Reactivating Customers

Yesterday FedEx lowered its 2013 GDP forecast to 1.9%, down from 2.4%.  It doesn’t sound like much until you realize that it is a 21% decline!  Pretty much a stagnant market.  And while this may not correlate directly to your industrial or construction market, it does say something about the general macroeconomic outlook (especially if other companies / economists start predicating similarly as perception sometimes becomes reality).

The key to growth then becomes penetrating existing customers – which everyone espouses and tries to do – and reactivating customers – which many fail to do.

The other day I came home from the office (okay, for those who know me, I walked down the stairs) and listened to our answering system.  There was a message from an eye doctor mentioning that I hadn’t visited in awhile, that I may want to have my eyes checked and they left their telephone number … twice.

Which got me thinking, yes, it has been awhile and I should get them checked.

The electrical application?

Revenue Generation from Customer Activation

And think of what happens if just 10% of their “dormant” accounts think similarly and call (which I have called.)

While many focus on the 80/20 principal which leverages your existing relationships to increase your share within a customer, it can limit your growth potential, especially in a stagnating economic environment.

Concurrently you need to ensure you are reaching more of your customers to capture their share of wallet. This requires communicating either consistently (and ideally) or utilizing reactivation techniques designed to communicate information and interest.  You need to earn the right to receive their business.

Strategies can include print and e communications, telephone calling (either managed in-house, outsourced, the infamous “our counter guys have the time” strategy or using an automated called (which the optometrist used.)

Just because someone is small to you doesn’t mean that they are small for someone else. And because they are on a salesperson’s list / in their territory (in the case of manufacturers), doesn’t mean that they are called on.  We spoke with a distributor the other day while developing their 2013 marketing plan. The distributor commented on 2 manufacturers whose promotions they didn’t participate in because the local rep didn’t mention the promotion until the last week of the promo!

This is where a customer engagement process can drive targeted incremental communications and revenue.

Consider the strategy of frequency of communications captures mind share; mind share captures market share.

Do you know of distributors or manufacturers who have done a good job of marketing to dormant or new customers?