Whether you’re a realtor, lender or small business owner, your customer database is without a doubt your primary business asset. Everything emanates from this list. These are people who know you, trust you and would willingly, even gladly, refer you. They simply need to be reminded – convincingly and consistently – that you are a professional in your field.
The most successful professionals make keeping in touch with their customer database the cornerstone of their marketing plans. There’s a good reason: For every 12 people you stay in touch with on a consistent basis, you will net two transactions – either direct business or referrals. Marketing to your customer database – your “sphere of influence” – will hands-down yield the best return on your marketing investment.
Every time I meet with a potential client and share this statistic – and my many client testimonials that support it – the new client is immediately on board. On board, that is, until it’s time to pull their customer database together. The two most common issues:
#1 I haven’t even started compiling my database, and
#2 I’m not sure how to harvest my list from my CRM software (like Outlook, Constant Contact or even MLS).
Let me assure you: it’s not that difficult. The sooner you tackle this task, the sooner you’re off to more leads. Three suggestions for now:
If you haven’t started compiling a list of contacts and leads, thought leader Brian Buffini offers a terrific eBook on getting started: How to Build Your Database from Scratch.
If your customer contacts are in different places, disorganized or written on paper, we have resources for data entry that are accurate and reasonably priced. I literally have clients who have photographed random pieces of paper with hand-written names and addresses that we have turned it into a robust Excel spreadsheet.
If your customer list exists within a CRM program and you need to export it, the easiest way to figure out how to do that is . . . you guessed it, Google. For instance, if you’ve been using Constant Contact, try this Google query: “Export contact list from Constant Contact.” You can find step-by-step instructions to export your list from virtually any program this way. Once you figure out how to download the file, save it to your computer and then you can manipulate from there!
Reaching Neighbors helps clients make the most of their customer databases with direct mail marketing solutions that consistently drive referrals. We’ll be sharing more of our database knowledge in this space, and feel free to contact us any time with your specific questions.
