Hitting the Business Bulls Eye
Target your message to increase marketing effectiveness and save money.

By Bob Merrigan

On any given day, business owners open their e-mail to find a barrage of useless offers, such as renter’s insurance sent to homeowners, work from home deals sent to business owners and menopause relief sent to men.

It’s ironic that small businesses have such potential for direct—even one-to-one— marketing, but still use such a “broadcast” approach in shaping their message.

These companies are operating under a “one size fits all” mentality. The problem is, a single message just isn’t sufficient—or effective—at communicating to all customers and prospects.

Assess Customer Knowledge
A tool companies can use to focus their communications goals is the Customer Knowledge Curve. It can help clarify “What’s Important Now?” to your prospect or customer.

The Customer Knowledge Curve is based on a simple premise: Over time, your customers (or prospective customers) will build their base of knowledge about your product or service, and that knowledge will determine the likelihood of future sales.
The better you understand what information each customer needs before progressing up the curve toward “loyal usage,” the more effectively you can target your message to accomplish that goal.

Let’s assume the starting point is a total lack of knowledge; that is, your prospect doesn’t even know there’s a problem, let alone that you could provide a solution. Without a sense of need (or want), you’ll have difficulty building much of a value proposition.
Some problems are readily apparent, such as the need for toner to make your printer work or the need for paper to continue making copies. Others are less so, such as the need for consulting services or the value of training.

Target Your Marketing
If your prospect is at this early stage, your marketing efforts should be more general, focusing more on the importance and implications of the problem, especially the consequences of ignoring it rather than the specific advantages of your solution.
Once the need is acknowledged, you can begin to establish an awareness of your product or service as a potential solution. Before becoming a customer, the prospect must know you exist and then begin to develop an opinion.

In some instances, your prospect may be at the brink of buying—almost out of copy paper, to use the examples above—or lacking the internal resources to face an impending crisis. At this point, your marketing must focus more on why, out of all the options available, yours is the best solution. You must build your case by explaining the importance of your key features, and clearly identify significant advantages.

Your goal here is to get the customer to try your product or service. You want to create a user experience and do everything you can to ensure that experience is positive. Communications just prior to this point will focus on the importance of taking action. Just after, you can focus on reinforcing the buying decision or providing instructions or other information that will make the user experience more positive.

Managing the Spread
But what if you have customers and potential spread along the entire curve? Well, you’re not alone, most businesses do.
You need to segment them into manageable groups that allow you to integrate your communications and sales efforts most effectively.

For starters, let’s say there are five groups:
1. Key customers (the 20 percent who deliver 80 percent of your business)
2. Other customers
3. Hot prospects (know they have a need, are looking for a solution and you’re a part of that search)
4. Warm prospects (meet two of the above three criteria)
5. Cold prospects

Key customers. For your key customers, your communications will be very personal, and designed to continue to build their loyalty and keep them “part of the family.” These include face time, special buying arrangements, customized service and outside-the-product enhancements that would be very difficult to repeat or replace.

Other customers. You’ll constantly be evaluating the remainder of your customers to see who has the potential to move into that “key” category. Meanwhile, your communications will be designed to help build their business with you. You might give a discount for an add-on purchase, an update on new capabilities or a special invitation to a workshop, dinner or other event.

Hot prospects. How can you convince hot prospects that (a) the time to act is now and (b) the partner to pick is you? Communication at this stage needs to address these two issues as directly and emphatically as possible.

Warm prospects. As you move farther away from a buying decision, chances are you should be looking at an information offer (“Find out more”) rather than a price incentive (“20 percent off”) You’re building your case. The prospect already recognizes the need and is now evaluating possible solutions.

Coldest prospects. The coldest prospects are those who don’t yet realize they have a need, or who don’t think it’s serious enough to require action. These people need education, which is an investment on your part. You will have to determine if the potential return justifies that commitment.

None of us operates with unlimited resources. Targeting your message to address the information your prospects (or customers) need—and need now—will help you invest your marketing resources more effectively.

Bob Merrigan, owner of Merrigan & Co. in Kansas City, has more than 25 years in marketing communications and is a past president of the Kansas City Direct Marketing Association. He can be reached at (816) 756-5777.