B2B Marketing More Insight and Analysis

If you've followed the instructions to date, you will have:Profiled and segmented customers and gained some insights into purchase behaviour; a greater understanding of their value, what they are likely to buy next – and what to invest in securing them as customers; defined and licensed the core of a prospect pool; gained a good understanding of what they are likely to buy and when; A clear understanding of what to invest in acquiring them.

With all this you are well on the way to building success but now you've got to make it happen; both in terms of designing the communications, formulating contact strategies and choosing media channels.

In my opinion, this is where your investment in analysis is leveraged even further – as if you've chosen the right supplier – all of these questions can be answered using the insights from the analysis and profiling performed.

Each segment within your customer base will have a contact strategy and communications programme appropriate to value, products mix and decision-maker typography. Customer insights can be extrapolated and used to design prospect relationship marketing (PRM) programmes too.

Realistic expectations

In case you are beginning to salivate at the thought of all that new business just waiting to tumble in through the door and your imminent promotion, I'd better undertake some 'expectation management' at this point.

There is a problem. Unlike us individuals, most businesses don't do retail therapy. Impulse purchase is almost non-existent in a business of more than one person. And no matter how well-targeted or constructed, your programme won't change that business truth.

The fact is that (most) businesses are highly profit-conscious and won't spend or invest hard won cash unless there is a clear business need. And not every business within your prospect and customer pool will have that need at the time you make your first contact. Savvy small business owners with an eye to their company's valuation will be even more aware of the value of increasing profit through cost-cutting.

Assuming your prospect pool is well targeted, a best practice PRM approach will recognise the purchase process, after first establishing a start point and an end point in the form of a contract renewal date. It will seek to systematically move any prospect through to a successful conclusion using a variety of communications and media as prioritised by segmentation and informed by insights.

The frequency and intensity of the communications is likely to increase as companies make the transition through the process and the objective of each element of communication will change too. For instance, there is little point in trying to 'close' the sale before stage one. So the communications should be used to support brand messages. At the appropriate stages (two, three and four), giving complete and detailed information and a clear proposition should ideally ensure that your company is at least one of the short listed options for consideration.

Enabling targeted communications

The insights gained in analysis should allow you to speak to each about things that interest them, and not things that don't. Importantly, at every stage of the process, you must give prospects the opportunity to communicate with you; experience suggests that a prospect is more likely to respond and provide up-to-date information (eg. renewal date) if they feel they are getting something from the relationship too.

This becomes a virtuous circle as it engages the prospects and provides you with the information you need to assist you with your selling. This is particularly pertinent if we are to maximise conversion from prospects who are a long way from their renewal date.

If you get this far, you're doing really well and you should award yourself a gold star. Next month I'll start to take a closer look at some of the things that we've touched upon in establishing the principles of a successful relationship marketing programme.