Michael Clark Shares Tips on Customer Lifetime Value

Customer lifetime value is not an easy calculation, and many marketers are unsure of what aspects of CLV they should be focusing on. In a new e-book from Direct Marketing News, Beeby Clark+Meyler Principal Michael Clark, along with nine other marketing leaders, shares his advice for deciding what elements of CLV are most important, and how to use these factors to guide marketing planning.

Writes Michael, “’Plans are nothing; planning is everything.’”

Whenever I’m asked to discuss CLV, I think of this quote generally attributed to Dwight D. Eisenhower. I know that highly advanced marketers, many of whom are direct sellers to their end consumers, are very focused on getting to ‘The Number.’ For most marketers, however, the simple activity of discussing CLV and moving down the path of CLV definition has enormous benefits, even if getting to a set of agreeable numbers is challenging, either due to incomplete measurement systems or to lack of data. The point, then, of CLV planning, is to better understand your business and how it derives value from marketing activities, and then coming to team agreement on what the important value drivers are or are not. …Given this opportunity with existing and first-time customers, we recommend that marketers initially focus their CLV planning efforts on:

1. Gaining team agreement on what a good customer looks like. Who are they and what are their attributes?

2. Identifying current customers that fit this profile and taking positive actions to retain them and to getting new or first-time customers to re-engage.

Read Michael’s full response and see what experts from Epsilon, Cision and others had to say on Direct Marketing News, and don’t hesitate to reach out if you seek more advice on the right approach to customer lifetime value.