Ladies and Gentlemen, Meet Jasmine

I previously spoke about a "Transformational" customer.  From this point forward, that customer will be known as Jasmine.


Meet Jasmine!


Jasmine is different than the customer we've been analyzing for a long, long time.  In fact, catalogers and many online marketers are uncomfortable with fundamental differences in Jasmine's behavior vs. prior generations.

• Jasmine is 27, but she is representative of a customer between the ages of 18 and 34.
• Jasmine doesn't have the earning power she will one day have.  Therefore, Jasmine has to find the best deals at the best prices.  She's not going to pay $400 for a handbag, when she can spend $99 for a handbag at a flash sales website.  
• You can't market to her by offering 20% off plus free shipping ... she simply won't buy unless free shipping is part of the brand, and she thinks brands inflate prices, so she's looking for deals that work for her.
• Jasmine approves of this (click here).
• Jasmine "lives" social and mobile.  This is a fundamental difference from Judy and Jennifer.  Jasmine's experiences are infused with social and mobile.  Facebook and Twitter aren't social media, they're "utilities", much like Comcast or your local electric company.  And this means a lot, because you cannot separate out and attribute social or mobile and assign marketing value to each channel.  She buys from Shoemint.com ... social and mobile and email ARE the experience, that brand curates for her, you don't separate and attribute her spend to any channels in this case.
• If Jasmine had to choose between internet access, a car, or her cell phone, she'd choose her cell phone.  The cell phone is to Jasmine as the internet is to Jennifer and as cable television is to Judy.
• Jasmine likes low prices, scoring a deal on MyHabit or One Kings Lane or Fab.com or Gilt Group.  She'll recruit friends to get discounts from businesses she shops at, she will use her phone to score a great deal, and she loves the simplicity of the mobile shopping experience.  In some ways, an element of gamification motivates Jasmine, she likes completing tasks and earning credits/discounts for completing tasks (see the first twelve steps required to be on Shoemint.com for an example ... go do that right now).
• Jasmine doesn't trust advertising as much as she trusts her friends and the opinions of others.  Her inner circle of 400 people provide all the information she needs to make good decisions.  She says that if something is happening in the world, "it will find her".  This is different than Jennifer, who spends time finding/hunting things, and is different than Judy, who likes to watch The Today Show to learn what might be important.  You will have to seed a lot of clouds to be able to reach Jasmine.
• Jasmine will take a picture of something she likes at Aldo Shoes, and solicit feedback from her friends before buying the item.  She might spend time at Best Buy with her husband, reviewing items, then comparing prices on Amazon while in-store, finally settling for a comparable item on Amazon.  While she participates in social commerce, Jasmine is almost post-social commerce, she's not going to be labeled, but instead, she is simply shopping in a way that is congruent with how she lives.  This style of shopping is not recognizable to Judy.
• Jasmine likes to share what she's doing, and likes retailers who make it easy for her to share ... notice that you click on "share with a friend" before "add to shopping bag" in this example at Francesca's Collections:
• Jasmine is not going to read a newspaper unless she's stuck at an airport for two hours and her iPhone needs charging.
• Jasmine likes Spotify, she thinks paying $10 a month for millions of songs is better than paying $0.99 per song.  Conversely, Jennifer loves iTunes, while Judy still buys CDs at her local Target store.
• All that being said, Jasmine will buy sheets from Cuddledown of Maine, but this behavior is not likely to be habit forming, and Jasmine had better get free shipping and an everyday low price.
• Judy loves a sale. Jennifer loves hunting for the best price. Jasmine shops if the business offers an everyday low price.  Jasmine will participate in a "gamified" experience that results in earning credits that yield a low price.
• Jasmine may or may not like this style of merchandising, but it is more aligned with her style than old-school marketing (click here please).  Conversely, Judy expects this content to be delivered to her via a television commercial.  Different approaches are used to reach Judy and Jasmine.
• Judy barely trusts having passwords online.  Jennifer has a hundred different online passwords.  Jasmine shares her passwords with trusted friends, it's almost a form of trust currency.

Last week on Twitter, an 18-34 year old individual told that people like Jasmine will "do the marketing for you if you treat her well and let her do her job."  This is the complete opposite of Judy, who waits for companies to rent her name from a co-op so that she can see their catalog.


It isn't hard to identify Jasmine in your customer base, so get busy!  Record the referring URL, any blogs in your industry or Facebook or Twitter are key indicators that you're dealing with Jasmine.  She's a "true mobile" individual, using her iPhone or Android device ... she may use an iPad, but that's more likely to be Jennifer.  She likes sales/discounts, but she prefers low price point items.  She demand free shipping. Heck, if you are Fab.com, half your database is comprised of people like Jasmine!  Even if you're a traditional catalog brand, you have online customers with no attribution to catalogs/email who shop infrequently, off price, with free shipping ... hint ... this is Jasmine!


We care about Jasmine, because the marketing strategy for her has to be very different.  In my studies, 50% - 80% of what Jasmine spends is not associated with catalog marketing.  In other words, catalog matchback programs significantly, and I mean significantly overstate what she spends because of catalog marketing.  Instead of 18 catalogs a year, Jasmine needs maybe 3, all within a month or two of a purchase.

So get busy segmenting your database.  Find out who Judy, Jennifer, and Jasmine are, and start treating them differently.  You'll be significantly more profitable, and you'll make Judy, Jennifer, and Jasmine happier.


Next week, we'll dig a bit deeper, learning more about how to deal with Judy, Jennifer, and Jasmine.