Keeping in Touch in the Off-Season

In today's competitive catalog and Internet business, it is totally unacceptable to contact customers only during, say, the fourth quarter of the year and to ignore them for nine months. Building a long-term relationship with catalog customers means creating a contact strategy that touches them year-round. The secret is to be innovative enough in the off-season to generate sufficient money to at least break even, as well as to keep your year-round staff busy. A number of techniques can help you keep in touch with your customers and generate additional revenue to retain staff, make the most of your facilities, and contribute to overall profitability: 1. a special inventory liquidation sale, 2. one-day or weekend sale, 3. promotional events geared to the season, 4. outbound phone calls or e-mail follow-ups, or 5. VIP treatment. In addition to your best buyers, there are two other groups of customers that you should single out: offseason shoppers and first-time buyers.