CEM Expert for iQube Marekting

We combine research and marketing consultancy to help clients create original ideas, new strategies and implement change to gain better results.

[chrisiqube]

New Post has been published on iQube Marketing Limited

New Post has been published on http://www.iqubemarketing.com/iqube-id-different-consumers-seek-different-relationships-with-brands/

iQube iD: Different consumers seek different relationships with brands

In today’s economic battlefield, iQube’s research shows WHY consumers are very different and how companies can engage more profitably with their valued brand advocates and attract new customers.

The iQube iD model of Settlers, Prospectors and Pioneers, sheds light on how our values and personality motivate us to spend our money in different ways, on different products in different stores, for different reasons.

Based on a clear understanding of our fundamental motivators (our values, beliefs, attitudes and life experiences), companies and organisations have been improving their customer engagement, intimacy and service for over 30 years using our approach to understanding human behaviour.

iQube’s unique model offers fresh insight into how our dynamic spending decisions are triggered by sub-conscious desires that determine customer choice and ultimately your company’s sales performance.

To see how businesses implement the iQube ID consumer model to transform their marketing effectiveness and deliver sustainable commercial value and growth, simply get in touch…….it costs nothing to start the conversation.

Euan Kilpatrick

Head of Food and Drink

iQube Marketing Ltd

  [email protected]

d : 0118 332 0208

m : 07467 959256

[chrisiqube]

New Post has been published on iQube Marketing Limited

New Post has been published on http://www.iqubemarketing.com/essential-link-voc-voe/

The essential link between VOC & VOE

Combining VoC and VoE

What your employees are thinking, saying and doing impacts upon every one of your customers. It effects every step in the customer journey and is a key driver of overall customer satisfaction. So linking VoC with VoE is not just important, it’s absolutely essential. And the most effective way to achieve this is via a single programme that encompasses both VoC and VoE – we call it the Voice of the Customer through the Voice of the Employee.

Voice of the Customer through the Voice of the Employee

A growing number of organisations are coming to realise the importance of listening to the Voice of the Customer (VoC). And through focus groups, customer surveys and direct observation, firms are acting on what they hear to create stronger customer relationships and, in turn, grow sales and improve retention. Organisations are also learning to listen to the Voice of the Employee (VoE) to ensure that their employees are effectively engaged, well motivated and capable of delivering on their objectives. So far, so good, but where firms are falling down is their failure to link VoC with VoE. And that’s a huge mistake. Employee engagement and customer satisfaction are not, in reality, separate entities or concepts – they are inextricably linked. And listening to the VoC is meaningless unless you know what’s driving the message you’re hearing – happiness/satisfaction/frustration. Only by understanding why your customers are saying what they’re saying can you learn from the positives and seek to eliminate the negatives.

Learning to listen

If you perform a costly customer survey and then act upon the outcome, you are essentially flying blind. Unless you have a deep understanding of the factors underpinning customer experience, resolving issues and overcoming challenges is a hit-and-miss process. But if you have listened carefully to the voice of your employees, you WILL have a deep understanding of what’s going on behind the scenes. When you learn that customers are happy/satisfied/frustrated you WILL know why, and you’ll be ideally placed to take corrective action and exploit new opportunities to deliver even greater levels of customer satisfaction.

A new approach to VoC and VoE

The challenge for businesses is to review their entire approach to VoC and VoE, to take a holistic approach, and to create a program that seamlessly combines the two. That’s no easy task, but it’s one that if managed successfully, can deliver sustainable competitive advantage through greater employee engagement and enhanced customer experience. Get your frontline employees truly engaged and they’ll become powerful customer advocates. Engaged employees demonstrate a strong obligation to their customers, striving to do their best. And if they don’t have the right information, skills or tools to achieve that, they’ll soon let you know. So listen to what they’re saying and you’ll be able to identify and resolve issues before they escalate.

[chrisiqube]

New Post has been published on iQube Marketing Limited

New Post has been published on http://iqubemarketing.staging.wpengine.com/customer-journey-mapping-key-considerations/

Customer journey mapping – key considerations

The importance of the customer journey

Customer Journey Mapping isn’t a new concept, yet only recently has its importance come to be fully recognised, particularly at senior executive level. And like any new methodology, as Customer Journey Mapping becomes more widely adopted, it will evolve and adapt according to the environment where it is employed. In some organisations a very simple form of Customer Journey Mapping may be appropriate, while in larger multi-channel businesses, a more sophisticated approach may be required. Yet ultimately, the goals always remain the same – to understand what your customers want and need, and to map out the steps they have to take to achieve their goals. This is the essence of customer journey mapping.

When you first set about creating your Customer Journey Map, there are a number of key considerations to keep in mind.

Don’t try to create your map in isolation

Gaining input from others areas of the business is a great way to explore and formalise the impact that each department has on the customer experience, even if they are one or two steps removed from the front line. Facilitating workshops where diverse stakeholders can share insights encourages closer collaboration and makes for a more detailed and richer map, plus it can help to improve operational effectiveness.

Your brand should feel the same across all touchpoints

When customers are engaging with your organisation they expect a level of service and an experience consistent with your brand values. So when you’re mapping out the customer journey across diverse channels, remember that from the customers’ point of view, it’s all one brand, not different departments with different objectives. So think carefully about how that brand experience is delivered across all touchpoints.

Understanding your customers

Your customer are not all the same, so create detailed pen portraits of your main customer types or segments. This will help to provide insight into how they like to interact with your organisation, how they make their buying decisions, and which transaction channels they prefer. The more you understand your customers, their wants and needs, the more easily you can create a customer journey that delivers them.

Your Customer Journey will evolve continually

Creating a customer journey map isn’t a project with an end date, because sales channels and customer experience can evolve over time as technologies and customer preferences change. So once you’ve “completed” your Customer Journey Map, review it on a regular basis to make sure it reflects the reality of the customer experience. Just as you need to regularly update your Sat Nav to keep up to date with changes to the road network, you should update your Customer Journey Mapping to include changes to the customer journey.

[chrisiqube]

New Post has been published on iQube Marketing Limited

New Post has been published on http://iqubemarketing.staging.wpengine.com/mapping-customers-journey-across-touchpoints/

Mapping your customers' journey across touchpoints

Mapping customer touchpoints

If you’re to successfully develop long-term customer relationships and generate greater customer value, it’s important to have a clear picture of the customer journey across all your marketing channels, both at the point of initial engagement and decision-making, and throughout the life of the relationship. This means identifying all customer touchpoints and examining them under a variety of lenses, e.g. marketing, customer service, fulfilment etc.

At each touchpoint, customers may undertake or experience one of five different types of activity

• Encounter – when a potential customer first becomes aware of your brand

• Education – when your product or service benefits are communicated to potential customers • Decision to buy – based on evaluation of perceived benefits • Initial product/service experience – when actual benefits can be assessed • Deepening of customer relationship – the next step in the customer lifecycle

Understanding the customer journey

The below illustration is an example of the type of activities that need to be mapped out and evaluated at each touchpoint. Once you understand the nature of the interaction at each touchpoint, you can develop insight into where opportunities exist for closer engagement, where key decisions are made and why, and how you can exert greater influence on customer choices. You can also develop your understanding of how different customer types engage with your organisation. These may be e.g. new customers, existing customers or returning customers.

When mapping touchpoints, there are a number of factors to keep in mind:

1. Assess each stage from the viewpoint of your customer. 2. If possible, perform customer research to better understand why customers are taking a particular path, or completing a particular action. 3. Identify and define key customer segments and evaluate the typical path for each – this can reveal crucial behavioural variances across different customer types. 4. Don’t overcomplicate the process – simplicity is key if your findings are to be of value, and your recommendations are to be implemented.

Enhancing the customer experience

When the time comes to put your new knowledge to use, your insights can help to improve the customer experience and deliver a range of compelling commercial benefits:

• Increased sales – through the delivery of positive experiences at initial point of interest/encounter • Improved customer service through clearer recognition of key customer requirements across all channels • Mitigate risk of poor customer experience throughout the entire journey • Reduced customer attrition through deeper understanding of each stage in customer lifecycle • Consistent delivery of positive communications across all channels • Continually improve the customer journey through expanded knowledge of where new investment will have greatest impact

[chrisiqube]

New Post has been published on iQube Marketing Limited

New Post has been published on http://iqubemarketing.staging.wpengine.com/build-brand-delighting-customers/

How to build your brand by delighting your customers

The dynamic marketplace

To achieve stand-out in today’s highly dynamic marketplaces, brands must engage with customers on multiple levels and deliver experiences that match or surpass expectations. And companies must deliver products or services that are supported by rich experiences that surprise and delight.

Brand trust

Brand trust has long been generated by consistently meeting or exceeding customer expectations, and never letting them down. Yet today, that’s not enough. Customers always want more, and if your brand isn’t willing or able to give it to them, there’s usually another provider waiting in the wings ready to deliver. So brand trust is not just about meeting expectations, it’s also about providing your customers with richer, more rewarding experiences. Yet delighting your customers doesn’t always require an innovative new product or service. Sometimes it’s simply about making it easier for customers to engage with you, which ultimately makes your customers’ lives a little easier and helps to make your brand their provider of choice. So instead of forcing customers to go through standard channels, let them interact with you via media they use every day or perhaps via your own customer app. Then customer interactions become almost effortless.

Unique experiences

Many brands are using digital channels to create new customer experiences that are transforming entire industries and sectors. Uber, for example, has proved to be a truly disruptive market entrant by “evolving the way the world moves”. They are achieving this by changing a once frequently negative customer experience – “why isn’t my cab here yet?” – to a positive one, where customers  know precisely how long they will have to wait for a cab, and how much their journey will cost them. The service is also supported by a highly competitive pricing structure plus a convenient payment process. Having quickly established a strong presence in key target cities around the globe, Uber has now begun a process of brand stretch, extending their service to the delivery of packages as well as people, and delighting even more customers along the way.

Brand referral

Customer referral is perhaps the single most cost effective way of raising the profile of your brand. And delighting customers with remarkable experiences is one of the most effective ways of motivating people to share those experiences and refer your products or services to others. Referrals may take the form of word-of-mouth recommendations, online customer views or informal endorsements via social media. The more remarkable the experience, the more likely your customers will spread the word. But you don’t have to create disruptive services and experiences to be remarkable. Seeking to understand the changing needs of your customers and finding new ways to meet them is equally powerful and key to success and may even reveal a disruptive opportunity that is currently hidden.

[chrisiqube]

New Post has been published on iQube Marketing Limited

New Post has been published on http://iqubemarketing.staging.wpengine.com/using-customer-experience-build-brand/

Using customer experience to build brand

Building your brand through improved customer experience

Research suggests that there is a strong positive correlation between customer experience and company profitability. In short, if you keep your customers happy, they’ll buy more, be more loyal, and spend more money. Plus they’re far more likely to recommend your brand to family, friends and followers on social media. Of course, a “good customer experience” can look very different across different industries and service sectors.

Defining customer experience

In the motor industry for example, when someone buys a new car the customer experience can include everything from the purchase and delivery processes, right through to the way the car handles and performs. In the retail Financial Services sector, customer experience usually refers to the way branch or call centre staff deal with customer engagements – do operators have the right tools, the right skills and the right information to effectively manage customer queries and send customers away satisfied? So the term “customer experience” generally refers to the interaction a customer has with an organisation’s frontline staff – how their requests are met, how queries are handled and how customers’ needs are satisfied. And the influence that the quality of this experience has on sales and profitability is changing the role of senior marketing executives around the globe.

Customer experience and brand

The link between customer experience and overall corporate performance is driving real change in management theory and practice. Rather than being viewed as a standalone component, customer experience is becoming an integral part of the marketing and CRM strategy. And for the CMO or Marketing Director, their mindset has to evolve from a comms-focussed perspective to a broader, multi-channel view that encompasses every touchpoint in the customer lifecycle. Customer experience therefore becomes part of an organisation’s brand values, and integrating it into the brand strategy helps to facilitate and deliver a consistent customer experience across all channels.

Tactical customer experience initiatives

Delivering a consistent experience across all channels has been shown to drive perceived trust in a brand. And as the relationship between customer experience, brand trust and profitability becomes more visible, firms are responding with a variety of tactical initiatives to maximise the value opportunity, sometimes at considerable cost.

[chrisiqube]

New Post has been published on iQube Marketing Limited

New Post has been published on http://www.iqubemarketing.com/using-customer-experience-to-build-brand/

Using customer experience to build brand

Building your brand through improved customer experience

Research suggests that there is a strong positive correlation between customer experience and company profitability. In short, if you keep your customers happy, they’ll buy more, be more loyal, and spend more money. Plus they’re far more likely to recommend your brand to family, friends and followers on social media. Of course, a “good customer experience” can look very different across different industries and service sectors.

Defining customer experience

In the motor industry for example, when someone buys a new car the customer experience can include everything from the purchase and delivery processes, right through to the way the car handles and performs. In the retail Financial Services sector, customer experience usually refers to the way branch or call centre staff deal with customer engagements – do operators have the right tools, the right skills and the right information to effectively manage customer queries and send customers away satisfied? So the term “customer experience” generally refers to the interaction a customer has with an organisation’s frontline staff – how their requests are met, how queries are handled and how customers’ needs are satisfied. And the influence that the quality of this experience has on sales and profitability is changing the role of senior marketing executives around the globe.

Customer experience and brand

The link between customer experience and overall corporate performance is driving real change in management theory and practice. Rather than being viewed as a standalone component, customer experience is becoming an integral part of the marketing and CRM strategy. And for the CMO or Marketing Director, their mindset has to evolve from a comms-focussed perspective to a broader, multi-channel view that encompasses every touchpoint in the customer lifecycle. Customer experience therefore becomes part of an organisation’s brand values, and integrating it into the brand strategy helps to facilitate and deliver a consistent customer experience across all channels.

Tactical customer experience initiatives

Delivering a consistent experience across all channels has been shown to drive perceived trust in a brand. And as the relationship between customer experience, brand trust and profitability becomes more visible, firms are responding with a variety of tactical initiatives to maximise the value opportunity, sometimes at considerable cost.

[chrisiqube]

New Post has been published on iQube Marketing Limited

New Post has been published on http://www.iqubemarketing.com/customer-journey-mapping-key-considerations/

Customer journey mapping – key considerations

The importance of the customer journey

Customer Journey Mapping isn’t a new concept, yet only recently has its importance come to be fully recognised, particularly at senior executive level. And like any new methodology, as Customer Journey Mapping becomes more widely adopted, it will evolve and adapt according to the environment where it is employed. In some organisations a very simple form of Customer Journey Mapping may be appropriate, while in larger multi-channel businesses, a more sophisticated approach may be required. Yet ultimately, the goals always remain the same – to understand what your customers want and need, and to map out the steps they have to take to achieve their goals. This is the essence of customer journey mapping.

When you first set about creating your Customer Journey Map, there are a number of key considerations to keep in mind.

Don’t try to create your map in isolation

Gaining input from others areas of the business is a great way to explore and formalise the impact that each department has on the customer experience, even if they are one or two steps removed from the front line. Facilitating workshops where diverse stakeholders can share insights encourages closer collaboration and makes for a more detailed and richer map, plus it can help to improve operational effectiveness.

Your brand should feel the same across all touchpoints

When customers are engaging with your organisation they expect a level of service and an experience consistent with your brand values. So when you’re mapping out the customer journey across diverse channels, remember that from the customers’ point of view, it’s all one brand, not different departments with different objectives. So think carefully about how that brand experience is delivered across all touchpoints.

Understanding your customers

Your customer are not all the same, so create detailed pen portraits of your main customer types or segments. This will help to provide insight into how they like to interact with your organisation, how they make their buying decisions, and which transaction channels they prefer. The more you understand your customers, their wants and needs, the more easily you can create a customer journey that delivers them.

Your Customer Journey will evolve continually

Creating a customer journey map isn’t a project with an end date, because sales channels and customer experience can evolve over time as technologies and customer preferences change. So once you’ve “completed” your Customer Journey Map, review it on a regular basis to make sure it reflects the reality of the customer experience. Just as you need to regularly update your Sat Nav to keep up to date with changes to the road network, you should update your Customer Journey Mapping to include changes to the customer journey.

[chrisiqube]

New Post has been published on iQube Marketing Limited

New Post has been published on http://iqubemarketing.staging.wpengine.com/customer-journey-mapping-5-common-mistakes/

Customer Journey Mapping – 5 common mistakes

Challenges to success

The practice of customer journey mapping is being adopted by an increasingly diverse range of organisations. And in a competitive marketplace, the resulting customer service enhancements become a must-have feature if firms are to continue to attract and retain customers. Yet customer journey mapping alone is not sufficient to drive positive change – the lessons from the mapping process must be accepted across the organisation, flaws in the customer journey ironed out, and enhancements implemented. To successfully deliver all the potential benefits, there are many challenges to overcome, and five common pitfalls to avoid.

1. Mapping in isolation

Failure to include all areas of the business in the creation of your customer journey map can be fatal to a successful implementation. That’s because you’ll not only miss out on essential information gathering, you are also likely to struggle to gain buy-in from excluded departments. Without the full support of all relevant areas, together with backing from the executive, successful implementation is likely to remain out of reach.

2. Lack of customer input

When talking to the customer experts and front line staff in your organisation, it’s easy to forget that everything they tell you about the customer journey is in fact one step removed from the actual customer experience. And unless you engage with your customers to gain first-hand insights, all your data will in fact be based on hypothesis. So make sure you carry out sufficient customer research to ensure you’re building your customer journey map on good quality, primary insights.

3. Focus on quantity over quality

Whilst good quality customer research is an essential ingredient of a customer journey map, you shouldn’t fall into the trap of allowing the research phase to take on a life of its own. The research should have a very clear focus and have clear boundaries, otherwise it can evolve into a project in its own right. And as research outputs become increasingly complex, the ability to utilise the learnings within the customer journey mapping can be compromised.

4. A lack of co-ordination

Within most organisations, the customer journey will be impacted by multiple divisions or departments, so it is essential that input from all relevant areas is properly co-ordinated. Strong project governance is therefore essential if all input, recommendations and feedback from all stakeholders is to be fully accounted for.

5. Ignoring opposition

When the production of a customer journey map is one of your strategic objectives, it’s tempting to ignore resistance from other departments, managers or executives. Yet their reservations may be based on sound principles, so rather than ignoring the dissenting voices, listen to them and try to understand where they are coming from. If you accept input only from those people who agree with you, it is inevitable that you will miss out on key insights and considerations. So always keep an open mind, and carefully evaluate all input and feedback, whether supportive or not.

[chrisiqube]

New Post has been published on iQube Marketing Limited

New Post has been published on http://www.iqubemarketing.com/customer-journey-mapping-5-common-mistakes/

Customer Journey Mapping – 5 common mistakes

Challenges to success

The practice of customer journey mapping is being adopted by an increasingly diverse range of organisations. And in a competitive marketplace, the resulting customer service enhancements become a must-have feature if firms are to continue to attract and retain customers. Yet customer journey mapping alone is not sufficient to drive positive change – the lessons from the mapping process must be accepted across the organisation, flaws in the customer journey ironed out, and enhancements implemented. To successfully deliver all the potential benefits, there are many challenges to overcome, and five common pitfalls to avoid.

1. Mapping in isolation

Failure to include all areas of the business in the creation of your customer journey map can be fatal to a successful implementation. That’s because you’ll not only miss out on essential information gathering, you are also likely to struggle to gain buy-in from excluded departments. Without the full support of all relevant areas, together with backing from the executive, successful implementation is likely to remain out of reach.

2. Lack of customer input

When talking to the customer experts and front line staff in your organisation, it’s easy to forget that everything they tell you about the customer journey is in fact one step removed from the actual customer experience. And unless you engage with your customers to gain first-hand insights, all your data will in fact be based on hypothesis. So make sure you carry out sufficient customer research to ensure you’re building your customer journey map on good quality, primary insights.

3. Focus on quantity over quality

Whilst good quality customer research is an essential ingredient of a customer journey map, you shouldn’t fall into the trap of allowing the research phase to take on a life of its own. The research should have a very clear focus and have clear boundaries, otherwise it can evolve into a project in its own right. And as research outputs become increasingly complex, the ability to utilise the learnings within the customer journey mapping can be compromised.

4. A lack of co-ordination

Within most organisations, the customer journey will be impacted by multiple divisions or departments, so it is essential that input from all relevant areas is properly co-ordinated. Strong project governance is therefore essential if all input, recommendations and feedback from all stakeholders is to be fully accounted for.

5. Ignoring opposition

When the production of a customer journey map is one of your strategic objectives, it’s tempting to ignore resistance from other departments, managers or executives. Yet their reservations may be based on sound principles, so rather than ignoring the dissenting voices, listen to them and try to understand where they are coming from. If you accept input only from those people who agree with you, it is inevitable that you will miss out on key insights and considerations. So always keep an open mind, and carefully evaluate all input and feedback, whether supportive or not.

[chrisiqube]

New Post has been published on iQube Marketing Limited

New Post has been published on http://www.iqubemarketing.com/mapping-customer-journey-across-touchpoints/

Mapping your customer journey across touchpoints

Mapping customer touchpoints

If you’re to successfully develop long-term customer relationships and generate greater customer value, it’s important to have a clear picture of the customer journey across all your marketing channels, both at the point of initial engagement and decision-making, and throughout the life of the relationship. This means identifying all customer touchpoints and examining them under a variety of lenses, e.g. marketing, customer service, fulfilment etc.

At each touchpoint, customers may undertake or experience one of five different types of activity

• Encounter – when a potential customer first becomes aware of your brand

• Education – when your product or service benefits are communicated to potential customers • Decision to buy – based on evaluation of perceived benefits • Initial product/service experience – when actual benefits can be assessed • Deepening of customer relationship – the next step in the customer lifecycle

Understanding the customer journey

The below illustration is an example of the type of activities that need to be mapped out and evaluated at each touchpoint. Once you understand the nature of the interaction at each touchpoint, you can develop insight into where opportunities exist for closer engagement, where key decisions are made and why, and how you can exert greater influence on customer choices. You can also develop your understanding of how different customer types engage with your organisation. These may be e.g. new customers, existing customers or returning customers.

When mapping touchpoints, there are a number of factors to keep in mind:

1. Assess each stage from the viewpoint of your customer. 2. If possible, perform customer research to better understand why customers are taking a particular path, or completing a particular action. 3. Identify and define key customer segments and evaluate the typical path for each – this can reveal crucial behavioural variances across different customer types. 4. Don’t overcomplicate the process – simplicity is key if your findings are to be of value, and your recommendations are to be implemented.

Enhancing the customer experience

When the time comes to put your new knowledge to use, your insights can help to improve the customer experience and deliver a range of compelling commercial benefits:

• Increased sales – through the delivery of positive experiences at initial point of interest/encounter • Improved customer service through clearer recognition of key customer requirements across all channels • Mitigate risk of poor customer experience throughout the entire journey • Reduced customer attrition through deeper understanding of each stage in customer lifecycle • Consistent delivery of positive communications across all channels • Continually improve the customer journey through expanded knowledge of where new investment will have greatest impact

[chrisiqube]

New Post has been published on iQube Marketing Limited

New Post has been published on http://iqubemarketing.staging.wpengine.com/dont-panic-just-listen-customers/

Don't Panic Just Listen To Your Customers

The decline of brand power

Many of our biggest, most established grocery brands are seeing declining sales. It is not an overstatement to say that a ‘state of panic’ is sweeping through Britain’s grocery industry driven by fast changing consumer behaviour and the decline of brand power in a fragmenting trading environment.

Brand deflation and pressure are everywhere – major brand prices are falling as well as volumes for a third of our biggest brands witnessing sales decline; brand owners’ requests for price increases are being blocked by retailers and in-store promotional support is at an all-time high with price cuts being the dominant mechanic. At the same time, consumers are still chasing lower prices in the discounters where most of our familiar brands are not stocked.

Grocery retailers are also using price cuts, even off regular pricing, on our favourite brands to encourage shopper loyalty whilst at the same time delisting or reducing shelf-space for the same products. Whilst this is happening more focus is being given to Private label ranges as retailers seek to increase operating margins.

Brands are also being challenged to respond rapidly to the ‘health and obesity agenda’ and are investing in reformulating many established products to reduce sugar and salt content, whilst also needing to launch smaller packs of existing brands to help maintain margins in addition to appeasing the ‘health lobby’.

Consumers’ confidence in our big popular brands is being further eroded by their experiences of ‘me-too’ products often sold in the discount stores. The challenge to maintain brand health and equity through advertising and branding, has never been greater.

With the shopper and trading environment changing so fast, many brand owners are only able to respond tactically and instinctively, whilst strategic planning and NPD are being sacrificed for short-term targets.

The shopper decides

As a consumer market researcher and industry observer, it appears to me that many brand owners and grocery retailers have temporarily lost sight of the longer-term prize – understanding the changing needs of the shopper.

We need to understand what shoppers’ want from brands today as well as what the brand owner believes they want – we don’t appear to asking the important questions. Consumer marketing and research budgets are often being re-allocated to support trade marketing and short-term sales initiatives. As a result in many cases shopper insight and informed innovation are becoming further removed from the commercial culture of brand owners.

To help reverse sales declines, there is a need to go back to ‘marketing basics’ and re-invest in consumer research to ensure there is a clear understanding of what shoppers really want from brands and design products to meet their known needs. This can be achieved through evidence-based consumer and shopper research which will shape your strategic planning and help deliver business growth.

iQube Marketing can support your consumer insight needs and your company vision so just get in touch and start the conversation – we look forward to speaking to you.

[chrisiqube]

New Post has been published on iQube Marketing Limited

New Post has been published on http://www.iqubemarketing.com/iqube-id-launched-ife/

iQube iD Launched at IFE

A unique consumer profiling solution enabling precision marketing for the food and drink industry

iQube iD – Do I target Settlers, Prospectors and Pioneers?

Market research consultancy, iQube Marketing presented the launch of their exciting consumer segmentation at the recent IFE in London – the UK largest food and drink event.

The exhibition was attended by more than 1,000 small to medium sized food and drink suppliers and Euan Kilpatrick, iQube’s Head of Food & Drink was able to advise a number of these companies on how iQube’s unique marketing segmentation can add vital consumer insight, to enable growing businesses to better understand consumer needs in order to grow their sales faster.

Expanded from the principles of Maslow’s ‘hierarchy of needs’, iQube iD offers a unique perspective using survey research to create a consumer segmentation which identifies us all as

[chrisiqube]

New Post has been published on iQube Marketing Limited

New Post has been published on http://iqubemarketing.staging.wpengine.com/using-qualitative-data-shape-customer-journey/

Using qualitative data to shape your customer journey

The changing pace of the customer journey

Every organisation in every sector must recognise that their customers’ journeys are changing at an incredibly rapid pace. And if yours aren’t, you risk being left behind. This evolution is being driven both by technological advancement and by customers demanding greater choice in the way they engage with firms. So businesses should no longer focus on channel management, because this assumes they own the channels, when the reality is that customers now call the shots.

Respecting channel preference

Customers can no longer be easily influenced into selecting a particular channel, either by rewards or pricing incentives. If a customer feels their channel preference isn’t being catered to, or even worse, they are being coerced into channel selection, you’re unlikely to see them again. So respecting channel choice is key to maintaining a strong customer relationship.

The value of qualitative data

Technology has also driven a sharp uplift in the number of providers a customer will review before making their final purchase decision, which makes it more important than ever that your brand achieves stand-out from the competition. Yet measuring how well you’re achieving this, both in terms of product or service quality and in customer experience, is difficult. Data is often in the form of “opinions”, and acquiring this type of qualitative data can be challenging, but not impossible.

Get social

Twitter provides the ideal opportunity to engage more closely with your customers. As potential customers carry out online research, seek opinions about you and your competitors, and search for additional information.Twitter enables you to present information and offer solutions in an informal way. You can instigate and monitor conversations in a relatively controlled way, and capture valuable insight that will inform and shape your customer experience design.

Quality v price

Sure, some customers will only ever be acquired by price alone. But unless you want to get involved in a race to the bottom, you should recognise that you may not win – or even want to win – these customers, and so focus on those who are willing to pay a little more for a better quality product or service. What does this mean for your customer journey? It means that if you’re looking to achieve stand-out in terms of quality, those “quality” attributes must be presented clearly. Don’t make customers go looking for the information they need – accurate and clear product representation is key.

By respecting customers’ channel preferences, applying the insights from qualitative data, and providing opportunities for customers to engage with you and get closer to your brand, you can create a richer experience that is aligned with your customers’ needs and wishes.

[chrisiqube]

New Post has been published on iQube Marketing Limited

New Post has been published on http://iqubemarketing.staging.wpengine.com/customer-journey-mapping-increasing-complexity/

Customer journey mapping and its increasing complexity

Customer journey mapping

Customer touchpoint mapping has long been used by firms to develop and deepen their understanding of their customers’ journey – from identification of a need through to information gathering and purchase. Traditionally, customer touchpoint mapping has tracked a fairly straightforward process that makes it relatively easy to identify key points where customers may be won or lost. Yet the growth in the variety of customer channels, together with a wide range of factors that influence purchasing decisions, has made today’s customer journeys a complex web of inputs, evaluation and decision points. Conventional touchpoint mapping fails to account for the complexities of contemporary customer environments, and this has led to the evolution of customer journey mapping.

Defining customer journey mapping

Without a detailed picture of their customers’ decision-making processes, firms are operating in the dark when it comes to delivering communications that are both relevant and timely. So clarity around the path to purchase is essential if acquisition and retention activity is to be effective. Customer journey mapping considers not only your customers’ needs and objectives, but how they want to achieve those objectives. It considers external factors and other interactions that your customers may experience along their journey. So if you can construct a detailed map of the path to purchase, you will gain a richer picture of your customers’ experience along the way, a close-up view from your customers’ angle, and a deeper understanding of the factors that drive their decision-making.

Benefits of customer journey mapping

• A customer-centric view of the path to purchase • Clear identification of potential customer pain points • Identify opportunities to expand and add greater value to your current offering • Facilitates the development of a consistent customer experience strategy • Informs decision-making at both the tactical and strategic level

The impact of social media

Ultimately, a comprehensive customer journey map will encompass every element that influences your customers’ experience, including external factors such as social media interactions. Social media has created a step change in many customer journeys, as consumers are now being influenced by people they have never met. Social media is changing the whole information gathering process, and in some sectors, it has made the customer journey unrecognisable from 10 years ago.

Challenge and opportunity

Constructing a customer journey map that is sufficiently agile to handle this range of inputs is a big ask for a company that is only just beginning to consider customer journey mapping. But the reality is that, as customer touchpoints multiply, and customer contact data becomes more fragmented, firms will be forced to become smarter about the way they model and predict customer behaviour. That’s a significant challenge, yet it’s one that firms must rise to if they are to interact positively with their customers, and provide a rich and engaging experience in a competitive marketplace.

[chrisiqube]

New Post has been published on iQube Marketing Limited

New Post has been published on http://www.iqubemarketing.com/using-qualitative-data-shape-customer-journey/

Using qualitative data to shape your customer journey

The changing pace of the customer journey

Every organisation in every sector must recognise that their customers’ journeys are changing at an incredibly rapid pace. And if yours aren’t, you risk being left behind. This evolution is being driven both by technological advancement and by customers demanding greater choice in the way they engage with firms. So businesses should no longer focus on channel management, because this assumes they own the channels, when the reality is that customers now call the shots.

Respecting channel preference

Customers can no longer be easily influenced into selecting a particular channel, either by rewards or pricing incentives. If a customer feels their channel preference isn’t being catered to, or even worse, they are being coerced into channel selection, you’re unlikely to see them again. So respecting channel choice is key to maintaining a strong customer relationship.

The value of qualitative data

Technology has also driven a sharp uplift in the number of providers a customer will review before making their final purchase decision, which makes it more important than ever that your brand achieves stand-out from the competition. Yet measuring how well you’re achieving this, both in terms of product or service quality and in customer experience, is difficult. Data is often in the form of “opinions”, and acquiring this type of qualitative data can be challenging, but not impossible.

Get social

Twitter provides the ideal opportunity to engage more closely with your customers. As potential customers carry out online research, seek opinions about you and your competitors, and search for additional information.Twitter enables you to present information and offer solutions in an informal way. You can instigate and monitor conversations in a relatively controlled way, and capture valuable insight that will inform and shape your customer experience design.

Quality v price

Sure, some customers will only ever be acquired by price alone. But unless you want to get involved in a race to the bottom, you should recognise that you may not win – or even want to win – these customers, and so focus on those who are willing to pay a little more for a better quality product or service. What does this mean for your customer journey? It means that if you’re looking to achieve stand-out in terms of quality, those “quality” attributes must be presented clearly. Don’t make customers go looking for the information they need – accurate and clear product representation is key.

By respecting customers’ channel preferences, applying the insights from qualitative data, and providing opportunities for customers to engage with you and get closer to your brand, you can create a richer experience that is aligned with your customers’ needs and wishes.

[chrisiqube]

New Post has been published on iQube Marketing Limited

New Post has been published on http://www.iqubemarketing.com/customer-journey-mapping-emotional-engagement/

Customer Journey Mapping - Emotional Engagement

Enriching your customer journeys through greater emotional engagement

Customer journey mapping has become a must-do process in recent years, yet many organisations are failing to leverage the full value of the exercise. That’s because many customer journey mapping projects fall prey to one of the two most common pitfalls.

Common customer journey mapping pitfalls

Mapping your customers’ journey by putting your own processes under the spotlight – this presents the journey from your perspective, not your customers’. Take the same journey your customers take, and map it from their perspective.

Focusing on the “logical”, while ignoring the “emotional” – no matter how detailed your customer journey map, it’s all-to-easy to evaluate customer experience and engagements in a way that is too “logical”. By this, we mean assessing customer experience from a purely factual perspective. For example, X% of customers experience a delay at point Y, for an average of Z minutes. This may be valuable data, but it fails to account for your customers’ emotional response. It won’t tell you how they feel about this experience. And it’s how they feel that will determine what they do next.

Evaluating emotional response can be a challenge, but it’s critically important – because however logical we may think our customers are, emotion plays a huge role in driving customer decisions.

How to enrich your customer journey through greater emotional engagement

Understand where you are right now – evaluate where your customer journey is currently generating positive emotional responses, where opportunities exist to improve emotional response, and where you’re potentially generating negative emotional responses.

Set objectives – there’s a whole range of positive emotions you can aim for in a customer journey, including: excited, reassured, happy and delighted, eager for more, made to feel part of something. So work out how you would like your customers to feel at each stage in the journey.

Listen to your customers – it’s important to encourage feedback from your customers, because only by listening to what they say will you gain accurate insights into how they’re feeling as they progress through the journey. But be proactive too – perform customer research to understand what emotionally responses are driving their decisions.

Create the right culture – if you don’t have a culture of continual improvement, then it’s likely you will set about improving the customer experience, then when you have achieved your objectives, you will stop. But customer journey enhancement isn’t a project with a target completion date – it has to be built into the fabric of your organisation.

Emotional engagement plays varying roles in different markets. If you’re selling luxury goods, it is perhaps the single most important driver behind purchasing decisions. If you’re selling a commodity product, emotional engagement plays less of a role, but it’s still important. So consider carefully how your customers feel at every point along their journey. Make them feel good, and more of them will come back. Make them feel great, and they’ll come back more often too.