Does the business world really need another book about database marketing?

Hasn’t pretty much everything that needs to be said about the subject already been written?

Well, no. Dozens of books have been written by database marketing and customer relationship management experts covering various aspects of the disciplines, including calculation of lifetime value, developing models to make database marketing efforts work better, implementing one-to-one marketing, selecting the right lists, and an endless array of other direct marketing, database marketing,and CRM subjects.

But there isn’t a single book or article that shows how to incorporate all of this wisdom into a coherent, overarching business strategy that includes both the database marketing strategy and the technology “build.”

What’s missing and what’s needed is a clear, non-technical explanation of how all the parts should fit together to create a dynamic, customer-centric, productive business without the endless acronyms and murky pools of technical jargon.

Also, there is a crying need for a book that approaches the problem the way business people live and work: by defining the problems and objectives and then identifying the technology that will fix those problems and achieve those objectives, not the other way around.

In addition, the book provides inside information about the actual business of database marketing. That “actual business” includes knowing how to get the maximum benefit from working with an agency or supplier and, on the other side, how to work with a client.

The Business of Database Marketing covers all the bases for the typical business reader.   It even includes a catalog of the 37 “Best Practices” and a roundup of some of the major “Dos and Don’ts” in making business sense of the world of database marketing. It will be the one easy-to-read and easy-to-understand guide for putting database marketing and customer relationship management to productive use for every business.

Includes a CD with useful forms, presentation materials from the author, and the special the ROI Calculator from the book.

Foreword by Arthur Middleton Hughes

Preface

Section I Fundamentals 


Chapter 1 The Early Days

The Beginning of Database Marketing
Enter PCs
Open Systems and ASPs
The Rise of CRM


Chapter 2 Understanding Marketing Databases

Flat Files
The Relational Database Model
Indexing
Bit Mapping
Inverted Files


Chapter 3 Do You Need a Marketing Database?

Setting Criteria
Benefits of a Marketing Database
Automated Merge/Purge
Automated Data Hygiene
Automated Data Enhancement
Frequent Updating
Increased Marketing Velocity
Better Selectivity and Segmentation
Campaign Automation
Event Triggers
Implementation of Business Rules
Automated Scoring
Management of Contact Frequency
Contact History
Results Tracking and Reporting
Data Mining
Reduced Demands on IT
Simplified Vendor Management


Chapter 4 Database Marketing or CRM?

The Development of the Continuum
CRM and the Customer Experience
Why Database Marketing Matters
The Three Phases of CRM


Chapter 5 In-House or Outsource?

Security Issues
Reasons to Outsource
Database Marketing Experience
Cost
Timely Completion
Security
A Security Checklist


Section II Making It Work 


Chapter 6 Covering the Bases

Database Marketing Readiness Assessment
Involving Stakeholders
Orgaizational Experience
Reporting
Segmentation for Communication
Technology Requirements
Products and Priorities
Creating Compelling Offers
Convergence
Database Creation and Management
Aggregating Information
Data Organization
Identifying User Needs
Prospects in Your Database
Data Enhancements
Data Hygiene
Householding
Update Frequency
Campaign Development and Execution
Strategies for Segmentation
Testing and Measurement
Campaigns
Continuity Communications
Response Management
Response Handling
Tracking the Process
Modeling and Analytics


Chapter 7 Making the Investment

The Three Stages of Database Marketing
Buying the Technology
An Alternate Approach
Enterprise Systemsli>
Return on Investment
Cost/Benefit


Chapter 8 Writing and Issuing RFPs

Problems with RFPs: From the Client’s Point of View
Problems with RFPs: From the Vendor’s Point of View
Problems with RFPs: On Both Sides of the Desk
Doing It Right


Chapter 9 Data Hygiene

Typical Problems with Data
The Limitations of NCOA


Chapter 10 Populating and Enhancing your Database

Customers
Data Elements: Relevant and Irrelevant
Making “Appends”: Testing Outside Lists


Chapter 11 Generating and Managing Leads

Leads and Prospects
Lists
Distributing Leads


Chapter 12 Response Management

Understanding How Sales Are Made
The Challenges of Prospecting and Lead Follow-up


Chapter 13 Tests, Measurement, Analytics, and ROI

Testing
RFM
Profiling
Modeling
Segmentation and Clustering
Assumption Marketing
Enterprise-Wide Control Groups
Measuring ROI
The “Magic Number” in Retention Measurement
Cost-Justifying a Launch


Chapter 14 37 Best Practices

Technology
Right-Size the Technology Investment
Connect with Your CSRs
If You’re Outsourcing, Personally Visit the Data Center
Database Management
Seek Out Axes to Grind
Include Prospects
Be Realistic about What Data You Need
Rank Responses
Manage Response Management
Analytics
Create an Enterprise-Wide Control Group
Set up ROI Measures in Advance
Find and Exploit Nuggets
Provide an Information Flow
Creative
Test for Breakthroughs, Not Nuances
Connect Analysts to Creatives
Get Past the Corporate Gatekeepers
Remember “WIIFM”
Turn Statistics into Key Selling Propositions
Contact Strategy
Sense and Respond
Cross-Sell in Sequence
Differentiate Yourself with Top-Tier Customers
Include “Soft Touch” Communications
Survey Customers
Surprise and Delight
Key Communications to Relationship Phases
Talk to the People Who Talk to the People
Make Your Offers Relevant
Fish Where the Fish Are
Segment by Market
Develop a Process for Strategic Planning and Stick to It
Resell Former Customers
Let the Customer Choose the Channel
Offer a Web Response Option
Use Microsites
Drive Selection with Modeling and Segmentation
Test Timing
Pick the Right Person
Call Yourself up Some Time


Chapter 15 The Role of the Internet

Why the Internet Matters
Uses of the Internet for Database Marketers
Providing Information
Testing
Taking Applications
Generating Leads
Distributing Leads
Direct Sales
Advertising
Offer an Internet Response Option
Use Microsites
Offer an Ongoing Information Flow
Field Sales Management
Recruiting
Customer Service
Establishing Community
Creating “Buzz”
Innovating an Entire Business Model


Chapter 16 The Next Big Thing

The Power of Databases Marketing
Direct Mail List Acquisition
Duplication
The Effect of Business Silos
Timing Problems
Will It Work For You?
Getting It Done


Chapter 17 The View from Both Sides of the Desk

Relationship Tips for Clients
Attention From Senior Management
Working With Your Account Team
Relationship Tips for Vendors
Quarterly Business Reviews
Put It In Writing
Add Value
Stay In Touch


Section III Wrapping Up 


Chapter 18 The Ten Great Myths

The Future is 1:1
Technology Drives the Process
Database Marketing Transcends Brand
CRM Will Replace Database Marketing
Prospect Databases Can’t Be Made to Work Economically
Consumer Data and Data Hygiene Are Commodities
Effective Analytics Can Be Automated
More Personalization Is Better
The Future Is Online
RFPs Are Required to Buy Marketing Services

Chapter 19 Is the Sky Really Falling?

Privacy
Data Handling
Do Not Call
Overmailing/Overselling/Overmarketing


Chapter 20 A Final Review: Major Dos and Don’ts

Database Creation and Management
Analytics
Contact and Relationship Management Strategies
The Internet


Glossary of Buzzwords


Index

Whether you are an old hand or a newcomer to database marketing, you can profit from The Business of Database Marketing. The explanations of RFM, profiling and modeling are worth the price of the book all by themselves! I found it packed with valuable rules of thumb, clear explanations of sometimes complex topics, as well as wonderful stories accumulated from Richard Tooker’s decades-long career in database marketing.

Jan L. Davis
President & CEO
ShopperTrak RCT Corporation

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Richard Tooker is one of the legendary pioneers of database marketing who not only helped to create the concept, but has spent his entire working life improving it and modifying it. He has now written an excellent introduction to the subject—worthwhile for those new to the field as well as a review for experienced hands. His writing style is conversational and easy to read. Throughout, he emphasizes his main points as “Universal Constants.” Particularly interesting is his personal introduction to database marketing in 1975. In his 21 easy-to-understand chapters he includes the “37 best practices” and a summary chapter of scores of “Dos and Don’ts,” plus a valuable glossary of technical terms. No one who works in direct marketing should be without this valuable book.

Arthur Middleton Hughes
Vice President/Solutions Architect
KnowledgeBase Marketing
Author, Strategic Database Marketing, 3rd Ed.

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A history, a primer, a pragmatic work on the business purposes of databases and how they relate to real world results. Richard has written a work that is perfect for a marketer of any experience level with nuggets to take away from every chapter. This will become a must read direct marketing book that will keep company with Bob Stone’s Successful Direct Marketing Methods and Stan Rapp’s Maxi Marketing books.

Warren Hunter
President & CEO
DMW Worldwide LLC

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The Business of Database Marketing is destined to be a classic. In the tradition of pioneers Arthur Hughes and David Shepard & Associates, Richard Tooker nails it with a lucid, practical and robust exploration of the multiple concepts of database marketing and its applications. Filled with case study references, Tooker’s identification of the “universal constants of database marketing” is worth the price of admission. You cannot go wrong adding this one to your professional library. It has so many nuggets of information gold about a complicated subject it clearly qualifies as a mine. My advice: a “must-read” for experienced pros and novices alike.

Don Jackson
Chairman
The JCG Group, Ltd.
Author, 151 Secrets of Insurance Direct Marketing Practices Revealed

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A fun read. Tooker has a breezy style that makes his innovative reconceptualization of conventional marketing wisdom easy to absorb.

Rick Kean
Managing Partner
Business Marketing Institute
Former Executive Director, Business Marketing Association

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At last, a comprehensive guide to setting up and managing a database marketing database program for your company! If Kinky Friedman had set out to write a book about database marketing, this would be it. It’s a sometimes irreverent, often humorous, and always engaging look at the do’s and don’ts of executing a winning data-base marketing strategy and creating the underlying database that drives it. His complete and pragmatic guide is laid out in very straightforward (read: English) terms so that you can avoid the pitfalls of others and be successful the first time—or this time— around. A bible for anyone whose business is driven by database marketing and a playbook for every company that provides database marketing services to its customers.

Gary S. Laben
President and CEO
KnowledgeBase Marketing

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From start to finish, for expert or novice, Richard Tooker’s work is destined to be a pivotal work for those who create and maintain sophisticated databases. Richard puts the pieces together so that all parts of the database puzzle, including CRM, outsourcing and the ever-daunting demands for an ROI are addressed. From the section on “37 best practices” to the final “Do and Don’ts,” this work is essential reading for every B2B and B2C marketer. I especially like his “Universal Constants” which are stand-alone pearls of wisdom. One of these sums up the value of this book when he says, “Sooner or later, all database marketers will be asked to prove that what they do has value.” Read this and you’ll be able to answer this inevitable question.

James W. Obermayer
Sales Leakage Consultants
Author, Managing Sales Leads

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In writing The Business of Database Marketing Richard Tooker has a taken a very complex subject, difficult for most of us to comprehend, and made it interesting, straightforward, and easy to understand. His aim is to cover the “the entire spectrum of fundamentals” and he has done a masterful job of accomplishing his goal. His book is the best one I’ve found in all my years in the Marketing World for explaining the strategies for database development com-bined with the technological tactics for implementation. The practitioners in the Database Marketing World have a great deal to gain by understanding his insights into this important subject matter.

Edward “Ted” Spiegel
Professor Emeritus-in-Service
Integrated Marketing Communications
Northwestern University

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Richard Tooker’s 30+ years experience have allowed him to share a unique perspective about the business end of database marketing, something that until now has been lacking in the available literature. the book is well-written, and entertains at the same time it conveys valuable advice to database marketers on both sides of the desk.

Lester Wunderman
Founder and Chairman Emeritus
Wunderman