Insights and Ingenuity

On Monday, a new day will dawn…it’s significant for me because I’ll hit the ground running in a new position at a promising company. We’ll use our software product to collaborate, create, and distribute content at point of sale, considered purchase, and consumer gathering spots for our clients. Our product will be the delivery vehicle, and our professional services will provide the value–the key will be to help our clients’ messaging envelope their consumer targets in meaningful ways.

Consumer interest is becoming more elusive in today’s marketplace as situational, economic, convenience, and other pressures factor into the purchase equation. Which would seem to imply that businesses have to be not only intelligent and intentional with their communication and engagement strategies, but also well informed. And in turn, inform their customers with a degree of transparency that acknowledges purchase –and certainly repeat purchase–is an end achieved through relationship-building.

Consumer mistrust of corporate communications is high. Peer-to-peer relationships are flourishing. People are desperate for reasons to believe and leaders to follow. We have a deep-seated need to believe that good will prevail.

Companies can elect to rally the masses and speak with them in ways and with messages that comfort and inspire. Or companies can elect status quo (last year’s plan) and slowly, surely watch their customers defect.

Sell it and they will come. Um, pass, thanks just the same.

Self-centered companies operating on tired principals where the consumer is excluded from the go-to-market strategy will soon find themselves obsolete.

There’s a story to be told by your brand, and you’re inviting me into the dialogue with your Web content. You want to share, not shout. There can be an implied level of friendship in Web content that can’t easily be crafted in other media. Use the Web content to strike and maintain a level of intimacy that can endure.

A couple of posts reviewing two new works with opposing viewpoints on the power struggle between consumers and the marketers representing brands.

Gone are the days when tacit misdirection was acceptible. Consumer expectations necessitate ownership, accountability, and quality customer service when a product doesn’t measure up. Under no circumstances should the words “isolated incident” bounce around your grey matter; if it happened and the company is truly culpable (if only of not crystalizing product limitations or requirements), then you must disarm the viral bomb before it has a chance to start its countdown.

Ever heard of the Net Promoter Score (NPS)? It’s a metric used to determine the likelihood or propensity that a consumer would recommend a particular product or service favorably to someone(s) they valued. Next time you think about conducting a been there/done that client satisfaction call (whereas the structure of the call essentially guarantees you’re going to hear client peeves that are totally related to their immediate problem, and in little way a true reflection upon how your product/service is valued), think about asking just one question instead: “Would you recommend us?” Interestingly, our company has found quarterly ratings to be approx middle of the road, with substantially higher ratings when the question of recommendation (NPS) is raised.

User-generated content is powerful and pervasive. Studies show that consumers filter many of their decisions through their relationships with trusted – or otherwise endorsed – sources. If vehicles like blogs have the potential to reach everyone, and the messages communicated therein can be crafted to resonate strongly, how can marketers harness this potent power for our clients in a way that adds value, relevancy, and authenticity to the proposed relationship?