The Economic Recovery Mirrors Customer Strategy

This is an interesting article that compares and equates the broad economic dynamics of the past year with that companies in how they deliver to their customers...

"There was a shattering of confidence and no trust" within the global banking sector. If a lack of confidence and trust brought the world's economies to their knees, imagine how a lack of customer confidence and trust can impact a company. "Once confidence goes, you're in a terrible position because you don't know how far down it will go," added Gerard Lyons, Ph.D., chief economist at Britain's Standard Chartered Bank. He was referring to national economies, but he may as well have been speaking to a room full of customer executives.



1to1 Weekly
Date: 11/09/2009
Issue: November 9, 2009

The Economic Recovery Mirrors Customer Strategy
Global economic recovery and customer-focused business strategy have a lot in common.

These days, when economists get together, the conversation usually isn't pretty. The Great Recession this past year hit almost every industrialized nation, and then some. At last week's Premier Business Leadership Series (PBLS) conference, however, leading economists framed what they think will be a global recovery in a way that mirrors customer-centric strategy.
The recession has two overarching causes, according to Joseph Quinlan, managing director and chief market strategist at Bank of America's Global Wealth and Investment Management division. "There was a shattering of confidence and no trust" within the global banking sector, he said. If a lack of confidence and trust brought the world's economies to their knees, imagine how a lack of customer confidence and trust can impact a company. "Once confidence goes, you're in a terrible position because you don't know how far down it will go," added Gerard Lyons, Ph.D., chief economist at Britain's Standard Chartered Bank. He was referring to national economies, but he may as well have been speaking to a room full of customer executives.

As the recovery begins, the tactics and strategies being discussed sounded a lot like what you would find in a customer strategy playbook. "We are seeing the first flickering signs of recovery," said David Hale, a global economist at Hale Advisors, referring to slightly positive numbers around housing starts, consumer confidence, and the loosening of credit by banks. However, we've got a long way to go, he said, and there is still rampant unemployment and uncertainty.

One positive outcome of the recession, Hale noted, was that as a consequence of layoffs in the U.S. there has been a gain in productivity compared to other nations that did not eliminate as many jobs. "U.S. businesses will enter 2010 ten to 15 percent more competitive than Japan or Germany," he told the PBLS audience. "This puts us in a good position for export growth."
Growth in exports is akin to a strong customer acquisition and retention plan: Who are we going to export U.S. goods and services to, and will they buy? Lyons said that within the past decade more people in the world have emerged from poverty, creating a new middle class in China, India, and other parts of the world. As potential customer bases expand, nations will have to understand the needs of these new consumers to deliver the right products and grow share-of-wallet in these emerging markets. "Countries with the ability to adapt and change will be successful," Lyons said.

The invisible versus the visible handIt's almost impossible to get a group of economists together without someone bringing up Adam Smith, the father of modern economics. And the PBLS event was no different. During the conclave Lyons pointed out that Smith's term "the invisible hand," which describes the free market, doesn't tell the whole story. He explained that Smith also defined a "visible hand" – morality and ethics. "People talk about the power of the invisible hand, but not the visible," Lyons said. "The financial sector has lost that."

This is another direct reflection of customer-centric thinking. As Don Peppers and Martha Rogers, Ph.D., discuss in their latest book, Rules to Break and Laws to Follow, a company that does not act in the best interests of its customers shouldn't operate a business at all. Acting in customers' best interest is necessary to create an internal corporate culture that encourages morality and ethics in all business dealings. Trust and transparency, effective employee engagement, and the balance of short- and long-term strategy are the foundation of a successful customer-focused organization, they write. It's also the foundation for a successful global economy. "We need to get some morality and ethics back in the system and focus on the long-term opportunity," Lyons said.

If You're Wondering What Not To Do When It Comes to Social Media, Learn From BCS

To the RichCustomerExperience Community, I hope you had a nice Thanksgiving! With the holiday shopping season upon us, I know there will be many companies who will deliver you a rich customer experience. I am even more confident there will be companies who will leave you disappointed. Please share your stories with us...

In the meantime, I wanted to share this good article that reinforces an important lesson regarding how to use, and how not to use, social media.

The BCS might not be your favorite institution, but it has kindly spent the last week creating a useful case study in how not to use social media...but it made the classic mistake—at least initially—of treating these social-media platforms like propaganda broadcast tools, rather than a way of finding out what, exactly, fans want.

If You're Wondering What Not To Do When It Comes to Social Media, Learn From BCS
http://adage.com/article?article_id=140754

Behind Coca-Cola's Biggest Social-Media Push Yet

This is a real interesting article on how Coca-Cola is gearing up for its largest social-media project ever, one that will test its own internal flexibility and force a number of its global markets into the digital and social-media space. Although I am not convinced that this project will really sell more Cokes, I do applaud their aggressive move into social media and inserting this new channel, that is becoming pervasive in many peoples' everyday lives, into their marketing machine toolkit.

http://adage.com/digital/article?article_id=140591

My Rich Experience at Springsteen Concert

Much has been written about companies needing to deliver a "rich customer experience" built around their products and services and all aspects of their brand to their consumers. The other night I was enjoying myself at yet another Bruce Springsteen concert and came to the realization on something I guess I had always known as a loyal fan...he delivers a great experience, everytime. Performers should be held up to as high a standard when it comes to delivering on a memorable, satisfying and enjoyable experience. If they don't, they face the same consequences as the retailer or the airline does...growing customer discontent, less loyalty, fewer purchases, poor word-of-mouth, declining profits...

Anyways, back to The Boss. Throughout his long career, he has always been known for delivering marathon-length concerts packed with his non-stop energy, emotion and responsiveness to his fans. Even now at the age of 60 years-young, his fans comes first.

On this tour, he is playing certain albums in their entirety among the 3-hour set-list. This night, he played Born to Run. As he noted on stage, this was the first album to start a real “conversation” between himself and his now-rabid fan base. More than 30 years after its release, this album still touches a powerful chord among the Springsteen faithful. He also takes requests from the crowd. There were hundreds of homemade signs with names of songs on them, and sometimes even a special message. "Living Proof" was a request the Band wasn't prepared to play. A sign with a photo of an infant, "future Boss fan," born two weeks ago Sunday night, prompted Springsteen to tackle the song. It took a while for him to get everyone together. It was like a glimpse of a rehearsal, but they got it right. That moment gave a feeling of intimacy, not sloppiness. He also went into the crowd multiple times, even at one time "body-surfing" the crowd from half-way back on the floor, trusting his faithful would get him back where he belongs on stage.

At times, it was hard to tell who was enjoying the concert more, the crowd or Springsteen. Truly a rich customer experience. Can't wait until the next show!

Marketing Needs a CMO: Why It's Time to Restore Marketing's Credibility by Driving Growth

Here's an interesting article that offers a perspective on the credibility, relevance and importance of marketing today... along with a good discussion that follows
http://adage.com/cmostrategy/article?article_id=140520

2009 State of Marketing Study: The Shift

Prophet recently released results of it's latest survey, 2009 State of Marketing Study: The Shift, conducted in partnership with the Association of National Advertisers. The goal of their research was to understand how marketers are shifting their roles from supporting business growth to being in the driver's seat and leading the growth agenda. Elevating marketing to a higher level requires both mindset and cultural shifts that start with, but are by no means limited to, marketing leadership. This study uncovered that while marketers from all walks and at all levels understand the need to effect such shifts, they’re further away from its realization than they think. See an executive summary of survey results here

http://www.prophet.com/downloads/whitepapers/shift-survey-2009.pdf

Southwest Airlines and Case-Mate on Leveraging Social Media to Gather Customer Feedback by Steve Latham

Southwest Airlines and Case-Mate on Leveraging Social Media to Gather Customer Feedback by Steve Latham

The DMA Needs a Paradigm Shift

The DMA Needs a Paradigm Shift

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Customer-centric view to define future CMOs: Forrester

Here's interesting but expected findings from a new study from Forrester...

Forrester Research data released this month shows that just over one in 10 companies value data-driven customer intelligence at the C-level. However, analyst Dave Frankland, the report's author, expects that to improve.

Forrester found in its October 16 study, The Intelligent Approach to Customer Intelligence, that 12% of company executives embrace customer intelligence, defined as "the management and analysis of customer data from all sources, used to drive marketing performance and business strategy."

In the study, the result of interviews over the past year with customer intelligence professionals, including a survey of 301 during the year's second quarter, Frankland noted marketing departments are likely to become "customer advocate[s]" as they try to reach savvier, advertising-skeptical consumers while demonstrating bottom-line results.

"In many organizations, the database was built solely to send direct mail," Frankland said. "Now, many companies are waking up to the fact that this isn't a contact opportunity, it's a knowledge opportunity."

It's likely that CMOs will lead this charge toward more accountable marketing, he added.
"The traditional archetype of CMO is focused on the brand, and though that will never go away, I think the focus on the customer hasn't always been there as much as it should," Frankland said. "There is the opportunity for the CMO to become the change agent.”

"When we discuss this with direct marketers, we tell them this is an opportunity for them to enhance their role in the organization," he added.

A little humor

Taking a slight detour from the all serious and important topics related to the customer experience, I wanted to share a funny clip on How NOT to use Powerpoint. Perhaps a learning opportunity here as well. Enjoy!




http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cagxPlVqrtM