1. M and M Direct empowers marketing, finance
and merchandising teams to analyse data
directly using ANALYZER
M and M Direct is the UK’s number one provider of
discounted name-brand sports and leisurewear. The
company sells direct to consumers, using mail order and the
internet. It has a turnover of £65 million and has 2.5 million
Customer
names on its database. M and M Direct
Cequity's end-to-end suite of
integrated services includes customer
Synopsis
management consulting, marketing
Industry Sector
database & information management
M and M Direct can improve the effectiveness and cut the costs of its mailings now that it is using
Retail (On-line & Catalogue)
solutions, analytics, metrics &
ANALYZER for data analysis. It replaced a clumsy legacy system and, thanks to its ease of use, has
dashboards and campaign
empowered the marketing department to conduct its own analysis. As a result, the company can
measurement support. Our state-of-
respond more quickly to changes in fashion and the marketplace. smartFOCUS’ Campaigner is
the-art technology solution, Cequity
used to clean and deduplicate lists selected using ANALYZER before fulfilment.
Solution Components
ACE is powered by smartFOCUS and
is a hosted customer marketing
ANALYZER has had an impact far beyond marketing: the finance and merchandising teams also
Data Quality/Management
system that can be quickly
use the software to measure business success, viewing reports in Excel using smartREPORTER.
implemented without major hardware
The Challenge or software investments. This helps us
Single Customer View
deliver rich yet valuable, information-
“The internet is our predominant ordering channel,” says Chris Harle, finance director of M and M
driven, customer& Visualization
Analysis experience
Direct. “It’s gone haywire in the last two years for three reasons. Firstly, the internet experience
opportunities for you.
has got better with more widespread broadband. Secondly, consumers are more internet-savvy.
Predictive Modeling
“From our experience, the Intelligent
And thirdly, every catalogue we send out is actively promoting the website, which offers
Analytical Marketing from smartFOCUS
customers a better range of stock. The catalogue costs us money to make and mail and has 1000
Campaign Management
makes it possible to instantly analyze,
lines in it. We carry another 1500 or 1600 lines on the website that aren’t in the brochures.”
segment, identify and communicate with
large volumes of customers and contacts on
M and M Direct had a legacy system which it used for data analysis, but it was too cumbersome. “It Email Marketing
an individual basis. Intelligent Marketing
was great if you could program and knew the system in detail,” says Harle, “but we wanted our
improves customer communications -
marketing team to be able to just drag and drop and get reports without having to wait a day for
Online Execution
throughout the entire lifetime of a company-
the IT specialists to do them.”
customer relationship and makes
The Solution Performance Management
performance driven multi-channel marketing
a reality. smartFOCUS is faster and more
M and M Direct now analyses its data using ANALYZER from smartFOCUS. “Its drag and drop interface
efficient than we thought it would be!”
Managed Service
is simple to use,” says Harle. “At the touch of a button, it enables our marketing team to understand
who is buying what, and who is responding to what promotion. It’s fast, flexible and easy to use.
Consultancy
Before, we spent 80% of our time getting the data and only 20% analysing it. Now we spend 5% of our
CEO - Cequity Solutions
time getting the data, and the rest analysing it.”
The use of ANALYZER has been extended throughout the business beyond marketing, including the
use of smartREPORTER to automatically generate and circulate daily sales reports which previously
took two hours of work a day to produce.
“The finance department uses smartREPORTER for measuring the business’s key performance
indicators - at the touch of a button. When I come in each day, I can instantly see what we sold
yesterday, the number of orders taken, their value, average order value, number and value of
returns, number of parcels despatched and so on (each with a comparison against budget). The
key performance indicators are fully automated,” says Harle.
“The finance department uses smartREPORTER for measuring the business’s key performance
indicators - at the touch of a button. When I come in each day, I can instantly see what we sold
yesterday, the number of orders taken, their value, average order value, number and value of
returns, number of parcels despatched and so on (each with a comparison against budget). The
key performance indicators are fully automated,” says Harle. “Our buying and merchandising
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team also uses ANALYZER to monitor and control what brands we’re selling, the associated stock
holding, and whether to buy more or start ditching product lines.”
Continued overleaf

2. An integral part of the solution is Campaigner, which is used to clean and de-duplicate lists
before they are sent to the fulfilment house. M and M Direct is able to run selections for
catalogue or email promotions using ANALYZER, and then screen the database against suppression
lists and deduplicate using Campaigner. The cleaned list is then automatically sent for fulfilment.
Having access to data on a customer level is enabling the company to save money. “We’re
analysing our customers at an individual and household level. We typically have 1.3 customers per
household, so we need to ask whether we need to send a catalogue to each customer or just to
each house,” says Harle. “If we don’t have to mail that extra 0.3 customers a brochure, that’s an
immediate saving in production and mailing costs that will have an immediate impact on the
bottom line. We’re also looking at who buys what, so that when we have a promotion on a key
fashion brand like Bench, we can see what our Bench customers might also buy. Now we have
postal pricing in proportion, we have to be even more selective about what we send out.”
The Bottom Line/ROI
I can’t emphasise
Harle concludes: “The best thing about ANALYZER is that it has enabled us to get the information
enough that it’s not
we need without any aggro. I can’t emphasise enough that it’s not just about marketing, it’s a
just about marketing,
vital business management tool. It was sold to us as a marketing tool but we said it’s too good for
marketing to be the only ones getting their mitts on it. We need to share it throughout the
it’s a vital business
company.”
management tool
About mandmdirect.com
mandmdirect.com is the UK’s leading online and catalogue retailer, bringing big brands at bargain
prices to a computer or letterbox near you! Founded 20 years ago, mandmdirect.com has been
supplying customers with fantastic products at prices that no high street store can dare to compete
with. At mandmdirect.com, you will find brand fashion, sportswear, outdoors clothing, sports
equipment and accessories for men, women and children from more than 200 top brands -
all at astonishingly low prices with discounts of up to 75% on rrp. With top buyers who can spot a
good purchase a mile off, stock that is updated every hour and with no expensive stores to run, it
means at mandmdirect.com you will never have to pay the full price again!
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marketers with the intelligence to drive high performance multi channel campaigns and more 189-A, Sane Guruji Marg, Mahalaxmi,
valuable customer relationships. Its Intelligent Marketing solutions integrate off-line and on-line Mumbai-400 011, India
data, analysis, campaign and performance management to deliver better targeted more timely
Phone: +91 22-43453800
and relevant communications that increase campaign conversion rates and improve customer’s
insight. Fax: +91 22-43453840
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