I recently wrote a post on the truth about customer loyalty. That truth, which I stumbled across in an excellent article by A.G. Lafley and Roger L. Martin, is that customers aren’t exhibiting loyal behavior when they buy the same products over and over. People return to a product because the buying process is simple and automatic, and they haven’t encountered a reason not to purchase it. In short, it’s good experiences that keep customers “loyal” and bad ones that push them away. How Customer Loyalty Impacts Your Marketing Strategy What you say about your product or service matters, but not more than the experience it delivers. Once you get your foot in the door, the rest is about keeping that door open. With the truth about customer loyalty in mind, I came up with a few concrete ways it impacts your marketing strategy. An Altered Psychology If the real reason customers remain “loyal” to a brand is the human brain’s desire for automaticity, marketers need to recognize this altered psychology and more importantly, that it changes their outlook on marketing. I said it last post on this topic and I’ll say it again: marketing messages still matter. A lot. But there’s a need for more care and consideration when crafting those messages. Here’s a staggering stat: according to a new study by Deloitte, 89% of customers in the US and UK said they make decisions based on customer experience ahead of price and product. It’s not about promising the lowest prices or the fanciest features, or saying and doing absolutely anything to sell. It’s not about convincing existing customers to keep purchasing your product or service over and over. They already want to do this. It’s about grounding your marketing message in reality, trusting your product and delivering the exact customer experience your customers expect. Build the Experience With Your Marketing Message A poor customer experience is usually the result of a disconnect between what a brand says it will deliver versus what it actually delivers. Once you set an expectation, you have to meet it because 82% of people will not do business with you after an unresolved poor experience. No businesses can survive that kind of turnover. So how can you deliver great customer experiences? It begins and ends with your marketing message. Every brand has the power to promote an honest message about their products and services, but sometimes marketers get caught up in the promise. We think customers always need more, and at the best possible price. Customers want these things, but not at the expense of a great experience. Treat your marketing message like both an opportunity and a responsibility. You have the opportunity to set yourself up for success by crafting the right message. You have a responsibility to your customers – and to your brand – to be honest about your products and services. Building great customer experiences starts with your marketing message – just make sure it doesn’t end there. Deliver Your Promise This leads to another question: what exactly is a “great” customer experience? Put simply, it’s an experience that matches your marketing message. If you know your products and services have certain capabilities and other limitations, promise only the truth about what you can deliver. Even if what you promise is less impressive than the competition’s, if you keep your promises, your customers will be happy. All you have to do is be honest. It might Philippines Photo Editor sound amazing to say you product does A, B C, D and E. If the reality is your product doesn’t yet do E (even though you plan on building those features in the future) – don’t market it that way! If any part of your experience fails to meet the expectations you set up for your customers, they will view it as a poor experience. Breaking any part of a promise – even one small part – is still breaking a promise. And broken promises never make customers happy. Conclusion The frustrating thing about brands delivering poor customer experiences is they have all the power. It seems like a simple concept, yet so many brands lose sight of what’s right in front of them. When it comes down to it, customers want simplicity. They want to discover a product or service and buy it again and again when they have that need. It’s human psychology. We don’t want to go through the same process every time we need something. When we are satisfied with a product or service, our brains tell us, “If it ain’t broken, don’t fix it!” It seems like an oversimplification, but it isn’t. Promise what you can deliver, deliver it, and enjoy the repeat business. It is, quite literally, science.

If there’s a trend in my recent posts on the truth about customer loyalty, it’s the running dialogue on what motivates humans to do the things we do. At first blush, human nature may seem like a heady topic for a humble marketing blog. But on second thought, marketing is about getting a group of people (target audience) to do what you want them to do (buy your product/service), so it’s once more unto the breach, friends! As is usually the case, something specific triggered an idea for a post. This week, it was episode three of a new TV series called American Gods, based on Neil Gaiman’s novel of the same name. Gaiman’s story is about many things and the plot complex, but it has much to say about one relevant concept: the power of belief. In the book, Gaiman’s main character, Shadow Moon, powerfully sums up belief: “It's what people do. They believe. People populate the darkness; with ghosts, with gods, with electrons, with tales. People imagine, and people believe: and it is that belief, that rock-solid belief, that makes things happen.” Marketing and the Power of Belief The notion that having “rock-solid belief” in something wields the power to make it a reality is a common one, it’s just not usually positioned this way. If you’ve ever read a book on self-improvement or productivity that mentioned the influence of positivity, it’s essentially the same thing. However, the word belief seems to carry significant weight, like it somehow has more meaning. This got me to thinking about marketing and the power of belief, and after much deliberation, I landed on an observation for not only the marketer in all of us but the also the consumer. Foster True Belief in Your Strategy As powerful as belief is, disbelief has a similar impact. Unfortunately, this is something marketers know all too well. Whether you run your own marketing agency or work in a marketing department, you need stakeholder-approval to execute your campaigns. There are meetings, pitches, and presentations, followed by discussions, additions, and subtractions, all of which lead to the inevitable “green light.” Of course, there’s eventual approval of a strategy because you’re paid to do a job. But does it look anything like the one you originally proposed? More importantly, is there true belief in the campaign, or was the approval pushed through with a “wait-and-see” stakeholder approach? Let’s get one thing right out in the open: getting stakeholders to fully buy-in is extremely difficult, and also completely different than a partial, begrudging sign-off. Why? With the former, your strategy has unquestioned support, meaning the proper resources and time to develop and blossom organically. Meanwhile, the latter kind of approval will result in endless check-ins, timeline changes and will wind up utterly out of your control before you blink. A marketing agency friend of mine recently told me about a client that “signed-off” on a proposed strategy, only to request multiple large scale changes once the campaign was launched. When belief is removed from the equation as it was in my friend’s situation, it’s difficult to get it back. The campaign was changed, and it meandered, sputtered and never reached the potential it once had, all because disbelief reared its ugly head. In American Gods, Shadow and his boss, Mr. Wednesday, often discuss belief and its power. During one conversation, Shadow admits he did not believe in love until he met his wife, Laura. Mr. Wednesday then replies, “So you didn’t believe until you did, then the world changed because you believed.” A simple quote, but one that puts the power of belief in perspective. Once you believe in something, the belief changes both you and the thing in which you believe. Marketers can take advantage of this simplicity if they accept it’s not about getting a certain tactic or strategy approved. The most important part of getting stakeholder buy-in is fostering belief in what you’re saying. Sometimes, the best way to cement belief is charts and numbers. Other situations might call for highlighting the tendencies of your target audience. And who knows, there could be a circumstance in which referring to American Gods and the philosophical power of belief wins you the rock-solid buy-in you need to make things happen. It doesn’t matter how you do it if you can Photo Editing Services just make them believe, your campaign will generate better results. In Search of Brands That Believe Let’s say you walk into a new shoe store called ABC shoes. They carry only ABC shoes. You browse around a while before an employee comes over to ask if you need any help. You decline, but not before noticing the employee is wearing a pair of Nike shoes. Later, on your way out, you pass a second employee, this one wearing Reebok kicks. You don’t buy anything, and can’t help wonder: why weren’t the employees wearing ABC shoes? It’s a basic example – and certainly, a mistake retail outlets should never make – but I use it to illustrate a point: successful brands have 100% belief in their products and services. There are many less obvious but equally powerful ways brands show their belief – or lack thereof – in their offerings. The behavior of a brand’s people, especially if it matches their marketing messages, is a great sign they believe in what they sell. We’ve also written about honesty and transparency as powerful indicators of a company’s merit. To put it simply: where there’s smoke, there’s fire. If a company’s people act differently than you’d expect based on the brand’s marketing messages, there is an internal issue with belief or buy-in. In today’s competitive market, there are just too many options to tolerate dealing with a company that doesn’t believe in itself.