Characteristics of Best Clients

As a follow-up to our Loyalty Marketing Series, Targa Media has published a checklist for evaluating and prioritizing relationship-driven clients. A smart rating system applies to every company database, revealing only the marketing campaigns that matter:

Your best clients aren't always the biggest spenders.
Clients are most valuable not because they are your cash cows (though a profitable side of beef is always nice) rather because they're with you for the long haul, they help you in tooling your best message, and most importantly, they help corrall new business to increase profits.

Your best clients might never have purchased anything from you.
That's right. Some of your biggest customer assets might just be prospects. Remember, the value of a client is calculated not only on the revenue they create, but also on revenues from referrals. It's an exponentially powerful formula.

Your best clients don't like to be "sold to."
You never earn the "right to sell" to a customer. When they sense you're selling to them, they'll feel like a project or statistic (even the most loyal of them). If you want a loyal client, throw the traditional sales tactics out the window and stay genuine.

Your best clients aren't always the first to respond to offers.
Don't tag your best customers based upon quickest response times. This approach is fundamentally flawed because it mocks the intelligence of a healthy client who makes informed, methodical decisions. Consider yourself as a client—are you the quickest to make a decision or a purchase?

Your best clients aren't easy to locate in your Web stats.
Test it yourself. Are your best customers showing up at the top of your Web stats? Is Web page "duration" an indicator of piqued interest? Or just as easily an indication of "being lost on the page" or "breaking to nuke a frozen burrito?" Stats have their place in any sound marketing campaign, but they're not the strongest indicator.

Your best clients aren't compelled by pricepoints.  More

Your best clients can't be found in a predictible demographic.  More

Your best clients differ from each other in their sales cycles.  More

Your best clients must feel like they're genuinely understood.  More

Your best clients want shortcuts, not "logins."  More

Your best clients want benefits, not features.  More

Your best clients will always champion good referral programs.  More

Your best clients should help engineer your product offerings.  More

Your best clients are innately loyal, and are not "turned into" loyal.  More

Noteworthy

BtoB Webcast: Web 2.0 and Customer Loyalty
Top media pick

Two Targa Media Clients Honored as "Emerging Elite"
Latest press

Targa Media Donates Marketing/ Design to Chamber of Commerce
Community interest

Recommended Reading

Creating Customer Evangelists
by Ben McConnell
Practical and Tactical Ideas on How Loyal Customers Become a Volunteer Sales Force.

Word of Mouth Marketing
by Andy Sernovitz
The Inside Scoop on How Smart Companies Get People Talking, Revised Edition.

The New Rules of Marketing and PR
by Ben McConnell
How to Use News Releases, Blogs, Podcasting, Viral Marketing and Online Media to Reach Buyers Directly.

Targa Media Inc.
307 W. 200 South, Ste. 1002
Salt Lake City, UT 84101
www.targamedia.com

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