There are 7 potential customer types you could have — Platinum, Gold, Silver, Bronze, Lead, Concrete, and RAW (Radio Active Waste). But you should have only the best, the Platinum Customer. They give you money and a lot more.
If you aren’t satisfied with the value of your current customers, make better choices by setting up a Platinum Customer Profile™ identification system. This is more than just “target” or “niche” marketing. The four parts of a Platinum Customer Profile™ are demographics, psychographics, behaviors, and geography.
The right profiling system will give you a way to improve your sales process and avoid those radioactive waste prospect/customers who are out there. It will also give you a metric to judge how well your message is working: if it attracts the right prospects great; if not, fix it asap. That makes the effort to set up this system a money maker and mind saver.
The hardest part is coming up with the profile in the first place. Demographics are facts. Psychographics are attitudes, interests, opinions, value, and lifestyle. Behaviors include decision-making style, sense of humor, and approach to problems, opportunities, and threats. Geography is location and also the effects of history and culture related to geography. You can put the results into most sales programs (ACT!, Salesforce.com, etc.). You can use the profile to be more specific with your salespeople about who to focus on. An added advantage is that it also makes it easier to communicate who you really want to work with to your strategic allies and other people in your networks.
In addition to setting up the profile, it’s critical to understand how a customer buys. There are 7 steps no matter what the purchase. Some are longer; some are shorter. Some are more important, some less depending on many factors.
I recommend using 7 steps in your sales cycle as well. These do not have an absolute one-to-one correlation with the customer’s buying cycle. But each must happen for the best kind of sale, a platinum sale, to take place. No matter what, the customer has to go through their version of the buying cycle in order for any sale to take place. What happens when they don’t? They DIY it, Do-It-Themselves, or DNAAs, Do Nothing At Alls, two ever present competitors. (More on this at my previous post on Ghost Competitors.).
I have done presentations on this subject for several business groups. I thought I would share the slides. If you need help or have questions, email me at T-R-I-P-L-E-T-T@ ownersview [dot]com.
Great post, Jan,
But what are the seven steps of a sales cycle?
Also, who holds the Platinum Customer Profiling trademark?
Much obliged, HR
Thanks for the nice comment.
The seven steps of the sales cycle depend on whether you are talking about it from the customer’s point of view of the seller’s.
Customer:
1. Decides they want to take action (they are dissatisfied, looking for an opportunity, or trying to maintain status quo).
2. Sets goals.
3. Determines objectives & inflexible constraints & sets priorities.
4. Finds options for accomplishing #2 and #3.
5. Checks out & evaluates the means that they have found (the most desirable solution).
6. Makes a decision to purchase.
7. Rejoices or experiences buyers remorse.
From the Seller’s viewpoint, it is all about a process that will lead to the right sale in the shortest amount of time. The Seller:
1. Initiates their pre-qualification system.
2. Initiates contact or reacts to a buyer’s request.
3. Handles initial objections through marketing efforts.
4. Creates a merchandising opportunity for the buyer to experience what it would be like to make a purchase from this seller at little or no risk.
5. Closes the deal.
6. Initiates a program that will ensure there is no “buyer’s remorse” as soon as the purchase is made.
7. Begins the retention program for those platinum, gold, and silver clients the seller wants to retain.
Although each Customer and Seller go through 7 steps, they do not happen synchronously. Some happen faster or slower and can be affected by the nature of the products or services or the profile of the Buyer or Seller.
Hope this helps. Let me know if we need to talk further. There are slides in my presentation that refer to these. You might want to check these out at http://www.slideshare.net/jantriplett/platinum-customer-profile-system