The Iron Rule of RFM

Few rules of thumb are so deeply embedded in our thoughts that we’re surprised to recall that they’re really just rules of thumb, not scientifically proven facts.

And for many, that’s the case for this month’s rule of thumb: the rule of recency, frequency, monetary value (shortened to RFM). As catalogers we use RFM constantly, almost without thinking about it, not because psychologists have proved to us that it should work, but because as marketers we know that it simply does work, day in and day out, and has been working since the earliest days of cataloging.