Because so many libraries use wholesalers when ordering books and other products, my clients always ask me for specific ideas to help them develop an accurate in-house customer file. As marketers, we know that customers are our bread and butter – not only for selling our backlist but also for introducing new product. And, we know we should market to them more frequently than we market to prospects. So, developing an in-house customer files is an important job and part of our marketing budget should be devoted to this objective.

Of course, the first avenue of inquiry is to work with directly with your wholesalers develop a program with them to receive a list of your customers from them on a quarterly basis. Perhaps if you offered to pay them for each name, you might get their attention! But failing that, here are some ideas you can use to today to begin building this important source of future revenue:

1) Insert cards into the front of your products before you shrink wrap them at the bindery. These cards should contain a compelling offer to encourage the buyer to complete the information requested (name, title, institution, etc) so that you can use this information to identify this person as a customer. Compelling offers that work include the word FREE! Offer a free poster, a free report, a free book, a free anything.

2) Send out a survey to the entire market and ask them to indicate which products of yours they have in their library. Again, give them an incentive to respond with their name and address. Often, including a $2.00 bill (a donation to their coffee fund) will do the trick. Or, offer to donate a book to their local school – or directly to the library itself. Or, offer to compile the results and send the report back to them.

3) Begin a telephone campaign to identify your customers. While this is perhaps the most expensive approach, it will pay the most dividends over the long run since not only will you be gathering invaluable information about your customers and prospects, you will also begin developing that all-important "relationship" with them.

4) Use every marketing channel at your disposal to collect information about your customers. Collect information from your sales force, your contacts at exhibits, your web site. Assign someone in your database/fulfillment department to be directly responsible for creating and maintaining your customer list. Funnel all information to that person and have a report that tracks how many customers are identified on a monthly basis. Establish realistic goals and measure them.

If you, like many of my clients, claim that 50-70% of your business goes through wholesalers so you can't identify your customers, implementing some of all of these ideas will result in the percentage of "unknown" customers dropping significantly. Once you can identify your customers, you will have the opportunity to reach these customers more frequently and this will increase your revenue return on your marketing investments.