Michael Collins

Database Marketing Counsel

Michael Collins runs Database Marketing Counsel, a data strategy and CRM consultancy in London. An acknowledged consultant, trainer and author with 2+ years experience in CRM, he contributes articles regularly to web sites and journals and has delivered his lectures and workshops in Europe, North America and Asia.

Increased Effectiveness of Your E-Communications

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Posted on 2007-11-27

Understanding a customer’s needs is essential to good business – it is a basic tenet of marketing. But add to that insight into how different types of customers behave, react, respond and buy and an organization won't out miss out on valuable opportunities to do further business, expand relationships and maximize revenue potential.
E-communications have a huge benefit over traditional marketing channels. The marketer can track if their message has been delivered, has been read (opened) and then what the reaction or response has been – even in real time! But historical log files and transaction histories can also yield a vast amount of data that can be turned into essential business information to deliver both a fast start and the basis for a data-driven communication strategy. It is vital to understand the customer experience:
• What communication or stimulus drove them to your landing page?
• Have they perhaps been referred by a current customer?
• What was...

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A Vacation Is Not a One-Off Sale

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Posted on 2007-03-05

I have often been surprised to what extent travel companies still look upon each sale as a conquest rather than the next transaction in a customer relationship. I am referring specifically to what, in the United Kingdom, are called package tour operators: companies that create packages of transportation, lodging and, often, meals to destinations around the world, which they offer through catalogs or web sites. The trend has moved from selling through retail travel agents to direct selling off the page or via the web, but the benefits of this direct relationship are not being maximized.

I find this to be one of the last bastions of product-oriented business, where the products are created and then customers are found for them, rather than, in a customer-focused business, identifying the customers, establishing their needs and finding the right products for them. It may be a function of the selling process, with the sales agents purely performing on numbers of passengers so...

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Don't Forget That Customer Experience Includes Hopes and Dreams

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Posted on 2006-06-19
Buying a car is one of the last bastions of making a purchase where one can forget for a moment one is over 50. If you ...
- Buy a chair, can you get out of it?
- Buy a house, how many steps are there up to it?
- Buy a vacation, will there be lots of noise in the hotel?
This was never more demonstrated than in a campaign I ran for a U.K. motor manufacturer at the start of the 1990s (when I was a mere slip of a lad).

By analyzing the demographics and lifestyle profiles at each variant level of the model to be promoted, we had a very clear picture of who was buying which version of the car. The twin-cam, lowered suspension, six-speed on-the-floor gearbox with extra shiny black paint job version went to the "yuppie" market ( there's something we don't say, anymore), while the sedate, leather-upholstered version with automatic transmission went to the...
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How Do Sales and Marketing Collaborate?

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Posted on 2006-03-07

The key to sales and marketing cooperation is to use data to direct the marketers on the marketing mix and present the prospects most likely to buy to the sales force—a win-win situation that maximizes the effectiveness of the marketing budget and delivers the all-important commission to the salesperson.

Information-gathering is natural for the sales force and marketing functions but has been a disparate activity suffering from the natural tendency to contain information in silos of activity within departmental boundaries. I always envisage it as a young child in school carefully using his arm to shield his math test paper from his neighbor!

The sheer volume of information available as a result of the Worldwide Web; data acquisition from customers and prospects through CRM systems and corporate web sites; and intuitive data analysis tools means that customers and prospects can be profiled and presented with relevant offers at the right time....

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You Can Find Nuggets of Opportunity in Your Data

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Posted on 2005-02-07
We're told that businesses can find tremendous benefits from analyzing the vast amounts of data they collect. And it's true. In fact, you can find hidden nuggets of information among your data, once you know how to go through it systematically.

To give you an example, consider an international trade-show and convention organizer, which represents the epitome of silo culture. Operating through a number of discrete industry-specific events, publications and services, the company collected a huge amount of data that it brought into a single repository to be exploited in enhancing old services and creating new services for customers—and increasing revenue.

The business explored the resultant knowledge or "exploration" universe for the following purposes:
- To find important features regarding companies that visit, exhibit and advertise—or combinations of these.
- To identify key performers and appraise their...
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The Web Puts a New Spin on the Campaign Management Loop

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Posted on 2005-01-31

The growth of the World Wide Web has implications on both sides of the data-driven communications equation. On the one hand, the web provides a novel, exciting and convenient medium for delivering a message to customers and prospective customers. On the other, it presents a channel for data collection that makes possible concepts that were only hypothetical in the past.

The beginning of the 1990s saw the introduction of data as a driver for a variety of media beyond traditional direct mail. For instance, computers were interfaced with telecommunications equipment to derive computer telephony integration (CTI) applications aimed at helping manage customer relationships. This enabled contact agents to prepare themselves for calls, access customers' records and have repeat calls from the same customer channelled through to one agent. And data was used to drive variations in customer magazines and newsletters, bringing lifestyle "versionalization" and reader personalization...

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