What should a brand focus on? Always striving to rope in new customers with effective marketing, right? But in the quest to attract new buyers to your brand, are you missing out on building a long-term relationship with your existing consumer base? If you have even the slightest inkling of this happening, precision marketing can come to your rescue.
Now, in today’s business world, consumers have a plethora of choices at their disposal. From beauty products to something as niche as gym equipment, there’s always some other brand promising better quality or better still, a more tantalizing deal.
This makes it essential for brands to work on solidifying their relationship with existing customers.
That’s why businesses need to have a more precise approach. And that’s where precision marketing comes in. In this article, we will talk about everything you need to know about this form of marketing and the many reasons why it could prove to be game-changing for brands.
What is Precision Marketing?
When it comes to precision marketing, retaining, upselling, or cross-selling to existing customers is what successful marketing should be about. It involves using consumer and market data and a slew of relationship-building techniques. Basically, the focus is on strengthening the bond with existing customers.
Another important aspect of this technique is the increased focus on relevance. Using the one size fits all approach is a big “NO” with this type of marketing.
With customer segmentation and in-depth analysis of shopper behavior, it provides a unique experience for customers. As a result, customers feel a lot more attached to the brand. Which, in turn, increases customer loyalty.
So, it is safe to say that precision marketing involves a more personalized approach. Brands use surveys and other methods to extract genuine feedback and gauge consumer behavior accordingly. It is also a lot more data-driven than other marketing techniques.
Customers Slipping Out of Their Hands; Brand Loyalty in Numbers
Here’s an interesting fact from a retail dive survey in 2021. 73% of brands are more dependent on their existing customers than on building new markets. But are brands able to pull it off? Are they communicating well enough with their existing buyers? And if not, what can they do to boost loyalty? Let’s look at a few more numbers, shall we?
- Between 2022 and 2023, 71% of consumers started buying from a different brand at least once.
- 48% of the above-mentioned customers switched brands because of better customer service.
- Furthermore, 66% of these consumers switched brands because they found better deals elsewhere.
- Similarly, 40% moved to a different brand because they found better product variety.
Now, take a look at the reasons why these customers went to a different brand. Good customer service, better and timely deals, and product variety. Plugging these holes won’t be difficult if your brand focuses on existing customer behavior.
That’s why precision marketing is key for brands in an age where the consumer is, quite literally, spoilt for choice.
Let’s take a look at a few more reasons that make this form of marketing important.
3 Reasons Why Precision Marketing Is Important
1. To Stay Updated With What Customers Want
Consumers of old were different from what they are today. You go a couple of decades back, and it was all about good deals and clever advertising.
These methods can, undoubtedly, still attract buyers to your brand. But retaining them? Well, that’s a different thing altogether.
That’s why so many brands focus on striking a personal, value-based connection with their buyers. With precision marketing, this becomes a lot easier. You analyze what different segments of your consumer base want in terms of deals, customer service, or product quality.
And when you’re updated with what they want, you can serve it to them on a platter. In simple words, you will know what they demand in order to continue buying from you. Once you lose touch with your customers, retaining them in today’s competitive world is next to impossible.
2. To ensure relevant and personalized marketing
With in-depth analysis, you can also find out about what kind of ads or messaging your customers are most likely to respond to. Is it video ads? Or is it influencer campaigns? Or are they engaging the most with your emails? Each segment of your consumer base will react differently to different marketing channels.
With precision marketing, as you dig into shopper behavior, you also find out what marketing methods are driving them to your brand. That’s how you get clear instructions on the marketing methods that are proving to be the most effective.
By using the working methods, you can upsell and boost repeat purchases, enhancing customer retention.
As a result, you don’t let your customers look elsewhere even for a minute. There’s always a relevant email, notification, or targeted ad popping up, keeping them glued to your brand and its products and services.
3. To Adapt and Outsmart Your Competitors
When a particular consumer segment undergoes a behavioral change, what follows is practically a race. Which brand will adapt first? Even the most loyal of your customers won’t stay for long if your brand fails to adapt to their behavior. Why? Because there will always be another brand giving them precisely what they want.
The goal is to make sure that your brand is the first to reach out to them. In fact, precision marketing, if done right, ensures seamless adaptability. If you adapt quickly enough, your customers won’t even have to spend a moment looking elsewhere. Whatever your customers are looking for, “their” brand is already offering that.
Now, that’s the key term here; “their” brand. This is what good precision marketing does. It makes your customers feel a deeper connection with your brand. And after a while, it ceases to be about the discount percentage in your sales. Your customers become loyal advocates for your brand.
But how can it be done? Don’t worry; we’re here for you with some useful tips for a stellar precision marketing strategy.
5 Precision Marketing Tips for the Perfect Strategy
1. Focus On Branding
For your existing customers to stay with you, they need something to relate to. There has to be something that is unique about your brand.
After all, in today’s environment, branding is among the most critical aspects of any business. Something as minute as your logo or the brand’s tagline can be something your audience relates to.
Basically, all you need to do is to make your brand stand out in some way or another. And when your buyers can relate to something they don’t find with other brands, they are more likely to stay longer.
On the other hand, a brand with little to offer except good deals is less likely to establish any kind of loyalty with its customers.
So, once you determine your buyer persona, don’t forget to tweak your branding based on that. Because today’s aware buyers, who look beyond the discount and deals, will prefer to stick with a brand that aligns with their values.
2. Engage With Your Customers
As you must know by now, being aware of what your existing customers want is key to good precision marketing. That your customers are buying from you is not enough.
You’ve got to know why your customers buy from you when so many other options are available. And that is possible only when you engage with your customers.
Now, there are several ways you can interact with your customers. Right from social media stories to focused surveys, you can choose the method that serves you best. But when it comes to precision marketing, you can’t do it well until and unless you establish a smooth communication flow with your customers.
Furthermore, just the hit-and-click data won’t do the trick anymore. Today’s consumer is not as mechanical as the ones in the past. That’s why brands need to engage with their customers on a regular basis. In fact, around 78% of customers today prefer omnichannel engagement from the brands they are buying from.
So, just an occasional email isn’t enough. Your brand needs to establish a smooth communication flow with the audience across various channels. This can include social media, email, and direct messaging.
3. Provide Real Value to Repeat Customers
Let’s say a customer decides to buy from you again. And he/she comes back a week later, again. Let’s go a step further and say they buy from your brand for the third time. Can you just rest on your laurels and offers nothing more to your repeat customer?
On the other hand, one of your competitors offers personalized deals to those who buy from them again. Who, according to you, will the buyer be more likely to keep purchasing from? Your competitor, of course. In fact, the most loyal of your customers will move to that competitor brand in due time.
That’s why precision marketing mandates brands to keep providing value to repeat purchases. This can be in the form of extra discounts or prior notifications of offers. The goal is to make your repeat buyers feel valued. A brand that focuses on single purchases is sure to miss out on boosting customer loyalty and scoring high on the repeat consumer scoreboard.
4. Stay Unique, Stay Authentic
This is an important aspect of any form of marketing. Any brand that is a mere rip-off from a major name in the industry will fade out in the long run. Especially in today’s business environment, brands must focus on authenticity above everything else. Each and every one of your marketing efforts should reflect this originality.
Be it your social media posts or email flows; it should be like a breath of fresh air when your customers see you. Whenever they start feeling like your brand is just another name, following the path of countless others, your brand will start to lose its identity.
Remember, your brand shouldn’t get too complicated in an effort to sound different. When it comes to precision marketing or, for that matter, any marketing technique, the focus should be on being as simple as possible. No customer today will spend hours understanding what that ad copy actually meant online or offline.
So, be direct but be authentic. You need to strike the perfect balance between being cliched and pretentiously annoying.
5. Customer Experience Still Matters
How does your customer feel when interacting with your brand? Do they have to do all the leg work, or have you ensured convenience? This can prove to be a make-or-break aspect for brands today.
This is a mistake that big brands often make. They tend to leave their customers on their own, focusing less on customer convenience and more on roping in new ones. Now, customer experience today can be anything from customer care calls to replying to comments on social media.
Be it a concern, query, or a simple request on social media, precision marketing is all about paying heed to everything that your existing customer says. In fact, this form of marketing is all about building such strong relationships with your current customers that it will attract those who are yet to buy from you!
In Conclusion
So, does your brand do enough for those who are already your customers? Are your marketing efforts lopsided by the increased focus on bringing in new customers? If they are, now is the time to switch your approach and focus on providing value to your existing customers instead.
Put aside a strategic marketing plan to attract more customers; take a look at what your brand does for those who already give you loads of business. That’s what precision marketing is all about.
If we were to summarize it all in a sentence, it would be this: Focus on those already here before sending tantalizing invites to those elsewhere!