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Case Study: Local Automotive Center Spends $761.60 to get $22,388.40

By April 20, 2015No Comments

What do you do with your old customer lists? What if you could use them to your advantage and make a huge profit? Read about how this local automotive center spent $761.60 to get $22,388.40 by using an old customer list.

Over the years you have lost a number of customers, UGH! Some of them have passed away, moved, were courted by a competitor and decided to leave you, and others just didn’t feel appreciated! This is one of the main reasons that companies go out of business. More often then not, it is MARKETING APATHY that caused you to shut your doors.

How many customers have you lost over the years? In his ground breaking book “The Loyalty Effect” , Frederick Reichheld  found that if you can reduce your customer defection by just 5% per year, you can increase you bottom line profit of over 30%. Once you plug in your numbers, you will see how powerful a customer retention or even a customer reactivation campaign can be for you!

WHAT DOES IT TAKE TO GET AN OLD CUSTOMER TO COME BACK?

Your customer that left your product or service was a good customer at one time but for some reason left and went to the competition. We are creatures of habit, and once they have experienced the service of the competition and liked it, they will have a tenancy to stay. You have lost their attention! So what do you do to peak their curiosity again and win them back?

First off, do some real soul searching about the way you treat the most valuable asset of your business: YOUR CUSTOMER! The second thing you need to come up with is a systematic way to nurture your customer. You lost them once, you don’t want to loose them again. And the third thing you need to do is develop a direct response campaign to grab their attention and get them back to the fold.

Here is what we did with Quicktime Automotive in Grand Rapids MI. The owner had a list of 520 current and past customers that he want to reach. We sent out our Gift Card Mailer, a credit card weight post card that had a break away gift card. It does grab your attention!

CaseStudy

Below are the results:

  • Sent out 520 Gift Card Mailer to current and past customers
  • Timeline: Mid Oct to Dec 31st
  • Marketing Message: -We Miss You ….Offer $25.00 off of $25.00 or more
  • Response: 102 cards redeemed 19.6% response rate
  • Average ticket price: $225.00
  • Sales: $22,950.00
  • Cost of the campaign …$761.60 including creative, NCOA, printing, postage and drop First Class mail
  • Return on investment: for every $1.00 spent they received $29.00. Not bad.
  • Reactivated customers that left

Now that the owner has his lost customers back into the fold, he is working hard to keep them!