18.1. Delivering the Offer
Remember that for a CRM program, the customer offer is always aimed at generating some kind of response from the targeted customers. We hope to persuade customers to act in a certain way. Persuasion, according to Jay Conger in his book on the topic, is
“Quite simply … to present a message in a way that leads others to support it.”
This response may be anything from buying a product to adopting a new service offering. Naturally, whatever the offer, we want the experience to be positive, improve the relationship, and increase loyalty. The steps to build the offer and get it out the door and into the arms of your targeted customers are outlined in Table 18-1.
| Step | Purpose | Participants |
|---|---|---|
| Design the offer | Describe customer segments Define segment value proposition | Business offer sponsor and/or manager |
| Prepare the offer message(s) | Define offer details
Goals and measures Offer value Call to action |
Depends on offer:
Project team Business offer sponsor IT department |
| Present the offer | Select communication media
Test offer Transmit offer Receive and capture response Fulfill | Depends on offer:
Project team Business offer sponsor IT department |
Be aware that the fulfillment activity usually involves much more than the front office functions, and it is absolutely critical to delivering a positive experience. Communication must be established and nurtured with the people in the back office who complete the fulfillment of your offer. Don't expect that they'll be able to ship 1,000 new S-800 products next week if they don't learn about it until the orders start to come in. We'll talk about fulfillment more when we discuss offer preparation. For now, let's tackle the first step, which is to design an offer that will provide value to the target customers and encourage the right behavior to occur.