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March 2017 | Boating Industry | 29 [ Smart Stats ] www.BoatingIndustry.com better understand what's selling in your market – what lengths and footage, what types of prod- ucts, which helps boost inventory turns. If you're stocking the right products, that product is going out the door faster." That type of information is crucial to both dealers and manufacturers, so they can quickly identify areas for improvement. "Not only do I know exactly what boat is selling, what length is selling, what propulsion is selling, but I also know … what ZIP code is a hot ZIP code and I can use it to my advantage for marketing," Kloppe said. Smart marketing By using a combination of its own customer information and data from other sources, One- Water has been able to create profiles of its cus- tomers that allow it to craft marketing down to the local level. OneWater has locations throughout the Southeast and sells dozens of brands, making this information key to its success. "The biggest piece of what we've done is we've profiled and segmented our customers," Davis said. "We've done that by brand in each region." Utilizing a program called PRIZM from The Nielsen Company, OneWater can take its cus- tomer data to devise profiles of those buyers. "What they do is they'll take that database or customer list and bounce it off large consumer da- tabases – what do they own, what kind of cars do they drive, retail credit cards with Nordstrom's or Neiman Marcus or anything like that," Davis said. "There are thousands of data points they track. It's not targeting one individual user, so we're protect- ing our customers' privacy, but it does give us a good background for our customers." Armed with that information, the company can then not only map where it's current custom- ers are, but also get a map of ZIP codes that are densely populated with other similar customers. "My customer list will tell me where I've done a good job selling," Davis said. "What this [map] shows us is where is the opportunity that I need to go out and target." With locations in expensive media markets like Atlanta and Dallas, that information allows One- Water to strategically shrink its target audience to those people who are more likely to respond. "The data really drives a lot of those decisions," Davis said. "It lets us evaluate media proposals: Is this going to be effective in reaching that market?" Once OneWater has psychographic profiles of its customers, it can draw conclusions based on their values and attitudes, and what is impor- tant to them. Then the marketing team can cre- ate advertisements and marketing pieces using language that carries a tone and an attitude that is more likely to resonate with that particular customer for that specific brand. "We're able to know how we should differen- tiate those rather than just say 'This one needs to be edgier' and 'This one needs to be more refined or classy,'" Davis said. "We can speak to specific elements or features that we think are going to resonate with this customer. Without that data we'd be flying blind and wildly guessing while now we are taking more calculated guesses." OneWater has also purchased registration data for competitive brands in its markets so it can conduct the same process on those brands. "I know, for example, what the Chaparral buyer is versus my Cobalt buyer," Davis said. "I can focus on the key points that will be more relevant to my Cobalt buyer versus the Chapar- ral buyer. What makes my customer different?" It was that information that led to the com- pany's Pandora campaign, which was a finalist in the 2015 Best Ideas competition at the Ma- rine Dealer Conference & Expo. (Read more in the Best Ideas White Paper at boatingindustry. com/e-white-papers/.) The research showed that while competitive buyers listened to the online streaming music service, OneWater's buyers listen to Pandora twice as frequently. There's not a one-size-fits-all solutions for all companies, but knowing and tracking market and customer numbers are important for any business. "There are so many ways the data can be used," Davis said. "We could all use the exact same process and even get the same data results, yet all of us are going to come up with differ- ent ways to reach that audience. Small business is going to benefit from this business more than anyone else because it's going to let them reach their exact customer in a more affordable way to get a better return on their investment." "IF YOU'RE STOCKING THE RIGHT PRODUCTS, THAT PRODUCT IS GOING OUT THE DOOR FASTER." — Ryan Kloppe, Statistical Surveys Inc. SSI tracks registrations by ZIP code to monitor trends.