1. What kind of relationship are you ready for?

    Tuesday, 26 May 2009 10 Comments Posted by:

    Brands are interested in joining the conversation and have heard social media enables enriched customer relationships. Most brands will reply “we have a relationship with our customers” (usually sales or service interactions), “so we are ready for social media”. But I am talking about a relationship – a sales or service interaction tends to be a transaction (just a number in long line of transactions), not a relationship. Note: Service brands can and do build relationships via service transactions. Key element is personalized service (know me, know my history, know my pleasure and pain points, make me feel special) – great examples in my life are USAA and American Express.

    Having spoke to many brands, repeatedly we discuss relationships. The question I pose is “what type of relationship do you want with your customers? Do you want a marriage? Or do you just want to date casually and see other people?”

    wedding_rings2A marriage (a good marriage that lasts) requires nourishment: sharing, sacrifice (at times), giving without expecting something in return, yielding to the other’s point of view. The marriage produces Trust, Love, and Respect – necessary to build a lasting relationship. Trust, Love, and Respect are what any brand will say “Yes, I want that.” But brands can answer too quick. What a company should first ask is, “do I want to marry this customer and what am I prepared to do from now until death do us part?”

    As a customer I will start by dating the brand. Smart brands understand this is a period of courting: they woo me, demonstrate all the best things about the company (showcase products and services) to get me to the altar. And if the brand delivers on their promise a marriage can ensue. But this is where a lot of brands stop short. They get me to the alter and we exchange vows. Then I don’t hear from them until a problem arises or they have something to sell me. Think of your offline relationships – you know the friend or relative that only drops in your life when they need something – not a great relationship – not one you brag about or refer to others. The brands that I remained married to- connect with me, they do not let me down, they are there when I need them, they consistently deliver great products/service, they apologize if they screw up. And over time as the marriage ages, you have built up deposits of Trust, so one screw up does not end in divorce.

    Think of the brands you Love. You Trust them because they have been there for you (good and bad times). You defend them, you share your experiences with others. Both the brand and customer are happy and committed to each other. As Andy Sernovitz reminds me, “Happy Customers are your Best Advertising”. Amen.

    Brands, please remember – I can divorce you at very low cost and the break up is immediate. But a divorce for you is expensive – you are losing my revenue and I am influencing my network to reconsider their relationship with you. You then have to date a lot more people and get them to the alter – takes time and money.

    For those interested, here are a some of the brands I Love:

    And here some brands I am seriously dating:

    • Acura (I drive one, they still have some work to do, but I am close to saying “I do”)
    • Apple (iPhone, currently using it and loving the device)

    What Brands do you Love?

  2. Old School Operational Excellence at the core of Social Media Success for Brands

    Sunday, 10 May 2009 No Comments Posted by:

    I say yes!  I am more ops guy than marketer – truth be told – so this post (Great Examples of how operations can become marketing) over on Zeus Jones blog really resonated.  Zeus tells this story pretty well and lists a number of examples worth reviewing in the original blog post.

    In our work at Ant’s Eye View, we work with a mix of product and service companies.  It struck me that companies that think of themselves as service companies tend to get this more natively – they see the service they provide as a defining opportunity for their brand.  Disney is a great example – in particular the parks and resort experience – where the brand really is the creation of an experience – or more specifically, family memories.  Zeus mentions Zappos as another great example.  That clarity of purpose around experience creates a very natural foundation for social media engagement.  It can help you segment what conversations (in the sea of social conversations) are highest priority for engagement.  Those conversations that demonstrate the truth of your promised experience hold great opportunity for engagement – likewise, those that highlight your defects can provide clear calls to action for you and an opportunity for customer recovery. While the listening, organizing and engaging process still offers some challenges, the urgency to participate is clear.  The advantage here is that service brands tend to evaluate, manage and refine every touch point with their customers and look at their operations end-to-end.  In this way, a service brand can build clear social listening and response tactics into their current structure that are incremental in terms of change management.  I’d argue that if you took a service brand, say Disney or Zappos or Nordstroms, and told them they had to cut 10% of their costs, they’d have clearer decision criteria for how to approach that challenge that kept the brand front and center. I’m not saying cutting 10% would be easy, unburdened by rigorous internal debate and conflict, or that it wouldn’t negatively impact their business or brand, but it is far easier to understand the process through which difficult decisions would be made.

    On the other hand, companies that see their products as the brands often have a different challenge.  It’s hard for me not to pick on the brand I’m most familiar with:  Microsoft, or perhaps even more specifically Windows – though I think this can be broadly applied.  In this case the brand experience is defined by the experience you have with the product (or products) and not with the “company” – Microsoft.  This is where operations comes in for a product driven brand.  Unfortunately, too often in this case operations are bolted on only as necessary and are DISCONNECTED from customer experience management.  Want an example, how about customer service or product support.  If you own consumer Windows, who do you call for service?  Dell?  HP?  Gateway?  Lenovo?   Not Microsoft.  Even if you are an enterprise, who do you call?  Probably your own IT. The problem here is not that this was a bad model, it was brilliant for a long time.  The problem here is that operations represents a set of hardened and individually managed silos.  So, not only is customer experience fragmented, but accountability for experience is disjointed and poorly, if ever, reviewed end-to-end.  And, let’s face it, in product driven companies, even when reviewed end to end, pay careful attention to who’s at the head of the table – the product/engineering organization.  Now, let’s layer on social media / community engagement.  Now you’ve got a forum post or blog somewhere that is celebrating Windows or attacking Windows – who is accountable?  The answer is either everyone or no one – which is kind of the same answer.  And, it’s unlikely you could even get all the parties in a room that needed to be to decide who is accountable – not that a meeting should be needed.  Looking at Microsoft as an example, I’d probably offer this competitive assessment.  Google, Apple, IBM – these are not the biggest competitive threats.  IMHO, the single greatest competitive threat to Microsoft is a deep lack of customers!  WHAT?  Yes, that’s right. Microsoft has 100s of Millions of users, but users are not the same thing as customers.  They are Dell or HPs or Best Buys customers…and Windows users.  This is a huge challenge for an enormous brand that will be very expensive to solve and even more expensive not to solve. 

    The take away here:  Operations is Sexy of course!  Product driven brands like Microsoft’s portfolio need to triple down on operational excellence and implement clear end to end customer experience listening and engagement processes and ensure they have EMPOWERED audience “czars” that not only own the experience, but have the power and authority to drive product, process, licensing, policy, service and business model changes necessary to achieve success.

    What do you think?  How might this apply to the product companies you work for or with?

    sean

  3. Twitter Jumped the Shark, Who is Next?

    Wednesday, 6 May 2009 5 Comments Posted by:

    Twitter, Facebook, My Space… all were big, then got bigger, what is next?

    Well Twitter has Oprah and Ashton to thank for widespread awareness.

    Even before celebrity endorsement, more and more social network sites have come alive on the web. Why do we have the need for more and more social network sites? Could it be…current solutions are missing features? Social network sites have a short life span because users get bored? No switching costs for the millions of users to move from one to another or add another social tool to list? Or is it $ – the promise of high valuation, low cost to start, in hopes to sell for millions? Regardless, take a look at Top 10 Social Media Sites That Should Be Next In Line To Be Oprah-Fied  from Social Times.