This is part 2 of a 3 part series on Determining your customer perspective – Can you satisfy these customer segments?

As I mentioned previously, all customers behave and act differently. The personal contact that they receive from your organization should certainly attempt and make them feel that way. However, at some point and time you do have to segment and organize them. I use the Duct Tape Marketing Hourglass as my guideline in determining that structure. You can read more about that in my Ebook on the Pillars of the Lean Marketing House. In developing your marketing or sales channels, you must also determine if you can satisfy the segments that your organization wants to compete in.

Think about what is important for customer satisfaction. Is it, on time delivery, production cycle time, conformance, warranty clams, etc. Many segments require more hand holding before, during and after the sale. Others may require a little more customization. These metrics are extremely important when you are considering marketing to them. You want to align their expectations accordingly to what you can deliver. Be careful, many times to get the order in these segments you may promise more than you can deliver, never a good scenario for either party.

How much does it cost to market to this particular segment? Will you have to advertise through certain media, attend certain trade shows, additional fewer sales or technical support expenditures? And of course, how price sensitive is this segment? You may find certain segments prefer to buy online, through distribution or even direct. These sales cannot and should not contradict each other but be part of an overall marketing strategy. Without, price confusion, dealer erosion and mixed messages will send alarms to a customer that will certainly if not make it impossible, much more difficult in the sales process. You may be better off excluding a certain market segment.

Channel Management is one of the areas that I find as one of the most mismanaged areas in the marketing process. The particular way you go to market can vary the volume and timing of purchases. It even can effect after sales service and maybe an ingredient that is sometimes forgotten, customer loyalty. Many times you will find that the loyalty is stronger with your distribution source than your product. On another hand, an online purchase will seldom develop deep customer loyalties. There is nothing right or wrong about any situation just be sure you recognize the situation for what it is.

Can each of these segments have a different price for the same product or service? Unless you package the product differently it is very difficult to do that. Also, you have to make sure your distribution structure is compensated adequately. Failure to do so will cause that source to be always on the outlook for another alternative. They may build a need for your product within their clientele and then supply a competitor’s product through no fault of their own. Pricing issues must be dealt with before you enter each different segment of the marketplace. Many times by adding services or financing in these segments, you can provide revenue to offset the additional expenses. Don’t forget to ask you distribution source for ideas. They may have current financial packages that they would gladly utilize already in place.

Not every segment can be profitable to you. Not every segment is worth the risk. You must remember what allows you to make margin and not try to be someone that you are not.

Related Posts:

Lean your Marketing thru Segmentation

Improve throughput, cut your customers in half!

Have you struggled defining your Ideal Client – Find out how

Determining your Customer Perspective – Who do you want?

Technorati : Channel Management, Marketing Hourglass, Marketing Segments, Pillars, Sales Channels

John says, “The top half indeed resembles the funnel concept, but the expanding bottom half, to my way of thinking, adds the necessary focus on the total customer experience that ultimately leads to referrals and marketing momentum.”

As I was reading The Duct Tape Marketing Blog, I remembered another blog post John had recently written, Is selling Becoming More Like Marketing? Maybe, it should be turned around in that is Marketing becoming more like Selling? Marketing has always been judged on how many leads we dump into the top of the funnel. The salespeople take over and develop the relationships, build the credibility and make the presentations. After the sale, they maintained the relationships. The Eagles understood the bottom of the hourglass better than any other rperson in the organization. I am saying practically the same thing John did in his blog, but that really is the secret sauce that can make your organization successful today.

The important part of sale sand marketing is the work that takes place in both halves of the Hourglass. That is where the ball usually gets dropped and a prime example is the refusal of many industries to participate in the new wave of marketing. It is just too expensive to nurture, develop repeat and referral business all in person. Don’t get me wrong, you still need that human touch, but you have limited resources and limited Eagles(good salespeople) to go around. Developing effective and efficient communication in these parts of the hourglass is one of the most important things you can do to increase sales.

What does hold you back? Looking for that one thing or constraint that is holding you back is seldom found in the middle of your hourglass, the close. It occurs elsewhere and not having a structure in place to walk people through the 7 stages is imperative. That is why I encourage people to use the Lean tool of Value Stream Mapping and map these seven stages and put some measurements to them. Why? The obvious is that “people perform based on how they are measured” -Eliyahu Goldratt, Theory of Constraints. However, a word of caution as Marketing becomes more like selling, it still is people thing.

Related Posts:

Applying the Marketing Hourglass: The Pillars of the Lean Marketing House

Related E-books:

Ideal Client

Mirror Marketing

Technorati : , Duct-Tape-Marketing, Marketing-Hourglass, TOC, Theory of Constraints