Take a closer look at customer value

What type of customer is your advertising attracting?

Different customers have different values. This basic thought was driven home yesterday when we met with a leading businessman, who posited that of course he was interested in sophisticated media planning to hit sales goals -- but would the campaign attract the right type of customer?

For example, imagine you needed to acquire 1,000 cameras for a large photography school. You wouldn't rush out and buy 1,000 cameras and say, great, we're hitting our numbers. Cameras have wildly different attributes and values. You would want to make certain you brought in exactly the right types of photography equipment to meet the business need.

Yet many marketers are like that, focused on simple acquisition targets, and not the composition of the customers within it. Will your new customers be profitable? Loyal? Make future purchases? Attract others? Imagine if you could choose between these two new customers for your business:

Customer A. Spends $50 in the first year, then leaves and never returns.
Customer B. Spends $300 in the first year, and $300 annually for the next 10 years, plus tells all of her friends how great your product is.

Obviously you want more Customer Bs. So your offer, messaging, media mix, and measurement need to manage your ad system to bring them aboard.

It's nice that you have an ad schedule filled with CPMs and GRPs. Are you forecasting customer value, too?