I've been doing the foreign trade in the factory for about 2 years, I got a problem now for maintaining the customers.

I've tried to divided the customers into different groups, to have different customer lists,  ordered customers, sample-sent customers, high-interests enquiry customers etc. , but it doesn't work effectively  in the long run.

After some time, I may forget the lists.

I can't recall the enquiried customers, so very often I find many customers make many enquiries from time to time, but these enquiries are not in the same profile, then everytime I treat the enquiry as a new one to reply.

I can't recall all the sample sent customers, many samples sent, and get few reply. 

also for ordered customers, each time I have to check the customer's profile, and then everytime similar email to old customers like to ask the products comments, selling situation, and expect next order

So I feel a bit confused how to make a clear profile to keep the cusomers data, and how to make a good follow-up to different customers.

Any opinions and suggestions is appreciated. Thanks in advance for your sharing and help.

 

Dear Shen,
Make a list of order placing customers and ask for feed back about there changing requirements and inform what new you can offer now.
Make second list of customers who have high interest and ask for their exact requirements for follow up.
But most important is, that your data keeps increasing with more enquiries.
Sixer

Thanks for your kind advice.It makes lots of sense.
I have to keep the list updated as enquiry increases

Matthew_Shen wrote:

I've been doing the foreign trade in the factory for about 2 years, I got a problem now for maintaining the customers.

I've tried to divided the customers into different groups, to have different customer lists,  ordered customers, sample-sent customers, high-interests enquiry customers etc. , but it doesn't work effectively  in the long run.

After some time, I may forget the lists.

I can't recall the enquiried customers, so very often I find many customers make many enquiries from time to time, but these enquiries are not in the same profile, then everytime I treat the enquiry as a new one to reply.

I can't recall all the sample sent customers, many samples sent, and get few reply. 

also for ordered customers, each time I have to check the customer's profile, and then everytime similar email to old customers like to ask the products comments, selling situation, and expect next order

So I feel a bit confused how to make a clear profile to keep the cusomers data, and how to make a good follow-up to different customers.

Any opinions and suggestions is appreciated. Thanks in advance for your sharing and help.

 

Zeitgeist disturbs traditional lists. I think you should give up to do lists. Think about zeitgeist. Do what zeitgeist requires.