nformation in your current customer database can help you become more efficient at winning and maximizing your profits with new customers. That is, the more information you mine from your current customer base, the better position you will be in to select marketing programs that get you the customers (and the kinds of sales and profits) you want in the future.

We refer to knowledge of a customer in a database as  current "Customer IQ™".   How much to your really know about the customers who are purchasing from you now? You have a top notch "customer IQ" if you can answer the following questions.  Which customers are most profitable? What is the average length of time you have a customer, and how much does this customer buy over that time period? How much does it cost you to win and keep a customer in any of your chosen market segments?  What are the most effective marketing programs (in terms of sales per dollar spent) in any of your customer segments? 

Food retailers and their vendors take advantage of the power of customer IQ through the popularity of "supersaver discount" or frequent buyer cards that are appearing in grocery stores across the country.  Once your card is scanned detailed information on your current buying habits are compiled with your past buying history. This information can instantaneously be reported to vendors letting them know how well their displays, product groupings, pricing, advertising, product packaging etc. are working at any one location. They know how profitable you are as a customer (buying a lot of gourmet foods these days?  The dairy section is very profitable. They want you to visit there often!) and are learning quickly how to entice you back into their store.  Now that's leveraged marketing!

It should be the number one priority in a marketing department to have this information about customers to guide marketing activity.

What if you can't get access to this information?