Lifecycle · CRM · Marketing memo
Lifecycle marketing is not broadcasting
The real job of CRM is to improve the next customer decision, not maximise the number of messages sent.
A point of view
A lifecycle programme becomes strategically useful when it knows what the customer has already done, what they are likely to need next and when communication is actually helpful.
The common failure
Many CRM teams start with the message calendar. Monday is one campaign, Wednesday is another, Friday is a promotion. The customer is treated as an audience member who needs to be reached.
That reverses the problem. The customer is already moving through a journey. Marketing should decide where communication can improve the journey, not where the calendar has an empty slot.
The better model
Start with behaviour: acquisition, first use, repeat use, adjacent use, inactivity and reactivation. Then ask what decision the customer faces at each stage.
This is where next-best-use-case thinking becomes powerful. A recommendation is valuable when it follows a customer signal and reduces uncertainty about what to do next.
What to measure
CTR is useful, but it is not the outcome. Measure adoption, repeat behaviour, incremental action and downstream value. A message that generates clicks but no useful behaviour may be a successful notification and an unsuccessful marketing intervention.
Apply the thinking
Bring me the marketing problem, not just the channel.
I work backwards from the commercial constraint, customer behaviour and evidence, then decide what intervention makes sense.
Talk about your problem