Database: Schmooze the Movers

Customers who cared enough about your company to actually notify you of their changes of address should be handled with extra special care, said Bill LaPierre, vice president of catalog brokerage at Millard Group, during his talk “What Were They Thinking?” held at the Catalog-on-the-Road Conference in Cambridge, Mass., on Feb. 1.

“Don’t treat them like they’re new customers or like catalog requests,” LaPierre said, speaking from his own experience. He moved last year, and recorded how catalogers whom he had notified with his new address handled this new information.

Some sent catalogs with messages welcoming him as a new customer, “even though I had been shopping from them for years. Don’t they know me by now?”

Others sent books with a note thanking him for requesting a catalog. “I’m not a catalog request,” he said. “I simply wanted to alert them that I moved.”

Customers who do take the time to notify you should be viewed like the gold customers they are, said LaPierre. “These are customers who actually cared enough about their relationship with your company to notify you of the move. Why not be more careful with that information and rush a catalog to him or her?” he said. “After all, the person just moved, and might need to buy a lot of stuff.”

Moreover, he said, this is someone who already has shown an affinity for your merchandise. “In short, this is a very good customer,” he said.