The 5 stages of the Customer Lifecycle!

An important part of digital marketing and something really important to know during your Apprenticeship, is the customer lifecycle! If you aren’t familiar with this, we’ve put together this breakdown of all the key points, stages and parts for you!

What is the Customer Lifecycle?

The customer lifecyle is looking at the overall time a customer spends with your brand through five key stages. This allows you to gain an understanding of customer behaviours and work out how to best optimise your business to maintain the interest of your customers for a longer period of time as each stage is driven by how your business interacts with the public.

The 5 Stages

Create Brand Awareness

Make sure your content stands out and catches the attention of the ever scrolling user. Maybe consider using paid promotion to keep your content popping up? Or influencers to endorse your business and add a sense of trust? Think about how you can get the customer to consciously notice your brand.

Consideration – Encourage the user look into your brand or service

So you’ve managed to catch a potential customer or users attention? Now, let’s get them to look further into it! Show them the value you can bring to them and get them searching and researching for more. Maybe even consider enticing potential customers in using promotional offerings?

Purchase – Get users to buy or use your service

New customer in the bag! You’ve been able to engage the user enough to have complete a monetary exchange between them and your business – success!

Retention – Keep users coming back

So they’ve brought from you once? Why don’t you try to build a better relationship with the customer to keep them coming back? Loyalty is equal to long term income. Keep your content new and exciting, don’t let the customer get bored and make sure you are staying in the sights. Maybe a monthly email with new brand updates? Seasonal promotions and discounts?

Advocacy – Get users shouting about your business

So you have yourself a loyal and returning customer – perfect! Now let’s be so good that they can’t resist shouting about your business! Tell their friends, family, dogs and cats! Maybe even encourage them to write reviews as part of their online advocacy.

How do we measure the success of our Customer Lifecycle?

It’s a bit numerical, but it’s a fairly simple task to work out the success of your Customer Lifecycle. Check out our cheat sheet below:

(Customer revenue per year x Duration of the relationship in year) / Total costs of acquiring and serving the customer = Customer Lifetime Value

Helpful Key Terms

  • Cost Per Acquisition – The cost to your business of gaining a new customer through the activities you did at the Awareness stage, including advertising and marketing.
  • Transaction Value – How much are customers spending per purchase? Does this go up or down after the purchase stage as you go into the retention stage?
  • Transaction Frequency – How often do your customers at the retention and loyalty stages purchase? Does the frequency stay constant, or does it increase or level off over time? Are there any obvious patterns year on year?
  • Engagement metrics – Customers who have reached the advocacy stage, and some of those at the retention stage, may be more likely to engage with your brand. How often do they open your emails? Do they follow you on social media, and if so, how often do they engage with your content through liking or commenting features?

The customer lifecycle is just one of the technical elements that you will learn during you time doing Digital Marketer’s Apprenticeship. You can learn more about what to expect from your Level 3 – Digital Marketing Apprenticeship on our site and make sure you Be sure to sign up for our emailing list below and receive a FREE information pack on any apprenticeship of your choice!

Level 2 Highway Electrical Maintenance and Installation Operative

This Intermediate highway electrical maintenance and installation operative apprenticeship standard will provide you with a level 2 qualification.

Does being part of a team in a constructive and positive way interest you? if it does, then this could be the start of your journey to being an  Highway Electrical Maintenance and Installation Operative.

What is required for you to start your journey?

Entry requirements can vary between employers but on average Apprentices must have a Level 1 English and Maths qualification, as well as complete a Level 2 in both of these subjects before their end-point assessment. For those with an education, health and care plan or a legacy statement, the apprenticeship’s English and maths minimum requirement is Entry Level 3 and for those whose primary language is BSL, a British Sign Language (BSL) qualification is accepted in place of any English qualifications.

Duration: The typical duration of this Apprenticeship is 24 months for achievement of competence in the sub-sector your choose.

Must have core skills to help you on your way.

  • Understanding the employer’s health and safety and environmental requirements and procedures
  • Understanding the employer’s requirements and identifying what work is required, what their responsibilities are and what plant, equipment, tools and materials are required.
  • Good interpersonal and team working abilities when communication internally and with clients

What about industry specific skills?

  • Ability to identify and practically reference common types of highway electrical equipment and the underlying principles of how these are installed and maintained (e.g. street lights, traffic signals, traffic signs, safety cameras) – together with detailed specialised understanding on the chosen sub- sector(s).
  • Understanding the employer’s requirements and identifying what work is required, what their responsibilities are and what plant, equipment, tools and materials are required.
  • Understanding the practices of maintenance techniques. These may be routine and regular checks or reactive checks in unexpected circumstances. In both instances, you should have the ability to carry out these checks in a safe and efficient way.
  • Understanding your employer’s requirements and procedures covering emergency attendance and work, and being able to leverage these to identify hazards and maximise site safety.
  • BONUS SKILL: Understand how  to  identify  and  apply  the  appropriate systems of  surface protection safely and how to dispose of waste appropriately.

Desired Behaviours.

There are three primary attributes and behaviours which are desired if you are looking to complete the Level 2 Highway Electrical Maintenance and Installation Operative.

Firstly, always ensure you are promoting a positive Health, Safety and Environmental culture. This means being alert and aware of your surroundings so you are able to identify any risks or hazardous situations. If you do identify a potential risk, you must be confident in reporting unsafe practices and set an example within the workforce on how to work safely. Your priority is that no one – either from the public or within the workforce – is harmed.

It is really important that you are confident in taking responsibility and ownership for your actions, whether they have a positive or negative impact on the workforce. The ability to be able to acknowledge your skill gaps and be engaged in working to improve this is a highly desired behaviour. Not only does this show willingness to grow, but aslo maturity within your role. You must make sure you are cooperating with your employer to ensure you are working to meet expectations and develop to a point of potentially exceeding.

Make an effort to show your enthusiasm, consideration and commitment to the role. Being able to work using your initiative to solve problems, seek out critical information and plan and organise work activities are all important skills.

If you have any questions about the Highway Electrical Maintenance and Installation Operative Apprenticeships, or any other information you discover on our website, feel free to reach out to us on Twitter!