 2021

CRM software can provide a wealth of benefits for your small business, from customer
retention to increased productivity.

 CRM software is used to gather customer interactions in one central place to improve customer
experience and satisfaction.
 CRM is one of the world's fastest-growing industries, expected to grow at a rate of 14% between
2021 and 2027.
 The benefits of CRM include better customer retention, increased sales and detailed analytics.
 This article is for small business owners and marketers who want to learn about the benefits
of CRM software for small businesses.

Customer relationship management (CRM) software has become a near-vital tool for businesses
of all sizes. CRM software can provide several benefits to any business, from organizing contacts
to automating key tasks. It can also be a centralized, organized hub that enables consistent
communication both with customers and within the organization. This is especially important as
more organizations shift to remote work.

The CRM software market is currently one of the fastest-growing industries, projected to grow at
a rate of 14.27% from 2020 to 2027, driven by consumer demand for better customer service,
automated engagement and more nuanced customer experiences.

Editor's note: Looking for the right CRM software for your business? Fill out the below
questionnaire to have our vendor partners contact you about your needs.

 
What is CRM software?

CRM stands for "customer relationship management," a type of software that helps businesses
manage, track and organize their relationships with customers. A CRM can help you store
customer data such as user behavior, how long a customer has been with your business, purchase
records, and notes on sales interactions, which you can use to optimize your sales and marketing
processes and improve customer service across your organization.

"CRM … is a group of tools, technology and techniques used to help sales and marketing
professionals understand their customers better," said Bryan Philips, head of marketing at In
Motion Marketing.

CRM software works by tracking the behavior and actions of your current or potential customers
through your business's website, social media, or email marketing campaigns and then guides the
customer through the sales or buying funnel by sending a triggered email or alerting a sales
representative of the customer's interest.

Key takeaway: CRM software is used to store, manage and organize data on your business's
relationships with customers.

11 ways CRM can benefit your business

A CRM solution can be used in various ways and provide numerous benefits to your business.
Here are 11 key benefits a CRM could provide.

1. Better customer service

Modern CRM software has many functions, but the software was created to improve business-
customer relationships, and that's still its main benefit. A CRM manages all of your contacts and
gathers important customer information – like demographics, purchase records and previous
messages across all channels – and makes it easily accessible to anyone in your company who
needs it. This ensures that your employees have all they need to know about the customer at their
fingertips and can provide a better customer experience, which tends to boost customer
satisfaction.

2. Increased sales

A CRM tool can help you streamline your sales process, build a sales pipeline, automate key
tasks and analyze all of your sales data in one centralized place, potentially increasing sales and
productivity. A CRM helps you establish a step-by-step sales process that your employees can
rely on every time and that you can easily tweak as issues arise.

3. Improved customer retention

Once you've procured and converted leads, it's vital that you put in the work to retain them as
customers and promote customer loyalty. High customer turnover can have many negative
effects for your business, like diminished revenue or disrupted cash flow, so use your CRM and
the information it provides about your customers to encourage repeat business. The CRM will
provide sentiment analysis, automated ticketing, customer support automation and user behavior
tracking to help you determine problems and quickly address them with your customers.

4. Detailed analytics

It's one thing to have plenty of data about your customers, but you need to know what it means
and how to use it. CRM software typically has built-in analytic capabilities to contextualize data,
breaking it down into actionable items and easily understood metrics. Metrics such as click-
through rates, bounce rates, and demographic information allow you to judge the success of a
marketing campaign and optimize accordingly.  

5. Higher productivity and efficiency

CRM software uses marketing automation technology, which expedites menial tasks like drip
campaigns and frees up your employees' time to focus on work only humans can handle, like
creating content. It can also ensure that no tasks slip through the cracks (e.g., all important emails
are always sent to the right people). Additionally, a CRM can show you a dashboard of how your
business processes are working and where your workflows could improve. [Read related
article: How Workplace Automation Software Can Help Your Business] 

6. Centralized database of information

Another thing CRM software does best is providing a centralized database with all information
on your customers, making it easily accessible to anyone in your company who needs it. This
makes it easy for a sales representative to see what products a certain customer is interested in,
for example. If the customer has previously interacted with the company, the CRM will include
records of that interaction, which can inform future marketing efforts and sales pitches. This
saves your employees the time of digging through old files and records, and it makes for a better
and more productive experience for the customer.

7. Managed communications with prospective leads

Lead nurturing can be an arduous and complicated process, with many steps and opportunities to
communicate. A CRM automatically manages the process, sending your employees alerts when
they should reach out to the prospect and tracking every interaction, from emails to phone calls.

"One great advantage of [CRM] is that you can see your customer's journey holistically," said
Michael Miller, CEO of VPN Online. "With every phase in the design and every email you sent
out reviewed, you can quickly figure out the next move to make. It's like seeing it from the top
view, and you can easily create a decision on what to do next."

8. Improved customer segmentation

A list of hundreds of contacts can be unwieldy and overwhelming. For example, how do you
know which customers want to see your email about your new in-store product? A CRM will
automatically segment your contact lists based on your criteria, making it easy to find the ones
you want to contact at any given time. You can sort contacts by location, gender, age, buyer
stage and more.

"Automation actually allows the marketer to have a more meaningful understanding of the
customer and have more valuable interaction when they do interact because of it," Philips said.
"The important part to understand about automation is that we don't want to write a general email
to our customers. Instead, we want to send emails reflecting customers' preferences, interests and
values by segmenting them into groups using the data gleaned within the CRM." [Read related
article: Why Demographics Are Important in Marketing]

9. Automated sales reports

Your team can easily collect and organize data about prospective and current customers using the
CRM software's dashboard and reporting features, which allow employees to automate and
manage their pipelines and processes. The CRM can also help your team members evaluate their
performance, track their quotas and goals, and check their progress on each of their projects at a
glance.

10. More accurate sales forecasting

With any business operation, you need to be able to review your past performance and
strategically plan for the future. Using the automated sales reports in CRM software, you can
identify key trends and get an idea of what to expect from your future sales cycle performance,
while adjusting your goals and metrics to suit those projections. [Read related article: 7 Ways
to Improve Your Sales] 

11. Streamlined internal communications

Aside from facilitating communication between your business and your customers, a CRM can
make it easier for your employees to communicate with each other. A CRM makes it easy to see
how other employees are speaking with a potential customer, which helps your team maintain a
unified brand voice. It also allows team members to send each other notes or alerts, tag each
other on projects, and send messages and emails, all within one system. [Read related
article: How Poor Communication Hampers Team Performance]

Key takeaway: The benefits of CRM include increased sales, detailed analytics, automated
sales reports and better customer retention.
What companies can benefit from CRM?
Because CRM software provides such a breadth of benefits, many types of businesses and teams
can benefit from it.

"Not all customers are created equal, so the value of a CRM is that it helps you keep the right
customers and deploy your precious marketing dollars towards the customers that will return the
highest value over their customer lifetime," said Mike Catania, CEO and co-founder of Locaris.
"It is challenging for small businesses to identify and acquire customers, so bucketing them into
optimal and suboptimal segments through CRM is inordinately valuable."

Businesses of all sizes, from solo freelancers to enterprise-level corporations, can use CRM
technology effectively. After all, the key functions of a CRM are organization, centralized task
management, marketing automation, and communication, which are important to every
business's success.

Of course, some businesses stand to gain more from the use of a CRM than others:

Businesses with a dedicated sales team

If you have a sales team, a CRM is vital to help you manage your contacts and your customer
relations. A CRM can even help you improve and grow your sales processes by using customer
information, showing you key trends and areas where you can improve your strategies, and
automating menial tasks for your sales representatives.

Businesses with a marketing team

CRM and marketing go hand in hand. CRM data can help your marketing team identify, capture,
nurture and convert leads; track customer-salesperson interactions; monitor drip campaigns
within the sales cycle, and more. All of this can create a smoother and more consistent customer
experience.

Businesses seeking to increase efficiency

Because CRMs automate processes like contact organization and communication, the software
can significantly speed up everyday processes and tasks for your entire team. A CRM can also
reduce errors and ensure that all communications go out to the right people at the right
time. [Ready to look for a CRM? Check out our guide to the best CRM software of 2021.]

Key takeaway: While all businesses stand to benefit from the use of a CRM, businesses that
have sales or marketing teams or want to increase their efficiency should especially
consider using one
Read 6:

What Data are Marketers

Using for Loyalty Programs?
Larisa BedgoodJanuary 8, 2020
TwitterFacebookLinkedInFlipboard0

Loyalty programs incentivize your customers to shop at your stores and advocate for
your brand. With so many options available consumers today, more brands are turning to
loyalty programs as a way to keep good customers coming back.

Loyalty Programs Work

According to research compiled by AnnexCloud:

 87% of shoppers reported that they want brands to have loyalty programs

 Over half of the surveyed population reported that, if they like a brand, they will rarely
purchase something different. This includes 55% of older millennials, 53% of younger
millennials and 51% of Gen Z said the same thing.

 64 percent of brands reported an increase in loyalty memberships in the past year alone.

 Consumers are retracting loyalty or switching loyalty programs faster than even three
years ago, with 78% of consumers reporting they are retracting loyalty at a faster pace.

 54% of consumers say that they would consider doing more business with a company for
loyalty rewards.
  46% said that they have already increased the amount of business with a company
because it offered loyalty rewards.

The most successful loyalty programs should be driven by data. Your most loyal, high-
spending customers should be treated to highly personalized experiences dependent on
data-driven insights, only available through the massive amounts of data available about
consumers today.

So what types of data are marketers using to drive their loyalty program success? In a
survey by Merkle, 62% of marketers say their loyalty programs are fully integrated with
their CRM data. However, there are big gaps in the data being used for overall marketing
efforts and the data being used for loyalty programs. For example, 86% of marketers are
using demographics in their marketing efforts but only 39% are using demographics for
their loyalty programs.

The types of data that marketers are using the most for their loyalty programs are
customer account/history (57%), preference data (46%) and email responses (45%).
Marketers are using a wide variety of loyalty tactics. Seventy percent of respondents use
points-based tactics, while 35 percent use surprise-and-delight tactics, which involve
unexpectedly rewarding customers with incentives based on certain behaviors.
However, marketers are not necessarily limiting themselves to just one tactic but are
rather experimenting with using a combination of tactics. The most heavily used
combination is points-based and cash back, used by 12% of survey respondents.

Loyalty Programs Gain New Customer Data

Loyalty programs are also an excellent way to gain new insights into customers – data
which can be fed back into CRM systems for richer insights into customer preferences.
Respondents to a survey by CMO Council and Cheetah Digital reported that loyalty
program participants buy more, buy in greater volume or buy more frequently (43%)
than others. Additionally, 34% of respondents said that participants provide more data
and information for marketing to leverage in campaigns and programs.
An Acquia study revealed that 75 percent of consumers say that they are more likely to
be loyal to a brand when a brand understands them at a personal level. The survey of
5,000 consumers was not restricted to loyalty program members. This means using
every data point available about consumers to provide highly personalized experiences,
and for loyalty members, these experiences, offers and discounts must be relevant for a
customer at the precise moment of interaction cross the customer journey.

Brands may not be fully delivering however. Research by Bond Brand reported that only
25% of loyalty program members were satisfied with the level of personalization in their
programs.

Unify Data and Deploy Personalized Journeys with a

Customer Data Platform
Knowing your customers at an individualized level means collecting and integrating data
about them to create a single version of the customer truth. However, data is often
fragmented across many systems and marketing platforms, obscuring customer behavior.

Customer data platforms offer a massive opportunity for marketers to implement a

system that collects and integrates numerous data sources with ease and speed.
Through a range of system connectors, CDPs are built to continuously collect data from
around your ecosystem and consolidate it into a 360 single customer view by merging
identities from multiple devices into one, deduping customer records and without the
need for significant IT resources. Data, technology and analytics are seamlessly brought
together to create right time marketing insights.

V12’s Customer Data Platform, V12 Velocity, also integrates our third-party data catalog
to get to know your customers and prospects at an even deeper scale.

According to an Accenture Interactive study, loyalty program members generate up to

18 percent more revenue for retailers than non-members. By incentivizing repeat
customers, loyalty programs also increase retention, reducing acquisition costs. A recent
Brand Keys study also revealed that a loyalty increase of 7 percent can boost lifetime
profits per customer up to 85 percent and a loyalty increase of 3 percent can correlate
to a 10 percent cost reduction.

By building a strong loyalty program built on data-driven insights and personalized

experiences, brands can ensure they will have loyal customers for life.

Read 7
How CRM Data Mining Creates Smart
Marketing
Business intelligence tools and big data analytics have opened up nearly unlimited ways
to understand and use data more intelligently. From a marketing perspective, data
mining is the means to understand your customer base more thoroughly, locate patterns
such as why certain pieces of content are more engaging and more.

Let’s look at four practical ways that CRM data mining will help your company level up
its marketing game:
1. Build Better Target Audiences
The first contribution of data mining is to your customer identification.The most
engaging marketing campaign is useless without first defining who you want to reach
with your messaging.

Your target audience is the group of consumers that in some way need or desire your
product or service. How can you determine who fits those criteria? Data mining.
You can begin by classifying the broad population based on a range of attributes. If, for
example, your company sells onsite security systems, you could break down the market
based on demographics such as location, type of building owner and so forth. A rural
farmer isn’t as likely to need in-home security as a high-rise apartment in the middle of
the city.

Your CRM contains a wealth of historical data that’s helpful in refining your audience.
Using target market analysis, you can explore who your potential customers are. And a
customer map provides a visual breakdown so you can more easily digest the data.
Analyzing your target audience informs your marketing strategy as you plan how to most
effectively reach them.

Once you have a target market mapped out, clustering enables customer segmentation.
Not everyone who’s a candidate for your product will need the same version. For
example, two of your segments could be landlords and residential homeowners.

Landlords need to comply with local laws and show they take resident security seriously.
Homeowners care about keeping their family and valuables safe. Those are two vastly
different customer journeys and each would need a different level of security system.

Data mining allows you to break the target market into smaller groups so you’re able to
build messaging strategies appropriate for each based on their individual attributes.

2. Market to the Right People

Let’s face it: we’re becoming jaded to all the marketing shoved down our throats. We’re
exposed to hundreds, maybe thousands, of ads every day — the number is hard to pin
down. But the point remains: people are tired of the constant bombardment.

Adding to the difficulty, consumers are demanding relevant, personalized experiences

when interacting with brands. Six in 10 customers say that a central part of earning their
business is providing tailored engagement using past interactions, according to a
Salesforce survey from 2018.
The key to attracting attention rather than driving it off is to give the right people the
right content, and — here’s the kicker — at the right time. That’s only possible (at least
consistently) by first analyzing your data.

When it comes to marketing, efforts fall into two main categories: direct marketing and
inbound marketing. Direct (or outbound) marketing includes things like TV commercials,
Facebook ads, billboards and so on. Inbound marketing, on the other hand, lets people
come to the content, in the form of blog posts, videos and the like. Inbound methods are
much more effective and therefore more popular than outbound tactics.

That’s nice, but how does this relate to CRM data mining?

You need to understand your data in the context of your marketing efforts. Is the data
you’re looking at based on inbound tactics or direct marketing? That will influence how
effectively you can serve up content to the appropriate audience and the results that
follow.

Here are a couple inbound examples:

 You can use CRM data to optimize your blog strategy. If Tuesday and
Thursday mornings historically receive more page views, you know those
are the best times to publish new content.
 If data mining uncovers an unexpected downturn in social media
engagement, you can use that insight to identify the cause and tweak
your strategy.
On the direct marketing front, forecasting and regression techniques allow you to model
various activities. Going back to the security system example, if you hold an annual
security seminar, you can build an ad campaign strategy based on how campaigns from
previous years performed.

Compare Top CRM Software Leaders

3. Boost Customer Retention

Attracting customers is only half the battle. Customer retention offers vast opportunity
for companies that want to thrive. Building loyalty programs, executing one-to-one
marketing and handling customer issues are a few ways to encourage customer loyalty.

First up, loyalty programs. Once someone becomes a customer, it’s important to make
them feel valued. Putting a loyalty program in place is an excellent way to accomplish
that. Using classification and clustering allows you to identify the best candidates for a
loyalty program based on factors like their purchase history and engagement with your
brand.
One-to-one marketing is another helpful retention method. Marketing is about
interacting with people, not a set of database information. Data mining techniques
including classification and association help you personalize each interaction, such as
sending customers the most relevant offers based on data patterns. That brings a human
element so customers know you care about them as individuals.

Email marketing tools are a great way to send personalized messages.

Finally, customer service quality is a marker for customer satisfaction. If people have a
poor experience, it’s much harder to keep them from leaving. Sequential analysis is
particularly helpful in this regard. By allowing you to spot trends, it can uncover potential
weak areas in your customer service processes.

For example, looking at the data could reveal a pattern that most complaints relate to a
lack of timely responses from your help desk. With this insight, you can take measures to
cut down on the wait time so customers receive prompt help.

What do these examples all have in common? They offer personal, meaningful
interactions to customers. Given that consumers expect no less, it’s no surprise that
companies who place a high priority on sending such messages are much more likely to
succeed.
In 2018, Salesforce performed a study to weigh in on the topic. It found that high-
performing marketers are over eight times more likely than underperformers to be fully
satisfied with their ability to use data to send appropriate messages using the best
channel at the best time for their audience.

A 2018 Evergage survey of marketing professionals found a similar value in

personalization. According to the data, three out of every four respondents believe
personalization has a strong to extreme impact on customer relationships. The survey
also revealed that 88% of respondents think customers expect personalized experiences.

Clearly, it’s in your best interest to include personalization in your strategy. And
gathering insights from your CRM data goes a long way in supporting that goal.

4. Gain Long-Term Value from Customers

Which customers have the highest lifetime value (LTV)? Where are the best cross-sell
and upsell opportunities? Questions like these are important to answer if you want to
sustain long-term success. They’re also much easier to answer when rooted in data.

When determining LTV for each customer, classification and clustering provide a way to
make sense of your customer base by dividing it into smaller segments. Forecasting and
regression also play a critical role. After all, LTV is something you can only predict, so
using historical data can help inform which current customers will be most valuable.

Market basket analysis, which is common in the retail space, is another technique for
uncovering associations so you can gain the most value from customer purchases.

At a basic level, it looks for the relationship between different items that someone buys,
using an if/then rule. For example, if someone goes on Amazon and orders dog food and
sunglasses, market basket analysis seeks to explain the correlation.

It’s a complex concept, but the underlying goal is straightforward: gain a better
understanding of buyer behavior to increase sales. Physical stores put this into practice
by placing products that customers often buy together in the same vicinity.

What about cross-selling and upselling? Sequential analysis and association let you drill
into the data to uncover the best opportunities. Say a cable company wanted to
encourage upgrades from their basic product to an extended package that included extra
channels but cost more. They could use sequential analysis to determine that,
historically, men in their 40s upgrade most often, making them the best type of customer
to upsell.
Conclusion
CRM systems contain a wealth of customer data. But that data is only valuable if you can
use it to inform your marketing decisions. Data mining helps make sense of your
information so you can market more effectively at every stage of the customer journey.

The first step on that road is to invest in the right CRM software. With so many solutions
available, it can be hard. To help make your search less complicated, we created a free
comparison report. You can use it to get an overview of vendors and speed up your
selection process.

With the right CRM system implemented and a strong data mining strategy in place,
you’ll be on your way to striking it rich in the gold rush of the 21st-century.

How would CRM data mining add value to your marketing efforts? Let us know in the
comments

Read 8:

The Ultimate Loyalty

Rewards Handbook
Timi GaraiOctober 22, 2019
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Coming up with loyalty rewards for your VIP program is such an exciting time in a
company’s life. All the brainstorming, all the crazy ideas! It really makes your team’s
creativity flow, don’t you agree?

Unfortunately, these meetings often end up inconclusive. From my experience, most

problems stem from the lack of knowledge regarding the reward framework. What kind
of reward types are currently out there? What are the best reward system practices in
the industry, and what blunders should you avoid?

Don’t worry. You’re in good hands. This little guide has all the information you need.
What Are Loyalty Rewards and Why Do They Matter?
Before sinking our teeth into the reward types and how they are utilized, let’s inspect
their true nature. So what are loyalty rewards, in the context of customer retention?

The simplest answer is: Rewards are benefits or physical items that are granted, gifted, or
assigned to loyalty members based on their achievements or efforts within the program.

The success of a loyalty program massively depends on the rewards you offer for

members. Moreover, selecting the most fitting incentives for your brand and target
audience is just as crucial as picking the right goals and objectives you would like to
achieve with your loyalty program.

In this article we’ll show you numerous industry examples. Use our reward template as a benchmark for your own reward system.
Loyalty rewards are prime motivating factors to:

 Keep customers invested in the long run

 Prompt actions you want people to perform

Rewards are what motivate customers to change their behavior. This could include
more brand engagement actions or simply using features or services of your business
they have never used before.

Beer Hawk, UK’s largest specialty beer retailer, wanted to encourage customers to return expensive beer kegs.  With the help of
Antavo, they built a loyalty program that rewards this kind of behavior.
Reward Types
There are five distinct loyalty reward categories. A healthy loyalty program features a
mix of these, although not every one of them will fit into your strategy.

Financial benefits
Offering a financial benefit means you grant either percentage-based or fixed-amount
discounts. No doubt, you’ve already run into coupons that offer either 5% or $5 off a
purchase, but free shipping also belongs to this category.

The upside of financial benefit is clearly the concept of “free money”. Customers feel
they are receiving real value after each purchase, helping them to save money. This
system is also the quickest and easiest to be set up, as you don’t need to mess with
physical rewards.

On the downside, your discount strategy can be easily copied by competitors, and it

doesn’t give a reason for customers to engage with your brand.

Brittish high-end streetwear retailer Represent  uses discounts to catch the attention of customers. And to motivate them even
more,  reaching higher tiers  increases the size of the discount.

Service-related benefits
These kinds of rewards are aimed at making the shopping experience more convenient
from a customer’s perspective. Examples include express shipping, extended return,
money-back guarantee, free alterations, early access, stylist recommendation, gift
wrapping, priority customer support, etc.

Service-related benefits are great for shifting customers’ attention from discounts to the
more convenient shopping experience and for generating positive word-of-mouth.

Unfortunately, this approach works only if you haven’t explored it before the loyalty
program. For instance, let’s say you’ve already offered world-wide shipping and free
alterations for everyone. Withdrawing existing privileges and restricting them to a high
loyalty tier would surely lead to a huge backlash.

Antwerp-based jewelry retailer  Diamanti Per Tutti  balances service-related benefits really well. It offers worldwide shipping and 30-
day returns to every customer, but the highly popular free delivery is reserved for loyalty members only.

Gifts
When entering a reward program, customers often expect to receive some sort
of product or hand-crafted item. It can come from your own inventory or from a 3rd
party. You can grant gifts during special events, like on the member’s birthday or the
enrollment anniversary.

Gifts are the perfect way to express an act of kindness towards your customers and
show you care. Physical rewards work best if members don’t expect them. This way, you
can really put a smile on their face!

Do you have special edition products in your inventory or gifts from 3rd party partners?
These are perfect candidates for your loyalty reward system!

However, if you choose a gift that needs to be manufactured or needs to be bought – be

mindful. Not knowing which kind of loyalty rewards customers would relate to might
lead to throwing money out the window.
Among others,  JD Williams grants dedicated customers movie passes so they can enjoy their favorite blockbusters at home – this is
a gesture that members highly appreciate.

Events & Experiences

This category consists of happenings such as party invitations, concert tickets, hotel
stays, free lunches, organized either by you or a partner company. Events & experiences
are the perfect opportunities to build deeper engagement, provide exclusivity, and grant
customers lifetime memories they’ll talk about for years.

Keep in mind though that the more exclusive the reward, the rarer it should be to avoid
damaging the exclusivity feeling of it. Moreover, it requires a lot of effort from you to
organize such events, especially in multiple countries.

Simply Be celebrated the launch of its loyalty program with a huge party, where they invited many influencers and brand
ambassadors. This event contributed a lot to the brand’s positive word-of-mouth.
Custom
This is a tricky one. Basically, ‘custom’ stands for any kind of reward you can’t categorize
anywhere. You can go wild with your imagination here and come up with something
unique or brand-specific that helps your business stand out.

However, a large amount of customer insight, creativity, and resources are needed to
realize something unique.

US-based streetwear retailer Jimmy Jazz runs a raffle on Facebook that is independent of its loyalty program. However, members of
the Fresh Selects program automatically receive additional entries as a ‘custom’ benefit.

Aligning Your Rewards With Your Brand & Audience

Imagine yourself in the shoes of a sportswear brand, whose mission it is to support a
healthy lifestyle and to motivate customers – regardless of their athletic level – during
their journey. Would you offer them coupons to McDonald’s or Burger King? Probably
not.
Instead, why not offer them motivational music or podcasts they can listen to while
working out? It could be a members-only feature, with a monthly cap on the number of
tracks they can access. Increasing their tier level would increase this limit, though, which
is not only a great incentive but also fits your image and audience as well.

A simple glance at the  NikePlus Membership page is enough to see that it’s all about supporting the sporty lifestyle. This is backed
up by features, such as expert guidance, all-star treatment and fast delivery.

Are My Rewards Enticing Enough to Motivate

Customers?
This question can be tricky. There are various criteria that need to be considered:

 Are the rewards appealing enough? A thematic podcast is always more alluring than a
generic discount.

 Are they attainable enough? Exclusivity is nice and all, but pricing a reward or experience
unrealistically high might disillusion members.

 Is it a recurring opportunity? Limited-time rewards create a sense of FOMO, but to avoid

breaking people’s hearts, bring back fan favorites every now and then.
  Do they provide some form of diversity? If you stick to one type of reward, you are
limiting the pool of customers who would be interested.

 Does it have a ‘mystery factor’? People love secrets and riddles. Sometimes it’s worth it
to keep top-tier rewards a secret to drive excitement and engagement.

Luxury kidswear retailer  Shan & Toad  offers a little game during the first time members visit the loyalty program. This prize spin is
very enticing and draws in people easily.

How to Stay Profitable With a Customer-friendly

Loyalty Rewards Program?
Of course, loyalty rewards cannot escape the basic logic of all marketing and sales
incentives – they need to generate more return than their cost. So how can you play
safely in this case?
 1. For Earn & Burn programs: Define the point-price of the reward system in a way that
customers need to complete at least one purchase to earn enough points to claim the
lowest level reward.

2. For Tier-based programs: Tier benefits are usually on-going ones, and it’s really hard to
change later. Consider keeping the most expensive benefits for the most dedicated
segments. Also, don’t introduce all the benefits at the beginning.

3. For Perks Programs: The tricky part here is that all rewards are available unconditionally
for members. So try to keep the rewards as low as possible, run frequent tests and
updates among rewards to find your sweet spot, or attach reward usage to purchases.

4. For Gamified programs: The point of gamification is to build a habit; therefore, set the
goals to be easily achievable. Also, badges are gained on a frequent basis, and the reward
value should reflect this.

5. For Hybrid programs: By including partner rewards (free stays at a hotel, extra meals at a
restaurant, etc.) you can reduce your expenses. Usually, these cost you nothing as they
are brought in through special partnership agreements.

LuisaViaRoma’s Sneaker’s Club is a genius way to engage customers. Prompts members to use their points, and the early access
feature is a cost-effective incentive.
Get Ready To Be Creative
Hopefully, I managed to answer all your questions. From now on, nothing is holding you
back from unleashing your full creative potential. So schedule a brainstorming session
with your team and start planning your own loyalty rewards.

Of course, rewards are just a stepping stone in your customer retention strategy. For
more info about loyalty programs, check out our comprehensive guide about creating a
successful program

Analyzing 7 Well-known
Reward Programs: Amazon,
Kellogg’s, Uber and More
Klari NemethJune 7, 2020
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As life has started returning to normal after COVID-19, customers’ demand for
businesses to honor their loyalty is on the rise. However, when planning a rewards
program, you might feel overwhelmed by the myriad strategies and schemes to choose
from. If you would like to get a headstart on the competition, we will show you how
seven well-known brands approach loyalty and the different game mechanics they’ve
applied to keep their valuable customers by their side.
1. Amazon Prime – Shipping Convenience
Amazon, the largest e-retailer in the world, launched its subscription-based loyalty
program, Amazon Prime in 2005. Introducing a membership fee might feel
counterproductive in today’s competitive market, but it has allowed Amazon to offer
immediate and valuable privileges that free reward programs could never afford.

From the very first day of their memberships, Amazon grants Prime members unlimited
access to their streaming services and offers exclusive prices and savings. The key
benefit of their program, however, is shipping convenience. Members can enjoy free
next-day delivery with 100 million eligible items and no minimum spend threshold.
Furthermore more and more products are being added to the same-day delivery list. In
select regions, Amazon indulges members with a 2-hour grocery delivery
from AmazonFresh, which has been free for Prime members since October 2019.

The more purchases Prime members make, the more value they will get from their subscription in the form of free shipping.

To optimize the investment that the company puts into shipping benefits, Amazon has
introduced the ‘No-rush shipping’ option for members who are willing to wait six
business days to get their orders, instead of the standard two-day shipping that they are
eligible for. In exchange, members earn rewards on future purchases or immediate
discounts.

Currently, Amazon offers a $1.5 digital reward for each purchase delivered with No-Rush Shipping.

2. AutoZone Rewards – Easy-to-understand Rules

The American auto parts retailer AutoZone has a transaction-based loyalty scheme that
is very easy to understand. Each eligible purchase of $20 or more in the previous 12
months earns customers a credit. After members earn 5 credits, AutoZone gives them a
$20 reward, which they are free to use within 90 days.
The simplicity of rules is reflected in the promotion of the program as well. On May 20, 2020, AutoZone offered a $5 bonus reward
to new members.

To engage customers with your loyalty program, it’s really important to keep the rules
simple and clear so members will know what to expect. However, if you plan to
introduce limitations, you should be very cautious and make sure the communication of
changes is equally as digestible. AutoZone, which introduced new expiration rules for
their credits and rewards without notifying customers sufficiently, has incurred costs of
$48.9 million for their oversight.

The company is still doing great things with their program, though. As plastic cards are
being crowded out of customer’s wallets, AutoZone’s reward program is now accessible
online or in-app. The downside is, customers need to download it. A more seamless
alternative might be using digital cards made for Mobile Wallets, as they are available on
all phone systems from the get-go.
With the digital membership card in the AutoZone mobile app, customers can earn and use credits in store.

3. Kellogg’s Family Rewards – Engagement Through

Rewards
For FMCG brands that sell their products through retailers, it’s especially important to
find ways to communicate with customers directly. By building a standalone website for
its loyalty program, Kellogg’s is able to engage with Family Rewards members,
even outside of the buying cycle.
Kellogg’s was originally asking customers to enter codes that they could find inside
product packaging, but five years ago it was one of the first companies to implement
handier, receipt-based earning. Members can upload their online or in-store receipts via
text message, on KFR.com, or send them in via email.

Receipt uploads are not only rewarded with points, but members can support a good cause as well. After every Kellogg’s Frosted
Flakes purchase, Kellogg’s donates $1 to DonorsChoose.org through the Mission Tiger initiation.

To make it easier to earn points, Kellogg’s has partnered up with various retailers by
providing an option to attach retailers’ loyalty cards to Family Rewards accounts. As
soon as the loyalty card is added, customers won’t need to upload their receipts
anymore. Instead, points will automatically be issued every time their card is presented
to the cashier.

The heart of Kellogg’s Family Rewards program is the exceptionally wide range of
rewards they offer. This includes monthly sweepstakes, donations, free recipes, gift
cards, downloadable coloring pages, books, apparel, and free discount coupons, just to
name a “few”’.
The variety of rewards available to redeem guarantees that the program is equally rewarding for every member of the family.

4. The Vitamin Shoppe Healthy Awards –

Supercharging the Loyalty Ladder
Omnichannel nutrition supplement brand, The Vitamin Shoppe, revamped its reward
program a year ago. Healthy Awards is now a hybrid program that mixes the elements of
traditional earn-and-burn loyalty program mechanisms with spend-based tiers and
personalized rewards.

The program incentivizes repeat purchases with a complex program logic. While
customers can climb the loyalty ladder by spending more (Silver membership after $200
spent and Gold membership above $700), points also accumulate faster as customers
reach higher tiers.
Bronze level members need to spend $125 to earn a $5 reward, however as a Gold member the same coupon is available after
spending $83.

The Vitamin Shoppe offers educational content and nutritional coaching sessions as free
perks for each of their loyalty members. These rewards help customers to find the
Vitamin Shoppe products that support their personal fitness goals.
Nutritionists prepare customized meal plans for Silver and Gold members after an online coaching session.

Like other brands, The Vitamin Shoppe responded to the COVID-19 crisis by introducing
contact-free pickup and online community events, but the nutrition company didn’t
forget about their loyalty members and well-deserved rewards either. The validity of
rewards has been extended from 60 to 90 days to ensure that everyone can use their
coupons in time.

5. Uber Rewards and Uber Pro – Stress-free Rides with

Successful Drivers
Uber is constantly expanding its loyalty programs, Uber Reward and Uber Pro, to new
locations, targeting both potential customers and drivers.
Uber has implemented a point-based tier program for both audiences with tailored
incentives and benefits.

Employing the traditional earn-and-burn strategy, the Uber Rewards program offers
customers $5 in Uber Cash after collecting 500 points for eligible Uber rides and Uber
Eats deliveries.
Tiers are determined based on the spending of the last 6 months, even if it’s prior to joining Uber Rewards.

By earning points, members can level up to higher tiers, unlocking benefits that make
using Uber stress-free. Gold members are allowed to rebook their ride without a
cancellation fee, Platinum members get price protection between two of their favorite
destinations, while Diamond status indulges customers with complimentary upgrades
and 24/7 support.

To encourage drivers to provide customers with a great riding experience, Uber started
beta-testing Uber Pro two years ago. Drivers can advance to higher statuses not just
based on the number of rides accomplished, but also on the ratings they receive from
their customers. In addition to cashback on gas and 25% off car maintenance, drivers can
get access to roadside assistance, priority support, or even 100% tuition coverage.
Pro tiers are recalculated every three months to keep drivers motivated to provide high quality service.

As an act of goodwill during the coronavirus crisis, Uber added six months of gratis Uber
Rewards status to Gold, Platinum and Diamond members, and also showed their
generosity by transporting healthcare workers for free.

6. The North Face VIPeak – Million Ways to Earn

Outdoor lifestyle company The North Face has built a reward program that uses the
power of financial rewards to motivate customers to make repeat purchases, engage
with the brand and stay in touch at every channel – the behavior that every brand seeks.
Right after joining the program, members are encouraged to make their first purchase and start earning with a 10% off welcome
coupon.

The program divides the year into three, four-month-long Peak Points Windows, in
which customers can earn points in order to get a coupon at the end of each period. For
every $1 spent online or in-store, customers get 10 points, plus there are plenty of soft
actions to earn points with. Referring friends, downloading The North Face app,
checking in at stores, completing a survey, using a reusable bag or participating in a
campaign are all ways for members to earn additional points.
Just like the title of the program, the naming of membership levels – Basecamp, Halfdome and Summit – resonates with the brand
essence and the target audience.

Despite the innovative point earning options, VIPeak unfolds only one way to reward
customers: the discount coupon earned in the previous Peak Points Window. The
program terms proclaim that members might be offered with further opportunities to
use their points, however the details remain unclear.

7. The Home Depot Pro Xtra – Run Your Business with

Ease
To honor their best customers, The Home Depot launched a loyalty program for
professional customers who purchase work equipment and commodities at a high
volume. With all the benefits that it offers, the Pro Xtra program helps professionals
increase their profit margins by saving money, time and effort.

After logging in, customers can access My Pro Xtra Workbench to find and export all
historical purchase data and invoices, so the data can be easily imported in their
accounting software. Pros can issue buyer ID cards with spending limits for their
employees ensuring all company expenses are tracked on the same account, and with
the Text2Confirm solution in-store employee purchase authorization is quick and easy.

Pro Xtra Paint Rewards is a sub-program in which customers are not only rewarded with discount coupons, but they can get free
direct-to-job site paint delivery and a five-year color history by job.

The program helps save money on each project. A volume discount is applied on each
purchase of $1,500 or more, plus there are over 4,000 items available in The Home
Depot spread with bulk pricing.

Conclusion
Now what if we mix the list of companies and the description of their reward programs.
Would you be able to match them up again? I’m sure you would be. We’ve seen loads of
companies use traditional earn-and-burn solutions, adding perks or tiered discounts and
introducing point earning options of all kinds, but what do the above programs have in
common? They each reflect brand essence and reward customers with tailored benefits

Loyalty Program Best

Practices for Responding to
the Coronavirus
Tamas OsziApril 15, 2020
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The Coronavirus pandemic has created an unprecedented situation across all industries.
Many companies are still trying to find their footing, while others have already started
executing their contingency plans. What we can say for sure is that empathy has become
the new norm in marketing. If you overlook this and try to be pushy, it could hurt your
business. In order to help you respond to the situation caused by the Coronavirus, this
article includes the useful CRM and loyalty program action plans.

What Impact Has COVID-19 Had?

Global lockdowns and social distancing have dealt a fatal blow to brick-and-mortar retail.
On the other hand, eCommerce is experiencing a resurgence, with essential businesses
seeing a sharp increase in demand.

So what’s the current reality?

 Since people are now spending most of their time cooped up at home, ‘Home
Hubs’ have become a thing. Consumers are making as many purchases as possible
online in order to avoid human contact. But more time spent browsing also means
 more opportunities to send customers useful content, or catch their attention with a
viral marketing campaign.

 The change in shopping preferences has led to the phenomenon of ‘Crisis spend’.
Essentials, like food and functional products, like hygiene supplies, are indeed the
main focus at the moment. However, most people occasionally go out of their way
to buy non-essential goods, such as cosmetics, art supplies, workout gear or games,
to make themselves feel better.

 Witnessing the hard times that others in their communities are going through has
made people more socially aware. This heightened ‘Share & Care’ mentality means
that people are more likely to make donations or volunteer. Brands that show their
dedication to social causes often see increased empathy and a boost in buzz from
customers.

Antavo hosted an hour-long webinar with Jörn Roegler, VP Strategy & Insights and Giulia
Filoso, Loyalty Strategist, introducing the new customer reality in detail, as well as showcasing
a versatile action plan to future-proof your business.

How Have Other Companies Reacted?

A major lesson learned from the 2007-2009 economic recession is that customer
experience is what differentiates leaders from laggards. Brands that are quick to adapt to
this new situation and get on customers’ good sides with new, disruptive approaches will
be the ones to come out of COVID-19 relatively unscathed.

Here are a few examples from companies that have managed to connect with customers
during the health crisis:

1. Make Shopping Worthwhile For Customers

Being able to stand out from the competition is extremely important because customers
have more time on their hands to search for the best deals. In this case, highlight the
convenience of the shopping journey. Luxury fashion retailer LuisaViaRoma did so by
extending returns from 30 days to 60, while DSW is providing free shipping on all
orders.

Other than offering free shipping to everyone, DSW also introduced a generous return policy and curbside pick-up to cater to their
audience.

2. Show Visible Efforts to Support Health Care

Luxury giant LVMH announced that it will dedicate its French production facilities to
creating hand sanitizer gels, which are then distributed for free to hospitals and health
authorities across France. Doing so keeps the production flow going for the company,
while the charitable act has garnered positive word-of-mouth on the Internet.

3. Stay Close to Customers

UK beer company BrewDog has turned all of its bars into virtual pubs to keep their
community close to the brand. Hosted on Zoom, patrons can join in, raise a glass and
have a laugh online. Furthermore, participants can share a drink with the founders,
watch homebrewing tutorials and play games.
BrewDog’s virtual pubs feature live music streams and cooking sessions as well, creating an authentic pub experience.

4. Create Infotainment
Cosmetics brand e.l.f. leveraged infotainment and achieved virality by reaching out to
customers on social media platforms. In brief, the brand published a remix of a trending
song to TikTok, telling people about the importance of personal hygiene and self-
distancing. In doing so, e.l.f. garnered plenty of new fans who will be sure to think of the
brand when considering future cosmetics purchases.

5. Keep Customers & Employees Safe

Lastly, here’s a cautionary tale for what happens if you ignore the new customer reality
and push sales too violently. US-based game reseller GameStop faced major backlash for
not only keeping its stores open during the pandemic, but for failing to provide sufficient
sanitizers, safety masks and gloves to employees, endangering the lives of workers and
customers alike.
GameStop’s controversy ended up drawing the attention of the media and lawmakers as well, forcing the company to close all of its
stores in the United States.

Keeping Newfound Customers as a Booming

Business
Not every brand is suffering from a lack of customer interest, mind you. Some businesses
are experiencing quite the opposite, with a sudden surge of orders from new shoppers.
For them, the biggest challenge will be turning today’s customers into tomorrow’s brand
lovers.

 As mentioned earlier, this is not the time to exploit the situation commercially. Try
to serve, not to sell. Focus on long-term profit by keeping your prices affordable,
while protecting your margins as much as possible.

 Seize the opportunity to plan ahead. If you’re planning to launch a loyalty program
in the future to better engage your new customers, the concept of that program
 requires weeks of brainstorming and preparation — actions you can start taking
right now.

 Lastly, this is the perfect time to test: the unique nature of the current market
allows you to experiment with new strategies and learn faster. For instance, you can
test how your customer segments react to a new app, or to the introduction of an
Uber-based home delivery service.

Starbucks used the situation as an opportunity to expand its delivery service, partnering with Uber Eats to deliver coffee in 49 cities
in the US.

Making the Most Out of Your Loyalty Program

Having a loyalty program while the Coronavirus is still active is a great advantage. A
next-gen loyalty framework not only ensures that customers remain satisfied — without
too many discounts — but also creates plenty of touchpoints to help your brand remain
relevant.

Here’s a three-step action plan to increase engagement:

1. Avoid any friction. Shoppers have less patience than usual, and they might
abandon your brand altogether after one poor experience. Show your generosity by
extending points expiration and tier reset deadlines, so customers don’t get
frustrated about losing their progress. Furthermore, lower redemption rates for
rewards, so members are incentivized to use their available points.

2. Improve your incentives and rewards. Make your loyalty program more fun and
engaging by introducing new reward options, such as the ability to donate loyalty
points to charity, or develop new brand engagement elements, such as Instagram
contests.

3. Future-proof your program. Don’t forget about your long-standing members

either. Give special rewards or perks to recurring spenders, and encourage them to
interact with the loyalty program on additional channels as well. Also, introduce
profiling quizzes to learn about their preferences to enhance the personalization.
Despite suffering as a hospitality brand,  Hilton has donated one million hotel rooms  to medical professionals on the front line, and
postponed tier expiration for its loyalty program members.

Essential Steps If You Don’t Have a Loyalty

Program
In case you’re facing Coronavirus challenges without a loyalty program, there are plenty
of actions you can take to retain customer loyalty. For example, you can ask your
marketing team or industry experts to generate helpful content, such as advice on how
to make home life smoother or more exciting, beauty tips, fashion advice, guides on how
to repair broken household items, etc.

It’s also worth considering laying down the foundation for an upcoming loyalty initiative.
Loyalty programs — and CRM in general — simply cannot work without customer data
and segmentation. So run dedicated tests and surveys to learn more about your
audience.

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