How many times have you heard the phrase "the money's in
the list?" Probably a lot if you have been involved in
internet marketing for a length of time. While I
completely agree, I would like to add to this phrase and
say "the big money's in the database." If you want to
start making the really big money, I'm talking tens of
millions, even hundreds of millions of dollars a year from
your business, you have to learn how to do database
marketing for your business.
So what is database marketing? Database marketing is when
you gather together data about your prospects and customers
and use this data to market your products and services more
efficiently and effectively. Do you realize that if you
take a look at all the big companies, I'm talking about
companies that are publicly traded and making an insane
amount of money every year, the large majority of them use
database marketing.
That's called a clue.
Case in point, take a trip to your local supermarket.
Chances are your local supermarket is part of a national
chain. There are very few local supermarkets left due to
global competition. When you arrive at that supermarket,
pick up some groceries and go to the checkout counter. The
cashier will likely ask you if you have some type of
"advantage" card.
The advantage card gives you discounts on your groceries
that you won't get if you don't have the advantage card.
For the supermarket, the advantage card gives the
supermarket the ability to store your identifying
information into a database so that they can use it to
market better to you. Not only do they have the basic
information, such as your name, your address and your
telephone number. They also have your shopping habits,
because remember, before you complete your purchase, you
have to swipe that advantage card.
This is a classic example of database marketing at work.
Even though you are not a multi-million dollar national
supermarket chain or retail store, you can still employ
database marketing in your business as well. The key is to
develop a system to gather the information and then develop
a system to store and use the information.
How do you gather the information?
One strategy that you can use is the same strategy the
supermarkets use. You can create some type of "preferred
buyers" club where any member of the club receives
discounts or special perks that other prospects and/or
customers do not receive. The only requirement is to sign
up for the club by providing some simple information, such
as your name, address and telephone number.
Employing this ONE strategy would put you light years ahead
of much of your competition, ESPECIALLY if you are running
an internet business. Do you realize how much of your
competition isn't gathering any information about your
customers besides a name and an email address? If you take
it one step further and are able to get an address and a
telephone number, that opens up the door for you to use TWO
additional means of getting your offers in the face of your
prospect.
So decide today to develop a plan to employ database
marketing into your business model. This one step could
literally triple your annual revenue for your business!
----------------------------------------------------
Mark Garland is the owner of Anayzed Marketing Solutions
located at http://www.AnalyzedMarketing.com . He is the
author of "The Total Marketers Handbook" marketing eCourse.
If you are wanting or learn how to effectively market your
website or small business then you will definately be
interested in it:
http://www.analyzedmarketing.com/handbook.php
No comments:
Post a Comment