Our journey into high-yield marketing strategies began with a discussion of reach and frequency: The size and identity of the group to whom you are promoting your meeting, and the number of messages they receive about it. Next, we introduced the idea of accuracy: zeroing in on individuals-prospects-who are most likely to attend. With this, we also introduced the idea of quantifying prospect activity in terms of recency (R: how recently they attended), frequency (F: how many times they have attended), and monetary value (M: the amount of revenue generated for your organization by their attendance). By assigning values to this R/F/M formulation we can create a value profile for each prospect on your list. With it, you will have a much better idea of the likelihood of your prospects generating future revenue (whether through meetings or other products), which will in turn make it easier for you to decide how much to invest in marketing to them.
Weighting Variables The exact R/F/M formulation for your continuing professional education program will vary according to the importance you give to each of the variables. Under certain conditions, you might wish to adjust their value. You might also wish to assign different variables. For example, in the value profile of an association, recognizing members or past participants may be as important as considering how much money they spent. The chart immediately below shows sample R/F/M values. These values of customer participation over a specified period may be combined, with additional weight given to recency (x 5), frequency (x 3), and monetary (x 2).
At the bottom of the page is a sample R/F/M model of four participants/prospect records (note there are two records for participant A). There is a separate line for each time the prospect participated in a program, followed by the relevant R/F/M numbers, the assigned points and the extra custom-weighted points. At the end are two totals: weighted points and cumulative points. The totals show which individuals are the most likely to attend your future programs, and thus points to your marketing strategy for each of them. Which prospects will you target aggressively?