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Part 3 - How to Get the MOST Out of Your POS Software
and Maximize Profits...
Using Your POS Software to Electrify Marketing & Boost Sales
The single most powerful (and most overlooked) marketing
tool is the customer list stored in your POS software! For example, you
can creates TONS of additional sales and literally boost your response
rates by 1000 percent by sending your existing customers promotions.
Let me explain...
When someone makes a purchase, they prefer buying from
someone they trust and who has treated them fairly in the
past. If you were to rent a "cold list" (a list of people
who probably know nothing about your company, product,
service or offer) you may, with a well crafted sales letter
or promotion, get a 1 to 3 percent response on the offer. However, if
you send the VERY SAME LETTER to your past customers, you will see a
return that is much greater with response rates as high as 25 percent!
When crafting your marketing campaigns, you should always
try to include the customer's name and personalize the
message. This technique has proven to dramatically increase the
effectiveness of mailing campaigns.
The problem is, mailing each of your customers
individually (typing their names and e-mail addresses over and over
again) would literally take hundreds of hours of tedious work...
Fortunately, many of the good POS systems resolve this
problem by allowing you to merge fields into your e-mail messages,
promotions or sales letters (i.e. first name, last name, e-mail
address, product purchased, date of purchase,
etc) so that when people receive your message, they assume
you know them!
For example, let's say you wrote a sales letter in Word that looked something like this:
--------------------------------------------
Hello [firstname],
I am writing to thank you for your purchase of [product] on [purdate].
I noticed that you live in [city], and I wanted to let you know about a
special offer that we're sharing with all of our customers on the East
Coast...
--------------------------------------------
Now you can use your POS system and Word to merge all of the personal
information for each of your customers into the appropriate spots... So
Jane, for example, would receive a letter that looks like this:
--------------------------------------------
Hello Jane,
I am writing to thank you for your purchase of "Golf Swing
Pro" on April 3rd, 2004. I noticed that you live in New
York, and I wanted to let you know about a special offer
that we're sharing with all of our customers on the East Coast...
--------------------------------------------
Sending personalized emails or letters to your past
customers can be a VERY powerful and profitable marketing technique.
Not only can you create instant sales revenue, but it improves your
company's name recognition as well...
As a rule of thumb, the experts say that you should stay in touch with your past customer at least twice a year -- so when they're ready to buy, they think of you first!
Now you might be thinking... how can I send my customers
a message 2 to 6 times a year without annoying them? Well, you should
mix in useful information, and promote your offer in a non-intrusive
way. In other words, write as if you're looking out for your customer's
best interests.
To get your creative juices flowing, here are a few great
ways to get more sales and improve customer loyalty. You could...
* Automatically send thank-you letters after large
purchases.
* Notify them about discount sales -- As a valued
customer,
I wanted to tell you about a 10% discount sale we're having
for our past customers only!
* Send birthday cards.
* Send helpful articles or informational newsletters.
* Send emails that promote add on sales -- I noticed you
bought the XYZ widget. You might want to consider the XYZ attachment
which helps you do this and that.
* Send letters to regain lost clients -- I noticed you
haven't been back for over 9 months. Here's a no-strings- attached
voucher for $20 to get you back to see us again.
* Promote service by sending a letter that says -- Your XYZ lawn mower was last serviced on 5/1/200 and we're having a tune up special for only $49...
* Offer a 1 week sale to your top 200 customers.
The possibilities are endless. The key is to personalize
your mailings, create an irresistible offer, and explain the benefits
of what you're selling. Then test and track the results of each
campaign. If you find a winner, keep running it twice a year, or as
long as it's effective.
Don't overlook this powerful concept. If you're not
collecting your customer's names and emails in your POS software (at
the very least), you might want to start, right away!
To Your Success.
Jeff Haefner
www.PosSoftwareGuide.com
P.S. For more great tips about using retail computer systems and choosing POS software, go to: http://www.possoftwareguide.com/newsletter-articles.html
PASS IT ON!
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Thursday, 6 September, 2007