Q:
We've been marketing our company's products and services
successfully for several years now. But lately, our results have
been declining. We have good products, but our repeat business is
not what it should be. Any advice?
A:
Perhaps you're feeling the bite of a recent change in customer
focus. Right now, customers are less motivated by promises
concerning products or services alone and are showing greater
interest in what they can expect from the "ownership
experience." Instead of marketing what your product or service
does, the question is: What kind of experience are your customers
hoping to have when they buy from you?
A recently released Wunderman Brand Experience Scorecard, a
study that demonstrates the importance of customer experience,
concluded that brand experience drives loyalty. It showed that
consumers will even pay a premium for the brands they feel provide
a better overall experience. And what bothers customers most is
when the reality of owning a product or using a service doesn't
live up to the expectations raised by the company's
marketing.
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For many entrepreneurs, this means changing from a purely
product- or service-driven approach to one that emphasizes what the
customer can expect after the purchase. For example, suppose your
company marketed a machine with only eight moving parts--an
improvement over competing products that are more complex and
consequently subject to greater operational problems. To be
consistent with today's new marketing approach, you
wouldn't simply market a machine that promises less frequent
breakdown. Instead, you'd need to take it one step further and
market the benefits of the ownership experience. For example, less
frequent breakdown will result in lower-cost operation and peace of
mind for purchasers.
Match Perception With Reality
The Wunderman Scorecard shows that "performance"--whether
a company and its products and services meet needs better than
others--is only one part of the equation. Another extremely
important factor is "treatment," or the degree to which
customers have favorable interactions with your company.
What happens when a customer has a problem or a question? How
easily is it resolved? The difference between perception--the
expectations raised in marketing--and reality is often a stumbling
block for entrepreneurial businesses. For example, if your
marketing program promises prompt, 24-hour technical support, but
evening callers have to spend 20 to 30 minutes on hold waiting for
service, perception and reality clash. Or suppose you send out a
direct-mail piece offering a money-back guarantee. Your sales staff
is briefed, but when they're unavailable, your office staff is
unsure of how to handle the calls. As a result, there's a
disconnect between the promises made in your marketing and the
reality customers face when measuring the experience they have
working with your company.
Take a Test Drive
Whether your business has three or 30 people on staff, customers
must receive consistent, positive support in order to remain loyal
and for your business to build repeat sales. Unlike large
businesses, which typically use outside call centers where
personnel are trained to handle customer interactions in a
proscribed way, small businesses tend to take customer calls
in-house. So it's vital to keep all members of your staff
up-to-date on your marketing programs and train them to handle
inbound calls--yes, even the bookkeepers if they sometimes answer
the phone.
To make sure you're not letting customers down, try
experiencing each contact point in your organization from the
customers' point of view. You can evaluate how your company
performs by hiring a mystery shopping firm or asking several
friends to test your company's customer service performance by
calling or stopping in with a variety of problems or questions over
the course of several weeks. That should give you the information
you need to improve customer interactions, and it will provide
important clues to the ways you can more effectively market the
ownership experience.
Kim T. Gordon is an author, marketing coach and media
spokesperson-and one of the country's foremost experts on
entrepreneurial success. Her newest book, Bringing Home The Business, identifies the
30 "truths" that can make the difference between success
and failure in a homebased business. Kim offers one-on-one coaching
by telephone to motivated individuals, providing practical
marketing advice and budget-conscious strategies unique to your
business. To receive free how-to articles and advice, get
information on coaching and appearances, read a book excerpt, or
contact Kim, visit http://www.smallbusinessnow.com,
a huge site devoted exclusively to marketing your small
business.
The opinions expressed in this column are those
of the author, not of Entrepreneur.com. All answers are intended to
be general in nature, without regard to specific geographical areas
or circumstances, and should only be relied upon after consulting
an appropriate expert, such as an attorney or
accountant.