Segmenting customers based on post-COVID behavior
As countries around the world slowly start reopening their economies, and customers start buying with the same enthusiasm as before the pandemic, businesses will have to rapidly and dynamically assess the post-COVID behavior of their loyal customers. They will have to quickly put in place marketing campaigns to incentivize their loyal customers to resume their purchases with the same gusto as before.
This would be important for retailers in discretionary categories (apparel stores, electronics stores, home improvement stores, etc), restaurants/ cafes, travel-related businesses (airlines, hotels, etc), cinemas and even financial services firms (credit card companies, banks, etc). Even new-age businesses like app-based food delivery firms will witness a completely different business pattern than before.
For our clients, we suggest that a quick way of personalizing marketing campaigns based on post-COVID behavior would be to segment customers based on the following metrics:
1) Order value in latest month as % of Order Value in February (or March) 2020
2) Order Value in latest month as % of Order Value in same month in 2019
Based on these metrics, the business could segment their customers into Growth Customers, Recovering Customers, Below Par Customers and Attrited Customers.
The communication strategy for these various segments could be different. An example of this could be:
- Attrited customers: Confirm their health is ok and tell them that they are missed. Assure them about your safety protocols.
- Below Par customers: Thank them for coming back after the pandemic. Assure them about your safety protocols. Give a customized promotional offer.
- Recovering customers: Thank them for coming back after the pandemic. Assure them about your safety protocols.
- Growth customers: Thank them for coming back after the pandemic. Assure them about your safety protocols. Ask them for feedback on what would make it more convenient for them to purchase with you
Of course the appropriate communication strategy will be different for each business. So the marketing team needs to figure out the details.
CEO @ Knowledge Foundry | Analytics, Machine Learning
4 年Another tactic clients are using is to overlay post-COVID behavior segments against pre-COVID Value segmentation, to further personalize communication. The segments of most concern are High-Value, Below Par and High Value, Attrited customers
Growth Strategy, Business Dev, Solution and Product Marketing, Monetize data. Digital marketing. Go To market.
4 年Simple and effective Raj Bhatt.
Vice President @ Diageo | Supply chain operations, manufacturing, sustainability leadership across industries ( CPG, glass, EV) and countries (India, Japan, South Korea, Taiwan) | Formerly at P&G, STL Tech, Ola Electric
4 年As you mention, shopper segmentation is an important step for optimizing marketing spend