How Big is your Organization’s Potential Pot of Gold?
Once upon a time a few jobs ago, I had the opportunity to consult with medical device start-up companies. My main role was to help them size their market. This required a lot of time analyzing census data in conjunction with epidemiological data. For these start-ups to continue to receive funding, they needed to project their potential revenue to entice investors. With a typical ten-year development and testing period, it was critical to understand the realistic size of your pot of gold at the end of that long rainbow.
The optimism of my clients was uplifting. They all started out with the belief that they had the next great breakthrough and that their device would improve patient quality of life and increase their personal wealth. The reality was often less kind, as most analyses revealed a smaller potential patient pool than expected. Through an analysis of disease prevalence, annual diagnosis rates, contraindications, and treatment guidelines a potential patient pool may be reduced, for example, from 100 to as few as 5 or 10. While still enough in the grand scheme to move ahead, when presented with our “money slide” showing a significantly lower projected profit, the room nearly always took a collective deep breath.
In my current role as CX practice lead for Big Village, I enjoy partnering with my clients to improve CX for existing customers. I especially enjoy it when I am able to leverage the experience gained during my med device days to help our clients acquire new loyal customers.
Accelerating New Customer Acquisition
You may be wondering where the connection lies. It is in the ever-present funnel. Among all possible customers, not all are currently in the market for your goods or services (customer prevalence). Some may not have realized that they are in fact ready to consider purchasing your goods or services (new diagnosis). Others may have a brand preference or aversion to your product or service (contraindications). Others may see your offer as a second or third option rather than a first choice or just need to try other products or services first before they are willing to consider your offer (treatment guidelines).
The one parallel that we do not want to make is the ten-year cycle to profit. To exponentially shorten the rainbow and accelerate new customer acquisition, we look to what we already know and use that to propel brands forward faster. Commonly tracked metrics create the foundation for this success. Customer experience data, repeat purchases, customer retention, referral business, stated willingness to recommend and their connection to customer demographic, attitudinal and behavioral data are used to identify your ideal customers. Those for whom your organization’s products and services most strongly resonate. Conversely, we also profile customers for whom your offer, product or service falls short.
Leveraging Custom Created Audiences
The magic happens when we model these data points to help organizations future proof their business. It is by profiling the behaviors, attitudes, demographics and experiences of your most successful customers that we can then apply our audience analytics. Custom created audiences allow your organization to find and market to those customers with similar characteristics as those possessed by your ideal customers. Thus, increasing the probability that your marketing efforts and outreach will connect you to the pot of gold (customers) at the end of your unique rainbow.
As the process also shows the prevalence and compositional characteristics of those customers who are not ideal, it frees up resources for efforts with a proven stronger return on investment. When organizations accept that there are customers for whom their products and services are more appealing than others, they redeploy resources to focus on the most promising members within the vast potential customer pool. Focusing on the customers that bring your organization the most profit and greatest loyalty rather than attempting to be everything to everyone forces companies to redefine their approach which in the long run ensures greater financial gains and brand strength.
Curious about who your ideal customers are? Looking to improve your marketing ROI? Let’s connect today to future proof your business for tomorrow and beyond.