Communication After The Sale

Feb 21, 2017 by Mark Maier

We all know that service after the sale is key for retailers but what about communication?  According to The Center For Media Research communication after the sale can effect the bottom line in more than one way...

"According to a new Koyne/Influitive Marketing survey of company leaders and top marketers, examining how organizations currently manage the planning, resourcing and measurement of customer marketing efforts, only 61% were satisfied with the results. Customer marketing says the report, is the complete set of activities undertaken by a company following a customer’s purchase of products and services.

With data collected from CEOs and marketing executives at more than two hundred B2B organizations representing small companies with annual revenues up to $25M, medium companies with revenue between $25M and $1B, and large companies with revenue greater than $1B, the analysis reveals some significant findings:

• Of the satisfied respondents, most were from large organizations. This represents a significant opportunity for growth in the customer marketing arena
• Over 90% of respondents acknowledged that customer marketing is somewhat or very important
• Over the next year, 93% of organizations expect that their customer marketing efforts will take on greater importance, and 62% will increase their staff or budgets in the customer marketing area

Companies identified three main skills as vital to the success of customer marketing efforts: relationship building, communication, and customer service.

49% of companies reported that their customer marketing efforts resulted in moderate to significant revenue gains. 71% of large companies report greater gains due to customer marketing than medium (52%), or small companies (44%). The three most frequently tracked metrics were:

• Upsell/cross-sell revenues
• Renewal/churn rate
• Customer satisfaction

Organizations reporting moderate to significant revenue from customer marketing are more than two and a half times more likely to report high levels of customer satisfaction. The most frequently used customer marketing strategies reported were:

• Customer referrals and testimonials
• Customer user groups
• Events and newsletters

60% of survey respondents state that customer marketing is very important to their revenue; 33% believe it is “somewhat” important; 7% are neutral or think it’s not important. Although 49% of respondents see moderate or significant revenue impact, 93% agree that customer marketing efforts are important or very important.

In response to respondents requested to rank critical customer marketing skills, these are the summarized results:

• Relationship building
• Communication
• Customer service
• Digital marketing
• Creativity
• Organization
• Social media
• Selling
• Event planning

Less than half of the survey respondents felt satisfied or very satisfied with the results of their current customer marketing efforts. Clearly, there is a lot of room for improvement, concludes the report.

For additional information from influitive, please visit here."

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