Customer Engagement – Emotional and Analytical Aspects

I recently ran across a customer engagement article on the UK website, FinanceWeek.co.uk. It offers a beautifully succinct definition of customer engagement and explains why it’s so important.  In the article, “Customer Retention or Attrition – The Choice is Yours,” Neil Craig defines customer engagement as…

“Customer engagement goes far beyond customer satisfaction to embrace loyalty – and more. In fact, it incorporates the full relationship life cycle and includes emotional aspects as well as analytical ones.”

These are some key messages that I want to point out.

·         “…goes far beyond customer satisfaction…” – To really engage a customer, a company needs to go above and beyond and exceed every expectation a customer might have regarding the product or service.

·         “…it incorporates the full relationship life cycle…” – One of the main aspects of effective customer engagement is that it’s not a one-time shot.  It is a progressive, two-way, individualized conversation strategy.  Engage your customers at multiple contact points throughout the course of the relationship to build loyalty.

·         “…includes emotional aspects as well as analytical ones…” – Consumers make purchase decisions for many different reasons.  To fully engage a customer, a company needs to understand and appeal to the rational (analytical) reasoning as well as the irrational (emotional) reasoning.

Later in the article, Mr. Craig points out that “Customer engagement does not happen by accident. It requires an informed, meaningful and systematic understanding of your customers.” In order to fully and successfully engage your customer, you need to have a relationship life cycle strategy knowing when, how, and why to contact the customer and how to utilize relationship data to appeal to both the emotional aspects and analytical reasoning for each individual; constantly learning and evolving with each contact.

I recommend Mr. Craig’s article.  Customer engagement is a conscious effort with a systematic strategy that incorporates the different behaviors of each customer to provide an avenue for a two-way conversation that will grow into a personal relationship with each individual customer.

Insurance Leaders Discuss Web 2.0 as Customer Engagement Tool

I have recently come across an article on the “Insurance and Technology ” website that I invite you to read. It’s called “Insurance Industry Leaders Discuss The Opportunity Of Web 2.0 ” by Peggy Bresnick Kendler.

My favorite highlight from the article…

When asked…“What are the Reasons for a lack of interest in Web 2.0 in certain parts of the industry?”

John Anthony from The Hartford responded, “…While these communication tools offer an opportunity to engage our customers, partners and shareholders in a direct and often more-personalized conversation, they can be perceived as a challenge to existing corporate communication controls and processes…”

Customer engagement happens through two-way conversations with each customer. While there is a place for mass marketing strategies and the luxury of corporate communications controls, Web 2.0 strategies are the best approach for truly engaging a customer.

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Increase Consumer Perceptions in the Financial Service Industry

Forrester Research has recently published its Customer Advocacy 2008: Consumers Rate Their Banks, Brokerages, and Insurers. The contents were highlighted by 1to1 Media senior editor, Kevin Zimmerman in his article, Consumer Rankings of Financial Services Firms Hits Five-Year Low. Zimmerman stated that consumer perceptions in the Financial Services industry have hit their lowest levels since Forrester began the survey five years ago. The main reason for these low confidence levels was identified as a broader issue including the subprime credit problem, dropping stock markets worldwide, and soaring gas prices.

One thing caught my eye in this article that I think is the real source of the lowering confidence levels. Mr. Zimmerman mentions that “[there is]…a growing perception that [financial service] firms are doing only what’s best for their own bottom lines – and not what’s best for their customers – is having a negative effect.”

Assuming that’s true, let’s look at this issue from a marketing perspective. The driving force fueling any business is the customer. Without customers the business wouldn’t exist. Now, with seeing this report on falling customer perceptions, why would a company continue to leave the customer out and focus exclusively on the bottom line? The only way to permanently change the bottom line isn’t through cost cutting and elimination of customer service, it’s through customer retention and maximizing lifetime customer value. That’s right; the customer is the only certain entity that can permanently impact the bottom line.

In the article, Bill Doyle, a Forrester reports author, vice president and principal analyst says, “We always hear that the best way to build customer advocacy is to follow the golden rule – but that doesn’t happen nearly enough.” A great theory, but how can we utilize the golden rule to fulfill the brand promise?

The answer is simple; carefully listen to your customers and respond appropriately. It takes a strategic plan for building a valued relationship. Individualized customer engagement through 1:1 multichannel marketing is the only way to reach each customer. After all, no two customers are identical. The downturn in perception within the Financial Services industry can be reversed through careful relationship planning, listening, understanding, and communicating. When executed on an individualized level, with each and every customer, you can develop a nurturing relationship. This ongoing conversation will help the customer build trust with the brand, become loyal for a lifetime to the company and, over time, will create brand advocacy for the firm.

Increasing the bottom line is one of the most important charges with any business, but not at the expense of long-term customer value. If the customer is king then brand advocacy is the key to the kingdom. By engaging your customers on an individualized level, they will become loyal advocates to your company, never defecting and always touting their relationship with your brand. Communicating on a personal level with your customer is the best way to permanently increase the bottom line. No other single marketing effort is more effective.
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Customer Engagement through Operations

I recently had an issue with my bank regarding online fraud and had to cancel all accounts and open new ones.  A few months later, one of the canceled accounts (that had fraud on it) reared its ugly head back onto my online banking with an astronomical negative balance.  After many days of going back and forth with my bank, being transferred to 5 different departments and retelling my story to 5-10 different people (I lost count after 3) the issue was finally solved and every thing was back to the status quo.

This daunting experience made me understand customer engagement a little deeper.  It isn’t just through marketing and advertising communications that we need to engage our customers, but also through operations and day to day interactions with our brand or company.  Each and every time a customer comes in contact with your company, the person performing the contact needs to know exactly where the customer is in the relationship at any given time.  Whether it’s a new customer or a loyal customer for 25 years, the person personally communicating with the customer needs to have a snapshot of the customer relationship and be able to build and nurture that relationship at that moment.

Now back to the bank, the simple use of a system-wide CRM system would have allowed the first person I was in contact with to make a note outlining my issue, so the successive contact points knew exactly what was going on and where I was in the relationship with the bank.  But, I guess if they had, I wouldn’t have anything to prove with this post.

Customer engagement doesn’t begin and end with marketing. It is nurtured and proliferated throughout the entire organization and every contact point.

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The Case for Personalized or One to One Marketing

When marketers and advertisers talk about personalized or one to one marketing, a lot of questions arise as to why we would want to get that close to our customers.  Let’s take a look at our daily communications.

We all have friends, co-workers, significant others, and acquaintances in our lives. Our communication style differs between each of these groups. For example, you don’t talk to your co-worker the same way you would talk with your significant other. There are different socially acceptable standards for these interactions, but all have the same underlying features; two-way, progressive communication that’s personalized for each individual. It’s a process of give and take. Every party has a voice and each conversation is different based on the relationship.

Now let’s look at traditional marketing communications. Until recently, marketers and advertisers have participated in forced, one-way communication broadcasting the same message or idea to a mass audience hoping to reach a small percentage of the market — a market that daily turns deafer and deafer to the unsolicited barrage.  How can we expect to become a valued partner with our customers if we are forcing a message on them without giving them any voice whatsoever?  How can we expect one message to appeal to everyone?  The answer is we can’t.

We now have technologies, processes, and understanding that communication between a marketer and a customer needs to be treated like a relationship that we hold in our personal life.  We, as marketers, need to communicate based on our past relationship with two-way communication, giving the customer a voice and a say as to what they want the company or brand to fulfill in their life.  As the relationship grows, so does the conversation, ever-becoming a more integral part of the customer’s life.

We expect a two-way, personalized, progressive conversation with every relationship in our lives.  Why would we try to communicate differently with our customers?  Aren’t they a valuable aspect of our success and lives?

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SPURspectives is the blog of Spur Communications, a nationally-recognized, Kansas City-based Interactive Marketing Agency that is leading the industry in customer engagement through individualized, 1:1 multi-channel marketing communications. 

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Gain Permission before Engaging in a Relationship

In his recent article, Congress asks Embarq about Selling Customer Info, posted today, AP writer David Twiddy explains why Congress is looking deeper in the online subscriber tracking activities performed by Embarq with association NebuAd, a company focused on tracking subscriber visits for marketing and advertising purposes.  The allegations discusses that Congress wants to know if, in fact, they were tracking subscriber web activity, if they notified these customers of the tracking and how they ultimately used the information.

 

This reminds me that customer engagement and tracking of customer behavior constantly walks the fine line between helpful and intrusive.  Privacy has become a huge concern in today’s society, especially online, and needs to be taken seriously and with great care.  The entire backbone of customer engagement and customer interaction is Permission. Seth Godin has written an entire book called Permission Marketing and it still holds true today.  Without permission, any kind of customer engagement becomes scary and intrusive.

 

Let’s all learn a lesson from the story, even if the allegations turn out to be false, to always remember to gain permission to gather data, utilize information, or engage in any kind of intimate relationship with any customer.

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SPURspectives is the blog of Spur Communications, a nationally-recognized, Kansas City-based Interactive Marketing Agency that is leading the industry in customer engagement through individualized, 1:1 multi-channel marketing communications.

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Customer Engagement through Social Media

In the July 14 AdWeek article, Why Brands Need a New Kind of Leader, Brian Morrissey discussed why companies need to have a social media expert to lead and control the customer engagement strategies in the social media environment.  In the article, Brian discusses two major companies, Ford and PepsiCo, and how they have hired social media experts to run successful customer engagement campaigns.  The article really opened my eyes to the lack of participation of the major companies and brands to engage with the customer.  Why should the company be afraid of individual customer interaction?

 

The advances in social media and how it is utilized in marketing strategies have given the consumer a voice and a desire to actually communicate with their favorite or prospective brands in an intimate way.  The consumer needs to have the knowledge and understanding that the particular brand will be the best fit for their lifestyle.  What a better way to show the consumer that you are the better brand, than on this intimate stage.  So, with the tremendous benefits of this type of communication, why are so many companies reluctant to embrace these new technologies?  Is it the lack of metrics? The uncertainty of the outcome? The fear of messing up these intimate relationships?

 

Social media is here to stay and should be viewed as an ally rather than an enemy.  The Internet is quickly becoming a point of sale platform where customers are researching and molding their purchase decision by engaging with other consumers, brands, and information resources.  Being able to engage the customer on an intimate level at the point of decision is one of the most powerful forms of marketing. Listen, learn, and engage your customer for your brands success.

 

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Social Branding

What comes to mind when you think of your company’s brand?  Is it a logo? Slogan?  Feeling?  Customer service?  These are just a few of the requirements for a successful corporate brand.

 

Walter Landor defined branding as “…a brand is a promise. By identifying and authenticating a product or service it delivers a pledge of satisfaction and quality.”

 

This definition has been a great representation of a brand in the one-way marketing communication of the past.  Now, we have reached the new social world where brands need to engage customers by creating and continuing two-way conversations on an individual basis.  This means that the actual control of the brand has moved from the company to the consumer where the company has become a facilitator of the relationship.  Brands are becoming dynamic, in a sense, where they able to grow with the customer, ever-integrating into the lifestyle of that individual customer.

 

With the increase in database marketing, social media, and the shift in consumer behavior, consumers are demanding individualization and molding brands into their own personal lifestyle and daily routine.  This transition has created levels of brand loyalty and advocacy once thought to be unattainable.

 

On the flipside, a company needs to be aware of the power shift and be able to allow for the malleability of the brand with the essence still visible and constant throughout the individual customer relationship.  This dichotomy of the brand will forever change the way marketers look at their company from the social perspective and create awareness of the various conversations surrounding the brand (brand to consumer, consumer to consumer, brand to community, brand to advertising, etc.).

 

Social Branding is all about creating a dynamic brand that can be molded and changed for the individual customer relationships while still holding true and communicating the brand’s essence.  It’s a wonderful time to create a lifelong brand relationship with the customer.

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How Budweiser Could Have Come Out on Top

For weeks now, America has been on pins and needles watching the ever-lasting struggle between America’s own Budweiser and the foreign InBev in their epic battle on who will become victorious.  It looks today that InBev finally got the better of the Budweiser shareholders forcing Auggie to engage in friendly conversations with the management of the bitter rival InBev thwarting an imminent hostile takeover.  Another great American company losing the great fight.  But what could have been done differently?  How could they have stopped this maelstrom of repute?

When looking through the marketing eyeglass, many companies, such as Budweiser, see the company goal as increasing the number of consumers and consumption to increase the bottom line which will make the shareholders money.  This view is completely outward facing, not giving any thought to the meaning and feeling the shareholders may have about the reason for their investment. 

With that being said, Budweiser could have easily won this battle the moment the word InBev was muttered in the halls in St Louis by taking a global approach with customer engagement.  Every company has many customers (the user, the shareholder, the employee, the community, etc.) that need to be addressed in a specific targeted marketing campaign.  Budweiser should have had a targeted marketing campaign going towards the shareholder engagement for many, many years now creating more than just a monetary investment, but an emotional and behavioral investment that increases the value of the stock to a human level. 

This simple customer engagement turned human attachment to the investment would have given Budweiser the shareholder artillery it needed to fight off the Goliath InBev at the very drop of the name.  Now, the sale has become imminent due to the monetary incentives the shareholders are to gain with no thought or feeling whatsoever to the emotional aspect of what the sale means.

In conclusion, emotions and behaviors are the reasons people do what they do.  If Budweiser would have created shareholder emotional and behavioral attachments to their investments, selling their stock would be like getting rid of a lucky t-shirt or the ever-coveted baseball card collection.  We all need to look at and engage each and every customer increasing the attachment and affliction for our brand.  You never know when InBev will try to buy your company.

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Customer Engagement is the New Marketing

In his 1986 mind-blowing compilation, Marketing Imagination, marketing guru, Dr. Theodore Levitt defined Marketing as a company’s ability to “create, keep, and enhance a customer.” The ability to add the word enhance has really set marketing, as we know it, in the right direction.

Over twenty years later, this profound idea and theory are still being practiced by the best marketers around the world and will be for some time. However, with the advances seen in technology, the dynamics in consumer behavior, and the increases in marketing channels, will Dr. Levitt’s theory continue to grow or peril with other marketing ideas from the past? What would take its place if it were to fall?

With the new communication strategies (ie Social media) that are being utilized by consumers to gather information, aid in decision-making, and enhance the proliferation of word of mouth activities, marketers now need to engage the consumer in a meaningful, lifelong, two-way conversation, continually learning and growing the relationship to a level only dreamed of by our old friend, Dr. Levitt. This theory is called Consumer Engagement.

With Consumer Engagement, the marketer will fulfill the past needs of marketing by creating new customers, keeping current customers, and enhancing the brand to the highest level of loyalty throughout the best customers. But, with Consumer Engagement the marketer will add a level that, not only completes the marketing cycle, but allows for enhanced, dynamic communication throughout the consumer’s locus of influence creating brand advocacy where the consumer actually becomes a marketing channel in itself spreading the value of the brand.

Let’s see how Consumer Engagement fulfills these marketing needs:

Create: By gaining permission to start a conversation and build a relationship, a marketer begins to understand the consumer as and individual, drastically increasing its chances of turning the prospect into a customer.

Keep: Continually communicating, learning about the customer, and building a dynamic brand that is molded in the liking of the customer, a marketer will create a level of loyalty that will make it hard for the customer to defect.

Enhance: With this level of intimacy with the customer, the marketer now has the data and permission to integrate the brand into the day-to-day life of the customer, enhancing the relationship to the highest level of brand loyalty, brand saturation.

Advocacy: Complete and utter satisfaction for the customer has been a well played strategy by the marketer, molding the brand more and more into the life of the customer creating a brand advocate. This person will, no doubt, become a marketing channel in itself. As an advocate, they would create a word of mouth in their locus of influence that would allow the marketer to gain the permission to start the cycle over with each and every prospect in the group.

In conclusion, Dr. Levitt was right, marketing is a company’s ability to create, keep, and enhance a customer. But does that encompass everything in today’s environment? Or is Consumer Engagement the New Marketing? That’s for you to decide.

Paul Miser

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