There is an adage in the sales and marketing world that your best customer is a customer that you already have.
And for this reason you are likely to do well when you send a mailing to people who have purchased from you before.
But what about the almost-ran.
What about the people on your in-house prospect list? People who you have had contact with before—through the mail, by phone or over the Internet—people who asked for information but did not convert?
If they did not convert after the first contact, are they really any better a prospect than someone who is hearing about you for the first time? And if they are a better prospect, does it matter how long there is between contacts?
Test:This week we are going to look at an interesting list test that was done by G.A. Wright. The idea was to see if the house list of prospects would outpull a purchased compiled B2B list. But the test went a step further. The house list was segmented by age. The idea was to see if the length of time a prospect had been on the list would have an effect on whether they converted the prospect.
Results: The purchased compiled list pulled a response rate of .306%. The in-house prospect list blew the compiled list out of the water:
- Current year: 1230% better for a 4.070% response rate
- 1 year back: 816% better for a 2.082% response rate
- 2 years back: 357% better for a 1.398% response rate
- 3 years back: 315% better for a 1.269% response rate
- 4 years back: 173% better for a .835% response rate
Do you think you know why?
Let me know what you think—send me an email with your thoughts to inquire@cdmginc.com. We will publish the best responses in our next issue.
A quick note about last week’s test:
Last week we looked at email subject lines. I have concluded that because the preview windows often limit you to 30 characters, you need to get the drama and the news of your message into those first few characters.
But be careful—the spam filters are letting less and less through so be sure to always test your emails in a spam-checking program before you send them out.
Interested in more marketing case histories and their results? Click here.