Dear B2B Catalog CEOs: The Importance Of Human Beings

Dear B2B Catalog CEOs:

You have a major advantage over your B2C counterparts.

You employ human beings in a more central role in your marketing strategy.

In a recent project, I ran a query - I controlled for prior purchase history, equalizing customers. Among a segment of equal customers (as of September 2012), I measured next twelve month spend. Here's what I learned.

• Customers Assigned A Sales Rep = $800 future spend.
• Customers Not Assigned A Sales Rep = $600 future spend.

Remember, I equalized customers. This means that, with equal customers, the only fundamental difference in future value was that one set of customers were assigned a sales rep.

Better yet, within those assigned a sales rep, there were differences.

• Sales Rep = John:  $1,100 future value.
• Sales Rep = Jerry:  $825 future value.
• Sales Rep = Bill:  $775 future value.
• Sales Rep = Perry:  $520 future value.

In other words, it's really important to measure "who" works for you. My equalization methodology can ferret out the sales reps who truly provide incremental value to your business, and better yet, can put a dollar amount on how much value the individual creates.

For instance - if John is accountable for 1,000 customers ... and he generates $500 of true incremental value ($1,100 - $600 = $500) per customer, then John is accountable for $500,000 of incremental demand - likely $250,000ish of incremental profit.

It might be time to recognize John, don't you think?

Contact me (kevinh@minethatdata.com) for your own, customized B2B "human equalization analysis"!