What are they talking about? – 5 Marketing Terms You need to know

In-plants have experienced the shift to shorter runs, increased personalization, versioning and suppression of print. Your marketing and customer service teams may have explained what is driving change for print and the need to manage communications across digital channels. Data from more sources is driving marketing and customer engagement strategies across organizations in every industry.

Marketing teams are leveraging data to evolve strategies and produce measurable results. Where there’s data there are acronyms. To assist you in understanding what your marketing team is saying as they explain their changing needs, here are five marketing terms explained. 

ABM: Account-Based Marketing

Account Based Marketing is a strategic sales and marketing approach that focuses on specific targeted accounts rather than broad target audiences. It enables highly personalized marketing strategies. Sales and marketing content is tailored to individual buyers relevant to specific job functions. (Read more here.)

B2B and B2C organizations have adopted ABM strategies to improve:

• Collaboration between sales and marketing teams  

• Understanding of the unique needs of key accounts

• Efficiency in budget allocate

• Sales engagement with buyers conducting research before engaging with sales

• Business results and customer experience

CLV or CLTV: Customer Lifetime Total Value

Customer Lifetime Value is a calculated prediction of the net profit attributed to a new customer over the entire relationship with a brand. CLV helps businesses understand the total potential financial worth of their customer relationships. The data is used to inform decisions related to sales, marketing, customer service, and product development.

There are many different formulas to calculate CLV. Formulas will vary based on the nature of the business, the availability of data, and the specific goals of the analysis. Marketing teams use CLV to make better decisions to determine the best short-term and long-term marketing strategies. (Read more here.)

CAC: Customer Acquisition Cost

Customer acquisition cost is the total cost of acquiring a new customer or account. It includes all aspects of cost related to sales, marketing, and onboarding. CAC is a critical data point for marketing teams to understand how best to make sales and marketing investments across different products or lines of business. (Read more here.)

Marketing teams use CAC to optimize:

• Product pricing, features, and service offerings

• Budget allocation across channels (e.g., direct mail, digital advertising, content marketing, trade shows)

• Customer segments that are most responsive and profitable

• Building and nurturing long-term customer relationships

Predictive Analytics: Analytics

Predictive Analytics is the use of data, statistical algorithms, and machine learning techniques to identify the likelihood of future outcomes based on historical and real time data. The purpose is to forecast future behaviors, trends, and outcomes for prospects or customers.

Analytics are used to create models or profiles for accurate marketing segmentation. By understanding the likely behavior of customers, marketing teams can increase personalization and provide relevant content and offers to each market segment.

Data analytics enable better sales and market results by:

• Increasing conversion and customer retention rates

• Providing ongoing customer data and feedback to improve marketing strategies

• Predicting and reducing churn of accounts

CDP: Customer Data Platform

A customer data platform is a unified customer database that is accessible and integrated with several separate systems. CDPs are designed to collect, unify, organize, and store customer data from various sources into a single, comprehensive customer database. Organizations of every type are leveraging CDPs and cloud computing to manage legacy and siloed data to improve business results and customer experience (CX). (Read more here.)

CDPs enable a central hub for disparate data sources across organizations. By connecting data from each stage in the customer journey, CDPs provide visibility across marketing, sales, and onboarding, to operations, administration, and customer service. Teams can make better decisions based on real time data.  

CDP use cases include:

• Enhanced customer visibility and understanding across departments

• Improved marketing efficiency for upselling and cross-selling

• Enhanced customer service and customer retention

• Enabling predictive analytics to foresee customer behaviors

• Efficiency in processing forms, applications, and written documents

• Improving responsiveness for administrative processes

• Mitigating risk across the organization

Technology is driving effective sales and marketing strategies. Data driven decisions are used to justify budgets for print, mail, and support for digital channels. Partnering with your marketing teams is one way to align around your organizational goals. Being familiar with these concepts can help leaders navigate the complexities of modern marketing and position the value of your print operation.

My previous article covers more technical terms you need to know.