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February 28, 2010

Eyes on the Customer

Customer service has been on my mind lately. In recent months, we have noticed a growing tendency for customers to put more burden on us as services providers...in some questions pushing the boundaries of our contracts. So we have been evaluating our practices and their impact on customer relationships and satisfaction.

In thumbing through the March 1 issue of BusinessWeek and the article on Customer Service Champs, I was struck by a quote from survey winner LL Bean's Terry Sutton, Vice President for Customer Satisfaction. The article was talking about Bean's decision to keep its service operations in ME vs. off-shoring the operation, and also about its employee wage and benefits packages. Sutton commented that the money was well-spent since happier employees translated in better service which improved repeat business. The quote that caught my attention was "The technology has changed the game, but the basics haven't changed. We treat customers like we'd want to be treated."

In our business, we are facing increased competition as larger companies step down to pick up work from accounts once below their radar, pricing pressure due to off-shoring, and still-shrinking marketing budgets. As a result, every day we balance the costs of servicing our largest accounts as well as smaller, but promising, new clients. In budget terms, strict adherence to our commitment might be financially prudent, but it could easily lead to a "nickel and diming" behavior that would annoy all parties. So, we are working hard to define approaches to pricing and account management that let our team and our clients work more fluidly, as partners, while still ensuring reasonable compensation.

It is easy to believe that somehow our services and technology offerings will also win the deal, just as it might be easy for LL Bean to believe their products are better and will always win the sale. In practice however, customer experience is typically the differentiator and if they, or us, lose sight of that, we lose our competitive advantage..and maybe more.

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February 27, 2010

Creating Relationship

Relationship building seems to be a topic at every marketing conference on earth, so I thought I would do a little research, evaluating the activities of some companies I buy from at a business and consumer level.

I started with Lands' End. I had ordered some items in January so I thought that was a good place to start. I have 18 e-mails from them since February 11 - that is an average of more than one per day! By my measure, not a single one is personalized or shows any effort to make me feel like the loyal customer I am. So, "A" for effort, "D" for execution (too much stuff), and "F" for relationship.

Dell was next. We have been buying their equipment at work for years. They send me a generic e-mail nominally tailored to my market segment, plus some sale direct mailers. Weak effort nets a "C-".

How about banks or brokers? For both business and personal accounts, nothing from my local bank, Bank of America or Webster Bank except solicitations for new credit cards. E-trade sends me transactional mail plus constant solicitations for new services. "Epic Fail" on all counts.

Grocery stores, nothing.
AT&T or Verizon for my corporate or personal accounts? Nada.
Cable company? Just my bill.

You get the point..companies are still making little headway cracking the relationship building puzzle. Just like junk mail, e-mails arrive and I throw away 90+% without ever opening since I am conditioned to know more will come the next day anyway. Most companies have very weak efforts at prompting users to move online...and abysmal or non-existent efforts to tailor content.

Building relationships means becoming attuned to people's preferences, interests, likes and dislikes. It means committing to helping them tailor their interactions with your company. For example, look at the MyIBM links on IBM's Web page. They let users create custom bookmarks to speed repeat navigation through their site. They offer lots of tools for specifying interests and they use the information to parse what is communicated. They are not perfect, but their efforts at least create tangible evidence of trying which a customer can appreciate.

Relationship building is a process, not a product you can buy. Every interaction with a customer presents an opportunity to ask a question, gather another small piece of information, and build out the profile further. The process means interpreting, adjusting and adapting as you go. If you are waiting for the perfect toolset, you are missing the point that learning how to gather and use data is not a one-size-fits-all protocol, and that learning what works for you takes time and commitment.

Enough...it's time to go back and delete more e-mails.

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February 24, 2010

Reaching Marketing-Resistant B2B Prospects: A Pharma Example

You've read the articles extolling the importance of creating conversations with customers; about building relationships; about being relevant. But what does it all really mean in corporate marketing programs focused on marketing-resistant business prospects?

As marketers, we are wired to always believe that our information is the most important piece of news that our prospects need to know about. Of course, that is a fallacy. Let's use a pharmaceutical example to illustrate the point.

If you're a physician, learning the updated formulary status of a COPD drug is not going to nudge out taking care of patients, reading a journal article on novel treatment protocols for COPD, or spending time with your child building a snowman. (Yes, even physicians have personal lives.) And that scenario plays out in financial services, manufacturing, retails, etc., etc., etc.

Perhaps more important, every day, lots of drugs change formulary status in every state. That means our target physician could be getting dozens of update notices about formulary status every week. In a typical physician's schedule, that means the line between valuable and annoying gets quickly blurred.

Does this mean pharmaceutical companies should not be sending this type of marketing to physicans? No. The content is important, so the rationale is good. But, it does dicate an increasing focus on assessing content value, database segmentation, media preferences, and presentation style.

Not all physicians create scripts for COPD, just like men don't need to receive marketing materials for feminine protection products. Making sure the database helps target content is becoming increasingly critical to ensure that recipients don't develop negative impressions. Note...that simple obvious statement creates an "epic fail" for a host of major marketers. And in industry's like pharma, where sales processes are migrating away from reliance on face-to-face meetings driven by detail reps with a personal knowledge of physician needs, that puts extra emphasis on the underlying database.

Next comes media preference. More and more physicians (and bankers, engineers, CMOs, etc.) are migrating to electronic tools and mobile devices, reflecting their typically split schedules (private practice, hospital service, etc). But that does not mean all physicians want to clutter already crowded Inboxes. In pharma markets specifically, many physicans remain deeply concerned about missing important patient care information via e-mail, making the Inbox sacrosanct. Creating opportunities that let your target audience define their media preference is rapidly becoming de riguer.

Which leads to presentation format. Not all information is created equal. An announcement about formulary status can be transmitted in concise fashion, and can be easily complemented by links to more complete product data, etc. Short and to the point beats long-winded. However, if you are trying to communicate a breakthrough treatment regimen for a common condition (e.g. a new oral treatment regimen for osteoporosis), your content needs to be more complete. Proper targeting, media options and timing all now come into play to make the content more palatable to over-subscribed recipients.

In the end, if you look back at what I just wrote, it smacks of fundamental marketing. Which is why failure to adhere to this type of process can make your marketing materials even more annoying to critical prospects.

Despite its creative aspects, effective marketing remains a procedural science...more so than even in the new, Internet-enabled, social media driven, measurement obsessed current market. Don't let fundamentals trip you up.

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February 18, 2010

Five Tricks for Stretching Marketing Dollars

In a client call today, I was reminded of the stark budget realities of our current market. That made me think about five simple ways many companies could save money and get more out of their marketing budgets. They may seem simplistic, but I can attest to their relevance in many large corporations:

1. Scrub your mailing lists. I cannot overemphasize how much waste happens because of lack of segmentation, targeting, list cleansing and maintenance.


2. Know your customers so you don't send them offers for things they've already bought. It's that targeting thing again and the lack of a customer/prospect distinction is the one I find most appallingly common.


3. Make sure every customer touch has a clear, simple and convenient way for a customer to respond or comment back to you. If you spend money creating a communication, it does not cost any more to construct it well!


4. Offer customers the chance to optimize how they receive information from you...do not make assumptions about "e" vs. "print".


5. Nurture, nurture, nurture. It is cheaper to nurture legitimate prospects than constantly mining cold lists for immediate wins.

Times are tight and not likely to get easier any time soon. Fiscal prudence aided by good marketing practice can help you optimize the use of your precious marketing dollars.

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February 17, 2010

How Consumer Access To Healthcare Information Is Creating A Marketing Opportunity

With the launch of County Health Rankings, an informational site created through a partnership between the Univ. of Wisconsin and The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, you can now go online to see how your county is doing comparatively (versus other counties in your state) regarding health outcomes and health factors. It is the latest site offering up information to help consumers better understand their healthcare treatment options.

The trend toward more open access to information is forcing dramatic changes in doctor-patient relationships, hospital-physician relationships, and the marketing of medical devices, pharmaceuticals and other medical/healthcare services. Like car buyers armed with facts and pricing when they walk into a showroom, patients are increasingly entering a doctor's office armed with questions. And when they leave the office, they are less likely to accept everything they are told unquestioningly.

So how does all this create opportunity for pharmaceutical marketers? What physicians need more than ever is access to convenient, reliable sources of information that they can trust. While the pressure to produce blockbusters is relentless, this information gap and its associated gap in delivery platform options, is an open invitation to establish new working relationships with healthcare providers.

Certainly, it is naive to assume that BIg Pharma will suddenly produce universally unbiased materials, but think back to respected publications like the Merck Manual. The world's pharmaceutical manufacturers are sitting on a wealth of information and have access to some of the world's most innovative information management, analytics and investigational resources. With the right partnerships, leadership could be defined not only by the drugs delivered, but the resources and services surrounding the products.

The industry leaders are already deploying a dizzying array of web resources to HCPs, but that is actually part of the problem. Delivering more information on current generation platforms is a recipe for information overload. In it earliest version, the Merck Manual represented a breakthrough innovation -- a published database of critical content assembled in a best-of-breed medium. The real openings today have yet to be devised and their delivery vehicle is more likely to be an iPad or Blackberry or some future-generation mobile device than a current gen desktop computer.

The services story has been borne out in multiple industries through the past two decades. Now, I see a growing number of openings for information services in healthcare with each passing day. Who will step to the plate first?

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February 16, 2010

Microsegmentation Coming of Age

With advances in database technology, customer and prospect database segmentation became a discipline. With the Internet, the use of segmented data to deliver more targeted messaging became possible. But for marketers who still needed to reach customers/prospects via mixed media (print and online), either for reasons of customer preference or because of lack of an opt-in, the much higher cost of digital print still posed a barrier.

With newer and newer press technologies, including digital web and digital inkjet web presses, the ability to delivery on true cross-media microsegmented marketing is finally coming of age. Recent projects with customers in publishing, healthcare and financial services have taught us that pricing on digital print production is rapidly approaching offset pricing in many campaign/production configurations, opening up a new dimension of opportunity for marketing effectiveness. And none too soon.

McKinsey Quarterly recently published a brief titled "The Marketer's New Playbook" based on work original published in December 2008. The article illustrated dramatic differences in retail pricing/profitability across smaller regional geographies coming out from the current recession. The data supports what many marketers know inherently -- pricing is a function of local market demographics. Local market dynamics provide a dramatic and readily understood example of segmentation characteristics that marketing teams can leverage to better target promotions -- whether you are targeting consumers or business buyers.

While cost barriers are eroding, segmentation strategies that account for real-world personalization characteristics still require care in data collection, analytics and strategy. The leaders already recognize that and are investing in these areas. The laggards? Well they may be putting out creative mailers like the one I recently received with my name spelled out in cheerleaders, but they would be better advised to save some money and deliver me truly valuable, differentiated content.

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February 15, 2010

List Cleansing. Or Why Can't I Get That Offer?

Few things annoy me as a consumer more than receiving promotional mailings like the one pictured here that I can't take advantage of. In the case of The New Milford Sports Club, I have been a member for over 10 years.

List cleansing continues to be one of the simplest ways many companies can optimize marketing budgets. Creating simple customer suppression files to use in all your acquisition campaigns is not hard, and can be made part of routine process easily. At the same time, building customer loyalty by creating separate retention campaigns for customers is a simple way to reduce churn.

This is not rocket science, but from local clubs to large mailers like insurers, banks and retailers, the effective use of customer data remains amazingly inconsistent. It shouldn't be that way.

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February 11, 2010

What Is Your Corporate "Look"?

In a recent client meeting, we flipped through a series of websites to review what the client felt was "corporate" because they wanted to target larger corporate clients. We looked at a series of content-rich sites whose home pages were predictably jump-stations to their interior content. This particular client had nowhere near the volume of content, but felt that was the look for them.

While I fully understand the logic of hewing to convention and stylistic guides, I think it is increasingly important for companies to know who they are and what their culture is first. Is your company approachable and personal? Or is you style analytical and informational? Do you have a large repository of information to offer prospects?

Especially as more and more websites are developed/guided by professionals with an understanding of the web world, the more that sites are all beginning to look the same. Going into meetings to discuss the subtleties of marginal differences in imagery instead of discussing the broader issue of corporate personality is a waste of energy.

Marketing isn't about being me-too. It is about differentiation. So, what is your company's "look"?

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February 9, 2010

Misadventures in Marketing: The Xfinity Lesson.

Xfinity is a really bad name. Not just for the myriad misinterpretations already becoming Web legend, but for for inherent unpronounceability and an overreaching promise likely to be underdelivered.

So, why do really big companies with the wherewithal to do things right, so often do things wrong?

Lately, it seems to have a lot to do with trying to compete/survive in turbulent markets. Marketers love silver bullets...things that will bring quick relief to challenges. But in the current market climate, so much of building customer relationships is about being methodical and consistent vs. being splashy. Splashy creates excitement and interest for a while, but real success comes from the hard work of being approachable, honest and communicative. Even splashy marketers like Apple or Nike do an amazing job of being consistent behind those big campaigns.

I understand the Comcast name had become a punching bag -- the virtual definition of "bad service". So a name change seemed in order. But, as an alternative, I might suggest that most companies would be better served by following an alternate path:

1. Realize that what customers really want is good service at a fair price. You could give your company a nonsense name...something like Google (!)... and as long as you are delivering the goods, you'll do well. If you're delivering bad service, a name change may be the least of your problems.


2. Be real. It is amazing how fast customers can smell a fake. If you give lip-service to "service" but deliver junk, the market will chew you up and spit you out. Not every company will want to flog themselves like Domino's, but telling people that you are rethinking and reinventing isn't a bad strategy...ask IBM.


3. Think about the experience. Our collective fascination with Super Bowl ads tells me that people don't inherently hate advertising. They hate they way ads are delivered, and their typical lack of relevance. Technology is changing that landscape. Remember that markets are conversations, and if you marketing is uninteresting, irrelevant noise, it isn't likely to connect with an audience. How would you want to experience the brands/companies you do business with?

Current marketing is a lot like the old tortoise v. hare tale. Slow and steady attention to building real conversations with real customers about real service needs is likely to be a better strategy that spending millions on flashy actions, campaigns or name changes that may or may not have any substance behind them.

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February 7, 2010

Nobody Said Marketing Was Easy

It has been over a month since my last post on this blog. That is bad.

What is good is that I realize it is bad. Marketing is about consistency, about developing virtual relationships with prospects, about delivering value. It takes commitment, time, care and effort. It is not easy.

It is this consistency that clients often fail to acknowledge. In an age of instant communication, clients crave quick lead generation programs. In that pursuit, even in B2B markets, they dream up larger and larger incentives and gimmicks to get people to give up their names and enter a "nurturing" program. However, especially in B2B, the best leads are those that are created in response to simple, legitimate presentation of the actual value proposition. These programs tend to not be flashy...rather they are consistent. And they take time to bear fruit.

In my lack of consistency, I have reinforced for myself the challenge of marketing -- there is always something to do in the business day, but to grow and be successful, I need to let prospects (and customers) know we are here, and how we can help them. Slow and steady wins the race, and right now, I am behind. It is lesson you can learn from too.

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