Store profiling is a critical part of local marketing. As you may know, store profiling is the process of collecting information about a retail location with the purpose of creating more targeted and relevant messaging.
There are an endless number of attributes that can be profiled for this purpose, such as:
- Physical Attributes – Store type (free-standing, mall, in-line), drive-thru capabilities, store size, layout type, etc.
- Merchandising Attributes – The types of signs, fixtures and sizes
- Product Offering – Details regarding specific product lines or menu offerings
- Price Points – Specific product prices by store
- Consumer Demographics
- interests
- age groups
- ethnic groups
- language
- Regional – Weather, landscape, seasonal
- Local Signage Ordinances – Laws on exterior banners, posters, yard signs and other marketing materials
- Location – Proximity to high school, hospital, office buildings, highway
Collecting this information is a gradual process. I have found that most clients have some of this information; however, the data often is scattered or incomplete. It is amazing how much information is available if you collect all the data held in spreadsheets and departmental databases throughout your organization. This data can be gathered and loaded into a location profiling database (Synq Solutions calls this process Intelligent Profiling) that can be leveraged immediately for marketing purposes. The idea that you can use the data that you already have, and then work to improve and expand the depth of your location profiling data is a key concept of successful local marketing.
Building your profile database is an evolutionary process. It is also one where you have to weigh the cost of collecting and maintaining data against the marketing benefits. For example, if you want to obtain a very accurate picture of the merchandising configuration of each of your stores, you could have a team of specialists visit each location and collect that data; however the cost of this approach could exceed $500 per location. Alternately, you could mail paper surveys or conduct telephone interviews to store managers at a much lower cost. While this approach wouldn’t be as accurate or complete, it may make the most business sense.
Demographic data on your customers can be obtained by analyzing population data from third-party sources or it can be collected through direct surveying of your customers. The trade-off between data quality and cost is the deciding factor.
I generally recommend that clients start by using the data they have or obtaining it at a low cost. Then, as you learn to use the information to build and execute effective marketing programs, the value of improving the data quality will be more than offset by the cost of collecting the information.
This evolutionary approach requires flexible tools, so make sure you have partners with capabilities that allow you to quickly adapt your profiling database to new approaches as your needs change.
I have explored the concept of Location Segmentation and the many ways that you can collect information for Profiling; however, doing any of this without a goal in mind is likely to end up with bad results. In my next post, I will talk about the goals of Local Marketing and how they can affect your approach to Segmentation and Profiling.
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