How to Move from Inside-Out to Outside-In Marketing
As we discussed in part 3 of this series, even the largest and oldest companies are facing a new B2B selling environment where “old school” marketing and sales just doesn’t work anymore. Instead of talking TO your prospects, you need to listen to what they want. Instead of hitting leads with more disjointed messages, you need […]
When Your Buying Stages Don’t Match Your Customers’ Needs
As we discussed in part 2 of this series, even the largest and oldest companies are facing a new B2B selling environment where “old school” marketing and sales just isn’t as effective. Companies that talk TO their prospects instead of listening and working WITH them are starting to lose out. Large B2B corporations are often filled with […]
When Prospects Won’t Play It Your Way
Company X has just built a new eCommerce site and is consider adding an extra layer of cyber security. VP Bob volunteers to research the product category. Google points him towards Acme, a mature leader in the space, and he downloads a comparison guide, but it finds it difficult to determine if Acme is comparing […]
Let’s Recap, Then Move Marketing Forward
Over the last four years, we’ve covered a lot of topics in this blog, which is a reflection of the many changes going on in marketing and customer experience. Here are ten of the most popular posts: More Thoughts on Thought Leadership When Lightning Strikes – From Service Gaps to Loyalty When Customers Speak Out, Pay […]
Transformational Marketing
As it often does, the New Year holiday and all the corresponding online retrospectives caused me to look back. I realized that my marketing career has coincided with several major waves of innovation. Marketers started the century discussing one-to-one marketing and lifetime value, then moved to a focus on total customer experience and loyalty. At […]
One Bad Experience
This time my husband wrote the blog entry for me. Actually he wrote the following account of a bad experience to place on a restaurant’s Facebook page. You’ve probably all written one like it – or intended to after a bad experience. “About three months ago my wife and I discovered a new wine bistro, […]
Customer Experience in Financial Services – Part 2: Credit Card Issuers
Even with all the publicity surrounding last year’s Dodd-Frank financial-reform legislation and the pending Durbin Amendment fee controls, the public doesn’t generally differentiate between the major card networks (Visa, MasterCard), bank-issued cards, or the processing networks behind these. But the cumulative effect of the hype has been to make card holders generally suspicious. More than […]
Customer Experience in Financial Services – Part 1: Banks
What’s different about customer experience in the banking and credit card industries? Glad you asked. The customer experience research I directed last year (http://bit.ly/oDzXg8) showed that, in general, consumers place greater emphasis on “customer service” than on price when evaluating financial services providers compared to other industries. Banks appear to be rising to the demand […]
Ladies and Gentlemen Serving Ladies and Gentlemen
During Labor Day week , my husband and I enjoyed the Ritz Carlton’s strong service model. All guests, no matter how greasy and sandy from the beach, are treated as ladies and gentlemen. Associates, who are encouraged to think of themselves the same way, keep notes on guest preferences and transfer them to the next […]
Plotting Your Way To Super Loyalty
Anyone who has ever taken a business or economics course will attest to the fondness of academics for a 2×2 matrix. Put one variable on the X axis, another on the Y, and presto – all manner of phenomenon can be explained. It’s a clarifying and therefore tempting tool – and can be applied to […]