When implementing any new software you need to make sure you collect ALL of your customer data. Even if its been a while since you contacted them or don't think they would be interested any more. Too many times people hold some customer lists back because they think they are not interested anymore or wouldn't buy. The point of keeping historical data is to re engage and re-introduce your business. Even if you think they are not ready we can always put them in a long term nurture and give them the opportunity to change their mind and become a customer. Unless they have opted out or requested removal, customer data can give you insights and analytics about future customers.
What do I mean by customer data? This is name and contact details as well as any specific custom fields you may need to know (includes company info, demographics, products purchased etc). For example a real-estate agent might need to know what kind of house a person was looking for (for example, 3 bed, 2 bath, 2 car). Basically any info that helps you tailor the message to a specific group that helps you to zero in on the right person with the right information they want, rather than throwing everything into a newsletter and hoping that something interests them.
Even if it is just an email or just a mobile number we may be able to send them a form and ask them to enter their own info and update your records for you. You can even send text messages asking for their email address or to update their information.
Some places you might look to find customer data:
- Your accounting software
- Excel spreadsheets
- Other systems such as project management or newsletter software
- Social platforms, such as LinkedIn or industry platforms such as realestate.com.au (another real estate example but you get the idea)
- Past emails with clients
- Printed materials
We say printed materials because we once had a client that printed every client interest email and made notes on the sheet but then left them in a pile. Rather than have the client add all the customer data to a spreadsheet over the subsequent days, weeks, months, we got the client to scan them and I sent the PDF file to then use software to read the content and a virtual assistant at a very low rate to do the remaining data entry into a spreadsheet that we could upload into the software. This resulted in thousands of interested customers that would have just gone to waste.