Customer Experience: The Psychological Shortcut

By 4 Comments

Everyday we face hundreds of choices. It gets complicated. And this is why we create habitual behaviour — whether it is to take the same route to work, whether we put on our underwear before our sock everyday, or simply the same breakfast. It makes our life easier and we can go onto autopilot.

Consumer Decision Making Shortcuts

When there is no autopilot system, these choice get a bit to hectic. We look for the mental shortcuts that will make our decision making process easier. Its why we use the peer review system so often. For example,

  • If a hundred people say its good, we will try it.
  • If a blogger has a 100 000 RSS readers we follow them.
  • If some one we respect loves that product or service, we will give it a try. [Read more...]

The Five Different Types of Word of Mouth Marketing and How to leverage Them

By 10 Comments

In my last word of mouth post I look at the five different reasons why we talk about brands. And there is a good reason why we all get very excited about word of mouth when you look at the numbers:

  • Up to 80% of your customers will see Word of Mouth as the most credible form of marketing.
  • Word of Mouth has the most effective cost per conversion.
  • Any customer who arrives via the word of mouth channel is more likely to buy than any other.

But Don’t get To Excited About Word of Mouth Just Yet …

As not all word of mouth is equal.

These figures and points above are a generalization, and there is no doubt of their value, but we must keep word of mouth in context.

To do this we must explore the five different sources of word of mouth: [Read more...]

Why Your Competition Is Your Customer’s Expectations

By 1 Comment

We tend to think of our competition as the person who is selling the closest product and services. Banks look at other banks, cell operators look at other cell operators. You know how this work but things have changed.

You are no longer just selling a product or services.

Let me use an example to put this into context.

I live in South Africa and if I order a Kindle from Amazon.com in the States I will get it (at my front door) within three working days. Brilliant. Mind blowing and superb service and customer care.

Yet when my Blackberry breaks and I take it to a MTN service centre in Northgate for repairs. Here is what happens. I wait close to an hour (or two) to see a consultant, it then takes over two weeks to swop the hand set and get it back to the service centre. And when it gets back to you its still broken. [Read more...]

Is Nando’s Advertising Is Broken?

By 4 Comments

Nando’s are really good at getting us to talk about their advertising. They are quick to respond tactically and produce funny, witty adverts. It gets the word of mouth buzz going.

In this case they responded by taking a poke at Cell C with their other CEO – chief customer officer campaign with Trevor Noah. And yes I laughed. In fact I almost wet myself.

But here is the real rider:

Are you going to go and buy Nando’s because of this advert? I know I am not?

What is the point of advertising?

I am always reminded of David Ogilvy’s words when it comes to advertising. Sales, Sales Sales and yes, Sales.

Anything less is creative masturbation. It’s about a bunch of creative genius getting their creative rocks blown off at your expense. They are having fun but when the sales don’t come in, your board room discussions is anything but that.

I would like add another aspect to this –loyalty.

Conversation and Loyalty

[Read more...]

Why people refer, and how to leverage it for your business

By 1 Comment

My wife and I recently got a new family dog from the SPCA. She’s a cross border collie with something else – what, I really don’t know. She really is a very sweet little dog and my children love. But she drives me up the wall.

Every evening, I lock the dogs in the backyard, where they have a small grass patch to play in and their kennels to sleep in. Every evening this little dog managers to jump over the wall and wakes my wife and I with her barking. I was moaning to my brother about this and I don’t know what to do. He’s likes to fix things and he made a suggestion and worked.

We are generically designed to refer

You could take this conversation I had with my brother and replace with any conversation that you’ve had with your friends or people you know. The chances are good that someone has referred something. They will mention a product, service or solution that earned media is all about. as made a difference to them and the quality of their life. Of course, this could be good or bad.

This is how we work as human beings. We could get into the deep psychoanalytical (a chunky word for a chunky subject matter) study but it is logical and intuitive. It is something that we’ve all experienced, and it’s something that we all do.

We refer because of … [Read more...]

Why Your Big Budget Advertising Is Doomed To Failure (Sorry)!

By 2 Comments

The traditional media eco-system is going through a major metamorphosis. At first glance it would seem that this is largely driven by the changes of an evolving internet platform and mobile media — something where I think many marketers are taking huge strain just to manage the effects it is having on their brand and media strategies.

Changing Consumer Behaviour

Personally, I think this strain is more about the change in how our consumer are making decisions today. And I think this is the flaw where most media strategies fail.

There is no doubt that there is a symbiotic relationship between the evolving multimedia platforms and consumer behaviour. How consumers make decisions and what influences these decisions has  radically evolved from the first TV commercial and marketer’s ability to refine the advertising process.

Today, TV commercials do not have the credibility that they used to. As consumers, we no longer dogmatically believe what a brand says about itself to be true. Now we believe what other consumers say and we the ability to find information in different ways and validate what we want through a peer review system.

How Billions of Dollars Are Being Flushed Down The Toilet

All I have to do is go online validate if I am making the right choice about a product I want. Lets say its a new printer that I am about to buy. It looks like a good product and I know it has a good brand name.

What happens when I use my Blackberry, click through amazon to see what other people say and find 10 bad reviews? I replace the product with one that has good reviews.

For the brand that could mean millions of dollars of advertising investment and years of brand building down the tube. Ouch. And if your consumer believes that you are not being upfront and honest you will pay a severe price.

The Fragmented Media Eco-System

[Read more...]

Newer Posts »