Adding value to annual Lion NZ statements

How a dynamic statement tool helps clean up data and uncover new business opportunities

You could call it the holy grail of marketing – a way of talking to your customers that they always read. Dynamic Statements allow you to create attractive statements with individual customer-specific offers. It’s all about making sending and receiving statements a more positive experience. For Lion NZ, it was a way to create brand awareness and “give us a point of difference with our customers,” says Lion NZ national credit manager Anne Wilson.

Making the switch: from print to email

Lion is New Zealand's largest alcoholic beverage company, with a focus on production, marketing, sales and distribution of some of the country's best-loved brands. It also has a range of non-alcoholic beverages.

In 2015, Lion approached Datam – it wanted to switch from print to electronic invoicing for its 124,000 annual company statements.

The move to electronic invoicing would enable big cost savings by avoiding postage and stationery expenses, as well as efficiency gains for the company and customers. But there was also an opportunity to increase customer engagement.

“Dynamic Statements are in HTML5 format so information can be easily varied. You can have different offers for different types of customers, including YouTube clips, surveys, graphs showing different types of spend, even ‘pay now’ buttons, as long as the data can be presented to us,” says Angela Ackroyd, Datam customer communications management consultant.

Getting personal opens up new business opportunities

Using Dynamic Statements, Lion NZ can customise statement content to different buying groups and introduce and promote products that could provide further business opportunities for retailers, Anne says.

The statement also includes direct links to Lion’s customer portal, making it easier for customers to do business with the company.

“It’s particularly helpful when there are queries on the accounts. We get them earlier, and can turn them around quicker,” Anne says.

“Migrating to email has been an opportunity to update our database. It’s improved our data integrity by making sure the statement goes to the correct person.”

Heading over the ditch

Although the full potential of Dynamic Statements is yet to be tapped, it’s already garnering attention from Lion’s Australian colleagues who are looking to adopt a similar tool.

The approaching holiday season will also be a great time to use market-tailored customer offers.

Anne says having the right people to get the job done was imperative, and she believes the project “wouldn’t have been as successful without that high level of engagement” that Datam delivered.

“I’m tasked to reduce cost, create efficiencies and increase customer engagement. Working with Datam has made it easy to do that,” she says.

Get in touch with the Datam team today to elevate your statements to the next level of marketing. Let’s talk.