Dear Catalog CEOs: How Can Kevin Help In 2010?

Dear Catalog CEOs:

Many of you have a fresh marketing budget for 2010, and you're saying to yourself "I've read a lot of Kevin's content, but what can he actually do to help a cataloger like us?"

Below, I outline what the most commonly requested Catalog CEO project looks like. Contact me if you are interested in a project that looks like this (most projects have both components ... budgeting and filtering --- project costs are based on twelve month customers, cheaper for small businesses, more expensive for Wal-Mart).

• Budget Analysis: You send me at least three years of customer transactions and annual marketing spend by marketing channel. I show you how customers who respond to e-mail marketing evolve over time ... or paid search, or affiliate marketing, or the different catalog titles you mail. I provide you with a spreadsheet that you can use to see how to allocate advertising investment across marketing channels (as well as retention/acquisition mix) over the next five years, in order to have the most profitable catalog business over the long-run.

• Filtering Analysis: In this analysis, I identify how "catalog loyal" every single customer is in your database. I will identify customers who no longer require a steady diet of catalog marketing. You send those customers fewer catalogs, and you become far more profitable as a result. Or, in some cases, I identify customers who need to receive more catalogs. I don't care what the result is (more/less), I only care that you are more profitable. You can implement the results of the filtering analysis in-house, via your database vendor, or you can have me update the results for you on a periodic basis. The outcome of many filtering projects results in cost savings that can be pocketed, or can be applied to experimentation across various online marketing strategies.