*** This article originally appeared on OnDemandCMO.com
Customer Centricity
In five years, what will fundamentally change the customer experience as we know it today?
This Conversation on the Future of Business is brought to you by SAP & MIT Technology Review Custom.
Before we can accurately answer this question, we must first understand how customers themselves are changing. Empowered by technology, transparency, and an abundance of information, today’s consumers are dictating new terms of modern commerce. They want their voices to be heard. They insist on transacting across multiple mediums. And they expect their needs to be anticipated. They are a demanding lot, and when their needs are not met, they will not hesitate to patronize a competitor, or broadcast their displeasure to everyone they know (and even some they don’t).
Not surprisingly, this customer revolution is driving change deep throughout the value chain of most product and service providers. Perhaps that’s why, in response to our question about what will fundamentally change the customer experience as we know it, @ashulman2600 responded simply, “Just about everything.”
Indeed companies are dedicating entire teams to studying this customer phenomenon, even appointing chief customer officers to lead the charge. And the number-one weapon at their disposal is, without question, data. “I think real intelligence about the customer will be applied to every transaction, experience and interaction,” responded @robfinley. “Big Data will be at the core.”
But how will this data transform the customer experience, exactly? Our reader responses can best be summed up by what we’re calling the 3Ps: Participation, Personalization, and Prediction.
Let’s take participation first. Already consumers expect their feedback to be incorporated into product development. Many of these so-called “prosumers” exert influence by reviewing products, “liking” companies, and sharing impressions over various social mediums. But what happens when companies begin actively courting customers to contribute to all aspects of the value chain, collecting structured and unstructured data from a variety of sources to inform everything from the way goods and services are conceived and designed to how they are produced, delivered, and serviced? In this way, the customer experience will be fundamentally altered, molding itself to ever-changing customer desires and fostering greater loyalty, faster development cycles, and increased customization.
Which brings us to personalization. When customers are more active participants in the development cycle, they expect to see products and services that incorporate their input and meet their specific needs. How customer data informs this process is well understood. But these data-driven insights are now being married with powerful custom-manufacturing technologies, such as 3-D printers, that bring true personalization to life. “Customers will continue to want more customized products and services,” posted @ashulman2600. “With advances in 3D printing, digital currency transactions and other areas, consumers will be more robust prosumers.”
And finally, prediction. Perhaps @Dog21 captured this best in his response: “In 5-years Customer Centricity will be like Wayne Gretzky was in hockey: ‘I skate to where the puck is going to be, not where it has been.’ There will be so much relevant data, business leaders will be able to predict and alter behavior/decisions accordingly, well in advance of market shifts.”
In five years, the customer experience will be radically different. The expectations of the new breed of customer will continue to soar. And they will be looking for opportunities to participate in the development cycle, personalize their products and services, and have their needs predicted. But, fueled by massive new sources of powerful customer data, companies can position themselves to meet these expectations. And if they don’t, their customers won’t be shy about letting them know.
This article is part of the Conversation on the Future of Business by SAP & MIT Technology Review Custom. Read the full series:https://www.technologyreview.com/sites/default/files/collections/SAP_Intelligence_Report.pdf
Reprinted with permission. Copyright 2014 MIT Technology Review
How To Determine The Best Social Media Platform For Your Business
By Sarah Greesonbach
With the hundreds of social media platforms available to your business, it’s hard to know where to start. Should you learn to be active on a platform you’re most comfortable with? Should you learn the platform your customers seem to like the most? If only there were an easy way to figure out where to start….
While it may never be second nature to you — after all your business is your passion, not social media! — it is possible to narrow your activity to a few choice platforms to maximize your ROI for your time. The key is to focus on your ideal customer and create content optimized for the social platforms that customer inhabits.
Choosing the Right Social Media Platform for Your Business
The Where Should You Spend Your Time info graphic divides your attention into several different demographics.
For starters, if you’re an Internet Business or a Brick & Mortar Business, you likely have different needs than a B2C Business or a B2B Business
In much the same way, a company seeking increased SEO will want to use a different platform than a company seeking to create Viral Content, or increase Product Sales or Services Sales.
And what about your target market? A company looking to target Children Ages 2-13 or Young Adults Ages 14-19 will no doubt need to be active on a different platform than those looking to influence New Adults ages 18-25, Professionals ages 25-50, or Seniors Ages 50+.
Why is it so important to identify each of these characteristics? Because each of them will influence whether your best time investment is blogging on your website, Google +, Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, or Linked In.
Case Study: How Can My Online Business Get Viral Content to Young Professionals?
Let’s say you’re an online business looking to be develop more viral content for Professionals, in particular males in the age range of 27-35.
Because of how the average 27-35 year old male spends his time on the internet (that is, not sharing updates on Facebook or engaging on Google+), the best platform and strategy for this audience would be creative info graphics on a blogging platform that are then shared to Pinterest.
Why? Because Tumblr is more popular for teens, Facebook more popular for young adult women, and 27% of Twitter users are Young Adults. You wouldn’t be getting the best investment in your time by posting there.
So, Where Should You Post?
But for a Professional male performing a web search at work and at home, wondering how his suit should fit? The SEO on the blog is the number one source to access.
It’s also important to keep in mind that in the same study quoted above, 84% of U.S. Pinterest users are women. Translation? That’s a great audience to introduce to an amazing info graphic that is useful for that woman’s husband, partner, or friend, and share on Pinterest.
An Infographic in the Wild
A great example of finding success by choosing the right social media platform for your audience? Just take a look at Real Men Real Style’s break out infographic, “How a Man’s Suit Should Fit”.
Creating this useful, masculine infographic and sharing it on the highly-optimized blog, they made it easy to find and easy to share through Pinterest and for those performing a web search for “How a man’s suit should fit”. This combination created a maximum return that wouldn’t have happened if it were released on Twitter, Tumblr, or another cross-section of platforms.
Not sure where you should be investing your time? Save the info graphic, circle the keywords that best describe your company, and email it to
[email protected] for a free digital strategy consultation!
About the Author
Sarah Greesonbach takes social media and content marketing off your to-do list, leaving you to love your business. View more tips for digital and content marketing at https://www.GreesonbachCreat
ive.com.
3 Branding Mistakes To Avoid As Your Business Grows
By Jason Houck
Building a brand can be an exciting process, and when business is booming, the first instinct of many marketers is to get new ideas out there as quickly as possible. That instinct is easy to understand – your business is growing, and you want nothing more than to share your excitement with the rest of the world. Unfortunately, in many of these circumstances, marketers fail to notice the big mistakes they’re making in promoting their brand. Take note of these three major branding mistakes in order to avoid making them in your own business.
Straying From Your Brand’s Core Identity
Once your business starts to grow and you’re ready to build on that growth, expanding you brand is a good idea. But your expansion should never come at the expense of your brand’s core identity. For example, if your brand is built upon finding environmental solutions for small businesses, then it wouldn’t make much sense for you to start selling motorcycle jackets or printing car bumper stickers with your logo on them. Every expansion needs to be aligned with the original principles upon which your company is built. If not, you will come off as phony, or worse, a traitor to your brand’s core values.
Getting Sucked into Buzzword Marketing
You’ve probably heard lots of marketing phrases like this before: “We locally source free range, certified organic food products from small batch sources in order to ensure the highest level of sustainability and food security.” There are lots of appealing words there, but the problem is, none of them mean anything anymore. When a marketing term becomes a buzzword, it means that people are tired of hearing about it. Buzzword marketing is easy to get sucked into, because often buzzwords do provide a good description of what your business offers. However, even if a buzzword is accurate, that doesn’t mean that it’s a good term to use. Instead, think of original ways to describe what your brand has to offer. That way, people will actually want to listen to what you have to say.
Social Media Faux-pas
When it comes to saying something stupid and having that stupid statement immediately broadcast to millions of people, social media is definitely your best bet. Social media is great for up-to-the-minute communication, but sometimes it’s better to sit back and think about something for a few minutes before tweeting it out for the world to see. Example: During the 2011 uprising in Egypt, fashion designer Kenneth Cole tweeted: “Millions are in uproar in #Cairo. Rumor is they heard our new spring collection is now available online…”
How’s that for poor taste?
The take-away from all of these mistakes is: even though the marketing world moves quickly, sometimes the best policy is to think twice before launching your next marketing plan. Brand growth is a good thing, but growth can quickly turn into a very bad thing if it isn’t managed correctly. Branding is important to your virtual office business, so make sure you get it right.
About the Author
Hello friends. My name is Jason Houck and blogging along with Social Media Management is my passion. I reside in the mountains of North Carolina and would not trade it for the world. I am 32 years old and single and believe in living life to the fullest. I am here to weigh my mind on issues that we face everyday as an individual and to help you create success on topics, such as social media, family, life and business.
To sum things up, I love God and my family is a big part of my life. I encompass an “I can do it” attitude along with using creativity. If there is something that you would like me to comment on and share my ideas about in my blog, feel free to message me. I also welcome all negative and positive feedback. Until then, happy blogging.
Crowdfunder Blunder: Leverage Crowdfunding or Waste of Time?
Have you ever heard aspiring entrepreneurs casually say: "Oh I'll just put it on Kickstarter". I've heard that quite a bit recently and I thought I'd investigate.
People throw around the word "crowdfunding" like a party favor. Crowdfunding is the networking and pooling of individual funds for a project, often in return for a gift. Last year "crowdfunding" and "crowdsourcing" were buzz words, and the popularity of Crowdfunding sites still reign supreme. In a recent count, every niche seems to have its own crowdfunding site.
Crowdfunding seems like a great way to fund your startup without the hassle of investors that want their money back, and with instant validation from potential customers. Kickstarter, which has to date provided $786 million (as of Sept 2013) in funding is always a great case study for the benefits of crowdfunding. But what many entrepreneurs don't hear about is the flip side. I recently fumbled across YourKickstarterSucks which shows the sad fate of pitches that should never have been posted to begin with. If you think crowdfunding is the best method for gaining some traction on your business idea, consider the following: 10% of projects on Kickstarter completed their round, without receiving a single pledge, and 56% do not get funding because they don't reach their goal - an unfortunate #entrepreneurfail.
The only way a project will be a good candidate for crowdfunding, is if the target investors and donors are both willing and able to align with the project conceptually and financially.Now, say you do identify a project that makes sense to crowdfund. Here are some uidelines about posting a project on a crowdfunding site to maximize the returns for both your venture and the investors:
1) Be realistic about the total goals Make project crystal clear, concise and super easy to communicate
2) Show evidence of potential future success - through past sales or market research
3) Provide compelling gifts for investors/donators
Good luck as you vie for the hearts and wallets of your target market… and cheers to no more crowdfunder blunders.