By Scott Gerschwer, OutputLinks
Ten years ago it was all about branding. Every CMO needed to re-brand the organization and instill a sense of brand discipline in each and every employee.
I remember a “Wall of Shame” that consisted of various pieces of customer collateral and business unit-generated content that was inconsistent with a singular brand. The mandate from the new CMO was to destroy every piece and do them over using a distinctive style that represented the brand. The entire organization was indoctrinated by travelling “brand ambassadors” whose mission it was to enforce brand discipline.
The problem was twofold: one, a brand is much more than the sum of its stylistic elements. It is a promise. The goal is for the promise to be excellence and for the organization to live up to that promise. If this commitment to excellence is missing, all the branded logos and marketing doodads and brand advertising means nothing. Second, the entire exercise of branding is inherently inward-focused; that is, on the organization itself, not the customers. At a time when customer was king, branding often seemed to miss the point.
Nowadays “brand” has entered the vernacular. We talked this summer about the “LeBron James” brand, the “Yankees” brand, etc. When a term enters the vernacular, it’s time for the visionary’s to move on (if you already haven’t).
Where visionary CMOs are heading is away from “brand” and toward a focus on customer interactivity. Social media is a key component. For an excellent learning experience, go to the InterACT Conference next week and see superb sessions on creating customer interactive experiences with multiple channel solutions. Sessions featuring Scott Baker, GMC Software; Nick Romano, Prinova and Tom Dyson, Medco; and Jeff Swystun, DDB Worldwide and Beth LaPierre, the Chief Listening Officer from Eastman Kodak all promise excellent value.
I’ve been reading the Buzz Marketing for Technology blogs by Paul Dunay, Global Managing Director of Services and Social Marketing for Avaya, a global leader in enterprise communications. Mr. Dunay is the author of Facebook Marketing for Dummies (Wiley 2009) and writes convincingly about the merits of social media marketing.
Mr. Dunay writes of customer interactivity, stating that the single best place to focus social media efforts is social customer support. Spotting a customer issue, responding to them and solving their problem in minutes using social media provides an exceptional customer experience. And he points to a recent Forrester study, which suggests that customers actually prefer a better customer experience to everyday low prices and, moreover, that a great customer experience drives positive word of mouth (WOM). The goal is to reduce customer churn and increase retention rates; interactive communication does this faster than anything we’ve seen before.
The new CMO is now busy integrating multiple customer touch points (mail, social media, email, website, events, WOM, telephone) and creating interactive customer experiences, which is the best way to uncork the true potential of your customer base and your market.
The lessons of brand discipline will come in handy. Organizations that now employ official bloggers or social media gurus will need to allow many other employees within the organization –maybe all the employees--to fill the need for customer interaction. Those that don’t create another silo and customer interaction will become compartmentalized, canned and stifled. Or as Brian Wallace VP of Digital Marketing and Media for RIM puts it “2 years from now- if I still have a Director of Social Media – I should be fired!”
To assist professionals in navigating among the wide variety of print, online, mobile and social media solutions enabling highly personalized and interactive transaction and statement based marketing communications utilizing, the OutputLinks Group will be soon be launching CMOConnects. Watch for an announcement in a few weeks.