Clean Up on Aisle Sales: Segmenting Customers and Attitudes By Desiree Grace A funny thing happened on a customer segmentation journey: trash talk, bad behavior, and customer attitudes were exposed. Say what? Yep, when you start dissecting your customers and how you should be treating them, internal dysfunction often slides into the spotlight too. Here’s what happened: I was working with a client, whom we’ll call Zac, who had no customer segmentation in place. That meant every customer was treated the same way. There was no distinction between great, good, or frankly, terrible customers. They all received the same terms, attention, responsiveness... you name it. As you might guess, this was not sustainable. So, Zac and I collaborated on building a customer rubric —a list of qualities to evaluate and score his customers. This helped segment them into tiers, which in turn dictated how they would be managed. Would they be contacted monthly, semi-monthly, or quarterly? Would t...

Marketing Moment:  Lost in the Market? Let the 5-Cs Guide You By Desiree Grace Let’s get something straight: Marketing is not a walk in the park. It’s often underestimated, but the importance of good marketing is equal to having a solid map on a remote trail without WiFi. Frameworks like the 5-Cs help us navigate unfamiliar terrain and create order out of chaos. The 5-Cs are your compass, a tool that helps you analyze and strategize, guiding you through the marketing wilderness. You’ve probably heard of the 4-Ps: Product, Place, Price, and Promotion, the classic Marketing Mix. Let’s ditch the amateur level and talk about something more advanced: the 5-Cs. The 5-Cs are a framework for conducting a serious situation analysis. It’s how you take a long, hard look at where your business stands, where it’s heading, and how to outsmart the competition. Think of it like an annual inspection for your car, a health check that could save you from an overheated engine down the road. The...

Lost in the Gaps? Let Data Light the Way Gap Analysis for Salespeople in an Industrial Sales Environment By Desiree Grace Gap analysis is a strategic tool used by salespeople to identify potential areas of growth and opportunity within a specific market or customer base, essentially, the “gaps” in your coverage. In industrial sales, where competition is fierce and product offerings are often highly specialized, leveraging gap analysis can offer a significant advantage. This article provides a practical overview of gap analysis and how it can be applied by sales professionals in the industrial sector. What is Gap Analysis? Gap analysis involves examining current market conditions, customer needs, and existing product offerings to uncover "white spaces" or areas where new opportunities may exist. These gaps could include unmet customer needs, underdeveloped product lines, or untapped market segments. By identifying these gaps, salespeople can develop targeted strate...

Grace Under Pressure: The Power of Decency in Leadership By Desiree Grace We’ve lost some great leaders in the electrical industry lately, people of real accomplishment and longevity. But what has me reflecting most is not just what they achieved, but how they did it. What stands out most is their decency . Leadership and decency are not mutually exclusive. You can be both a great leader and a decent human being. One of these leaders took the reins of a company after the founder retired. He grew the business, expanded into new sectors and geographies, and had a profound impact on the industry, the customers, the employees, and the communities where the business operated. He also had a personal impact. He was, as you would expect, highly intelligent. But more than that, he was polite, professional, and decent, with a dry sense of humor. Even in hard times, like during layoffs and pay cuts, he conducted himself with grace and a clear moral compass. Another leader comes to mind—a...

Make Your LinkedIn Profile Work as Hard as You Do By Frank Hurtte Let’s talk LinkedIn. It's your digital elevator pitch, online handshake, and social proof. If you're in sales, leadership, or any role where people do business with you , not just your company, then your LinkedIn profile is your online handshake. First impressions matter. If your profile looks like a ghost town or a resume from 2004, it might be time for a tune-up. Here are a few practical, real-world tips to help your profile rise above the noise: 1. Use a Real Photo—A Good One No selfies. No sunglasses. No vacation shots cropped from a wedding. Invest in a professional headshot or at least a photo where you’re well-lit, smiling, and look like someone a customer would want to talk to. If headshots aren’t in your budget, take a photo against a plain background and use a program or app to improve it. Reality Check: Listen, we KNOW you looked great at your frat brother’s wedding, but save those photos...

Frequent Flyers, Forgotten Value: A Pricing Wake-Up Call By Desiree Grace and Frank Hurtte Customer Lifetime Value (CLV) is marketing-speak for the value of capturing a customer early in their buying journey and keeping that customer for life. Statistics show that it takes 5-7 times MORE money to acquire a new customer than to keep an existing customer. Treating your best customers better is key to customer retention and reducing customer churn. This should be a company-wide effort. Pricing strategy and execution should align with that strategy, and while typically part of Finance, they should not be excluded from company-wide coordination. Let’s review a real-world example from the airline industry. Recently, I had the experience of booking a three-legged journey with United. Due to a colleague changing schedules, I had to cancel one of the legs. As a Premier 1k and Global Services customer, I expected some sort of refund for the cancelled journey, since I was essentially buying ...

Leadership Qualities: Keep Calm and Carry  Lead On. By Desiree Grace   “Control your emotions and actions,” said Chad Williams, a former Navy SEAL, while discussing the importance of self-control in leadership. I couldn't agree more. A leader sets the tone for their team, whether they choose to fight, flee, freeze, or, even worse, panic. There is tremendous value in emotional self-discipline and keeping calm, even in the most challenging circumstances. It’s not easy, but it is achievable. We’ve all seen this popular poster, created in 1939, to keep the British people motivated when under threat of air attacks. The situations we face are not quite as dire, but the point remains. Let’s talk about three ways you can keep calm and demonstrate self-control when dealing with challenging work situations. Imagine an important customer is involved in a tense negotiation, and the situation escalates, raises his voice, pounds his fist on the conference room table, and makes derog...

PR- The Finishing Touch to Your Marketing Plan Desiree Grace Public Relations (PR) is an important tool in a Marketing Manager’s toolkit. While it may seem like a minor or decorative aspect of your company communications, similar to decorative light switches, don’t underestimate the importance of having a PR expert on your team. Just as you need a master plasterer to prepare your walls and finish your ceilings, it’s essential to manage your company’s image and oversee your corporate communications effectively. Let’s break it down. While PR is related to organizational image and is a close skill set to corporate advertising, it’s more than that. The audience for public relations is much broader than your current and prospective customers. It includes ALL stakeholders, people like current and potential employees, vendors, neighbors, the city and county where you work, even government officials, your industry at large, in addition to your customers. The objective with proactive pu...

White Swan Strategy: Increasing Customer Lifetime Value (CLV)—It’s NOT Magic! Desiree Grace   Some people think loyal customers are like magical unicorns—rare, and subject to luck, alignment of the planets, and other uncontrollable nonsense—the stuff of fairy tales. I would argue that loyal customers are WHITE SWANS. White Swans are highly predictable events that can be easily anticipated, and their size and importance can be easily estimated. You DO have control, if you know what to do. The choice is yours. Customer Lifetime Value defined Customer Lifetime Value (CLV) is key to customer retention and long-term profitability.  You can measure this easily by multiplying customer annual revenue by customer lifespan. Then, subtract any acquisition costs for year one and retention or servicing costs, like rebates, from the annual number, and presto! You have customer lifetime value. Let’s walk through an example: Cobalt Electric buys $10,000 per month per year from St...