Ladies and Gentlemen, Meet Jennifer

Yesterday, you were introduced to Judy, the classic Traditional customer.


Today, I introduce you to Jennifer, what I previously called the Transitional customer.


Think of Jennifer as a professional or service-oriented 43 year old customer (though she could be anywhere between 35 and 49 years old), a woman who spent her formative shopping years on the internet.


Here's a few things you need to know about Jennifer.

• Jennifer and the internet are "one".  If Google truly went down in protest of SOPA or PIPA, Jennifer would quietly implode.
• Jennifer is willing to pay full price for merchandise she loves from brands she trusts, but she's never going to pay for shipping or handling.  Jennifer will use any affiliate possible to get free shipping, she'll visit coupon sites, she'll like you on Facebook for discounts, she'll subscribe to and click through your email campaigns just to get the discount.  Channel marketers will say that Facebook or email "work", but to Jennifer, it's a means to an end ... a way to make sure she gets free shipping and hopefully a discount, too.  Jennifer is "post-channel", not "multi-channel".  Jennifer will scorch the internet to get a deal.  Do not get in her way!
• In fact, Jennifer loves sites like Coupon Cabin, she enjoys Kate Gosselin's blog.
• Jennifer carefully reads reviews from other purchasers.  Jennifer does not want to be burned when she spends $399 on a handbag.  That handbag better come with a 4.8 out of 5.0 stars and have at least a dozen positive reviews.
• Jennifer likes events like Cyber Monday, where she gets to combine discounts with promotions and fun.  She doesn't have to go to the mall on Black Friday and yet she gets great deals.  She feels like a "slueth", she literally "hunts" for merchandise at the best price.
• Jennifer spent her formative shopping years on the internet.  She met her husband on AOL.  She had an "Excite Homepage" before people knew what Excite even was.  She discovered Google in 2000.  If Jennifer were in college today, she'd argue that you don't need to study for a test, you need to know how to leverage Google and Wikipedia to get the answers you need.
• Because Jennifer was weaned on AOL, she has always been first to be "social".  She used email, she joined MySpace, then Facebook, and then Twitter, and is one of the biggest fans of Pinterest you'll find.
• Jennifer is the customer that email marketers are measuring.  All email marketers should code Jennifer in the database and actively measure her behavior.
• Jennifer browses catalogs, and even buys online after reviewing a catalog.  However, half of the demand that is attributed in matchbacks to catalog marketing would happen anyway.  You can mail Jennifer far fewer catalogs and get almost all of her demand.  Catalogers do not want to hear this.
• Attribution wonks struggle with Jennifer, because she "does everything".  She receives catalogs, she browses catalogs, she uses Google to comparison shop, she clicks through an email campaign, she visits a coupon site for a discount code, she visits via an iPad after reviewing your catalog in an app, she likes you on Facebook, and she buys on your website.  Jennifer "hunts" for her merchandise.  Hunters cover a lot of ground!  Take any channel except Google away from Jennifer, and she'll hunt for a new way to get to the same end result.  Just make sure she can get to her discount code in some way, and she'll buy from you regardless of email or catalog strategy.
• Jennifer is the iPad user you're currently tracking.  She will dictate what the iPad app experience will look like in 2015.
• Jennifer found Zappos before anybody else ... she liked free shipping both ways, and she loved the fact that her shoes arrived in a day or two.  "Why can't everybody do that?" is something she said often in the early days of Zappos.
• Jennifer has formed a "shopping habit" on Zappos, paying for Amazon Prime, buying consumables and having them shipped to her home.  She has no loyalty to the merchants she buys from on Amazon, all of her loyalty is with Amazon and only Amazon.
• If Judy buys a CD at Target, Jennifer loads up her iPad with music ... "I'm not going to sit here and listen to songs and commercials that I don't like, life is too short for that."

We can easily spot Jennifer in our database.  She doesn't purchase via mail or phone.  She often combines channels (receives email, visits via search twice, buys via a free shipping code from an affiliate) to place online orders.  She is more likely than average to take advantage of discounts and promotions.  She might be first to jump on new products or fashion products.  She's probably not one to be hooked on "winning products", as she has a sense of style and fashion that goes beyond what everybody else is doing.  She's an email subscriber using Gmail.  She purchases on Cyber Monday.  She visits the site a lot and doesn't purchase (online wonks think they have to fix this problem ... they don't ... that's just the way Jennifer behaves, just get a discount code in her hand and you'll be fine).

It's easy to find Jennifer in a database.  Find her.  Segment her!  Then start speaking her language, a language that probably doesn't include 22 catalog mailings per year.  In my consulting projects, I am routinely able to cut catalogs by 30% - 60% to this customer without a significant drop in demand.


Go set this attribute up in the database ... NOW!!

Tomorrow, we meet our Transformational customer, named Jasmine.