Deborah Eastman

"The only card excepted there"?

2008-08-19T08:47:00.000-07:00

If you've been watching the Olympics along with millions of other viewers you have seen the VISA ads. While some have criticized their focus on American athletes and ending with the tag line "go world", I'm more interested in why they end the commercial with the message "the only card accepted there". Where is a value proposition in that?

The ads are pretty good, evokes pride in American athletes, but I don't think ending with "the only card accepted there" evokes pride or loyalty to VISA. It says to me, we paid enough sponsorship dollars to lock up this venue and trap all customers to using our card. Hum, is that something you want to advertise?

While I can appreciate the economics of sponsoring an event like the Olympics at upwards of $750,000 for 30 seconds, and the economic return they gain by having VISA as the only card earning their transaction fees at the Olympics, I would not advertise that to the consumer. That's not a value proposition for the consumer, that's a business reality.

* Letter to Joseph Jaffe * Comments on your recent podcast *

2008-08-06T13:08:00.000-07:00

Dear Joseph,

I have been an avid listener to Jaffe Juice/Across the Sound for 2 years now. I believe my first episode was in the 20s or 30s. I wanted to participate in some recent conversations from your podcast.

1. Regarding your partnership with Deliver magazine and the listeners comment about their most recent “conversation starter” attempting to separate themselves for the impact of direct mail on the environment. When you began the sponsorship with USPS, I complexly understood the need to create a business model that made sense for podcasting. However, the “announcer” that delivers the “conversation starter” is anything by conversational. In my opinion their segment is just another form of the “30 second spot”. Advertisers have trained us to tune out the voice over and this is no different. I enjoy your audio comments, your rants, and your guests, but honestly you need to lose the commercial sounding message. If Deliver magazine wants to participate in the conversation, make it a conversation, not a commercial message. Put a real person on that is an expert in their business, in the industry, not a hired voice. I’m quite surprised that you have let this go on as long as you have as I find the segment off message.

2. Secondly regarding your recent discussion of the Net Promoter Score. First, let me make sure all disclaimers are completed. I’m the CMO of Satmetrix, the co-developer of Net Promoter and an organization that makes it’s living helping companies implement Net Promoter. In your most recent podcast you indicated that “easy to do business with” was the most accurate reflection of loyalty, not NPS. In the original research behind Net Promoter we found “likelihood to recommend” to be strongest correlate to actual customer behavior, with “easy to do business with: coming in at #5. While I get the point that it’s about the experience, doesn’t it make sense that recommendation sets the bar higher than easy to do business with? In your Delta experience, their lack of easy to do business with not only impacted your loyalty, but also your recommendation.

3. On the topic of Delta airlines, I encourage you to be the Jeff Jarvis of the airline industry and take up the battle with Delta. I will sign up for your war against poor customer experience. One way I am considering is to play a portion of your podcast in my module of the Net Promoter Certification training. I teach the closing module of which a portion is to redefine the customer experience for an airline. Funny how we all find that airlines needs this re-engineering but they just can’t seem to do anything about it! You would be amused at some of the experience design our students come up with.

I could “rant” on and on about the topics covered on Jaffe Juice, but a long blog post won’t get read. In summary, I ask that you:

1. Reconsider the delivery of your commercial sponsor more along the tone of a conversation.
2. Reconsider Net Promoter as a measure of both loyalty and word of mouth.
3. Take on Delta airlines and enlist your fan base to fight the war with you. Jeff Jarvis did Dell a big favor, look how far they have come in joining the conversation. Perhaps you could be that helpful to Delta.

I was disappointed to have missed you at WOMMA this year, but I was teaching Net Promoter in London at the time. Hope our paths cross in the future. Let me say explicitly, I recommend Jaffe Juice and Join the Conversation to all marketers. This captures both my loyalty and my positive word of mouth.

Bad Profits are just plain BAD

2008-04-30T15:40:00.000-07:00

I am an American Airlines frequent flyer. While I would not consider myself a promoter (I was Passive), I have just turned Detractor. Oh, I'll continue to fly on American domestically because of the benefits I get, but I have taken my last international flight on American.

Even with flight status, American does not allow electronic upgrades on International flights. To secure a business class seat, you have to use miles and pay a $300 fee EACH WAY! In addition, if you request the upgrade within 30 days of your flight it is a $100 expedite fee! Even then you can be "wait listed" and may or may not get upgraded.

On my recent flight to London I had a nightmare reservation thanks to a travel agent error. This fee structure combined with the fact that American does not fly direct to London, creating a 3 hour delay out of Chicago this week, has changed my Net Promoter status and my "continue to buy". I'm ready for another airline to take me to/from London. If I like them enough I may switch my domestic flights as well.

The point here is this nickle and dime philosophy has cost American my International business. This is the perfect example of what Fred would call bad profits. Profits at the expense of loyalty.

American, do you listen to your customers? Fix this policy! Is it really necessary to charge a $100 expedite fee in todays world of Internet connectivity? What cost do you incur? Is it worth the thousands of dollars I would have otherwise spent to travel back and forth to Europe several times a year?

Net Promoter Adoption

2008-04-17T17:33:00.001-07:00

Hello old friends, it's been a while. I'm trying to get my corporate blog to be more real-time, so in the meantime, I'm back to my personal blog and back in the game.

I have the opportunity to speak often on Net Promoter as part of my role as CMO at Satmetrix, including teaching Net Promoter certification. One of the key themes I share with business leaders is that Net Promoter Score is easy to adopt across a large complex organization because everyone can understand the concept of making more Promoters and less Detractors.

Well, recently my husband has returned to the consulting business. As part of my marketing consultation I recommended he start blogging to increase his visibility in the market. His recent post is a great illustration of how easy it is to understand and adopt NPS. Because of my influence, nearly every customer experience he has is critiqued, and he catagorizes himself as a Promoter or Detractor. With the power of the Internet, his Promoter/Detractor status is now displayed for all to see.

While he is still new and gaining readership, I noticed when I did a google search for him today that his blog was mentioned on an apache blog posting. For those not in the software world, this is a big deal!

Let the word of mouth begin!

Blogging and Day Jobs

2007-12-08T09:00:00.001-08:00

Well, as you can see it's been a long time since I posted anything. As noted in a prior post, I took a day job as CMO at Satmetrix. Since that time, life has been crazy.

In addition to the many things on the to-do list, my husband and I took a two week vacation down the Rhine River. It was the first time in nearly 10 years that we went on a real vacation without kids! Pictures are available here. It was an awesome trip and as a result, I would highly recommend Uniworld. In fact, we liked it so much we are returning next year with our new friends to take a trip through Eastern Europe from Budapest to Prague on the Danube.

I also started a Facebook account to learn more about that form of social media, and launched the Satmetrix blog. For more frequent postings on the world of Customer Loyalty, visit me here.

In the meantime, I will maintain this blog site and post whenever possible. I'm still very passionate about sharing my own customer experiences with various brands and communicating events in my life.

The Net Promoter Debate

2007-07-19T13:07:00.000-07:00

There is a healthy conversation happening about Net Promoter, it's link to growth, and it's success in driving customer centric organization.

The debate has been stirred up recently by a paper published in the Journal of Marketing where they authors attempt to discredit the research done by Satmetrix and Fred Reichheld on the connection between Net Promoter and growth.

After reading the Journal of Marketing paper, I have the following observations.

1. In Table 1, they show a correlation between revenue and commonly used satisfaction/loyalty metrics in various industries. The Net Promoter research was done at the organizational level demonstrating the correlation of an organization's Net Promoter Score and their growth rate. The research in the Journal of Marketing is different in it's approach and has little in common with the original research. Organizations use Net Promoter to measure their own customer loyalty and to benchmark their performance relative to their competitors.

2. In Figure 1 the Journal of Marketing research shows that Net Promoter is, at a minimum, equivalent to ACSI in correlating to growth. That says that a simple metric driven by a single question is at least as accurate at predicting growth than a more complex algorithm driven by multiple questions.

3. This conversation is missing the point that is attracting business leaders. The value of Net Promoter is its simplicity. Unlike complex satisfaction indexes, Net Promoter is easy to understand and take action on. Simplified surveys drive higher response rates, a better reflection of the customers that matter, rather than random sampling. Using real-time reporting, leaders can get information in the hands of employees that can address detractors, move the passives and nurture the promoters.

At the end of the day, it’s what companies do to improve loyalty that drives growth. Net Promoter offers an approach that is understandable by everyone in the business, not just the statisticians. This gives an organization a rallying cry for building customer-centric organizations. The paper lists a number of business leaders that are doing exactly that including companies such as GE, T-Mobile, Intuit, Progressive, Overstock.com, and American Express.

Net Promoter is a disruptive approach to traditional research. It does not attempt to replace all forms of market research, but creates a formula for understanding customer loyalty and focusing an organization on delighting customers and building Promoters that will protect and grow revenues. Net Promoter is not just a score, and not just a survey design; but an overall approach for how organizations collect, distribute and use the information to improve customer relationships. Leaders adopting Net Promoter want to do more than watch the score, they want to improve it. Read the many success stories of companies adopting Net Promoter and decide for yourself whether this approach will help you drive customer centricity in your organization.

Here are some of my favorite responses to the debate:

NPS What is it REALLY good for..., where the author says:

This all aside, however, I think the true value of the Net Promoter Score as a tool within companies lies simply in the focus on the customer it generates.
Where many marketers are now buried under reams of data, KPI’s, customer satisfaction studies, brandvalue analysis, etc ad infinitum, this is replaced by one single and easy to handle and understand metric. It focuses the organization on concrete results, on “how will we delight” instead of generic customer satisfaction indexes. It creates a dollars-and-cents conversation due to the measurable value of an individual promoter to the company. And again it focuses the organization on precisely that point – to get more profitable customers (insert dollar value here) I need to improve specifically X, Y and Z. “Here you go, dear finance director – my new marketing initiative will generate this ROI for the company, because of 500 detractors being turned into promoters, generating 1000 X, 500 Y and 750 Z. “

Net Promoter and Customer Loyalty

But does this matter? The answer is probably not. While Keiningham’s statistical analysis might be correct - and it’s important that we should take no proprietary management tool as gospel - it perhaps misses the point. Brands everywhere need a simple method to point them in the right direction; if anything encourages them to cut down on long, pointless customer surveys and look more closely at what people really want, surely that is a good thing?

Posted Love this comment on July 19, 2007 17:55
Alain Thys:

Stefan

to continue our phone conversation online :-) I thin k you hit closest to home with the "focus comment". As a CEO or Senior executive you're confronted with a gazillion KPI's which gives everyone in the organisations a large amount of excuses to everything under the sun, except "delight" the customer. focusing everyone on "one metric" may not be academically correct (but who cares), it does get the point across and eliminated internal excuses. It also is extremely helpful in getting various "silos" in the organisation to pay attention to the same thing.

Deb Eastman Joins Satmetrix

2007-07-17T07:55:00.001-07:00

For those of you I missed in my email distribution. I sent the following note last night to announce my new Adventure.

Dear Friends & Colleagues,

After much consideration I have decided to rejoin the corporate world. I have accepted the role of Chief Marketing Officer at Satmetrix. I know this comes as a surprise to many of you, but after careful consideration I have decided this is the right move for me at this time. While I have thoroughly enjoyed the last year of consulting, one of the reasons I have enjoyed it so much is because of the work I have done with Satmetrix and their clients. I have a real passion for customer experience/customer loyalty and Satmetrix is experiencing tremendous success in helping companies implement enterprise wide customer loyalty programs. Net Promoter presents a market disruption that I just can’t sit on the side lines and watch, I want to get into the game and help companies win.

My background in deploying similar programs at BearingPoint and my passion for strategic marketing makes this the perfect sandbox to play in. The CEO, Richard Owen, and I have talked about this for years and it’s time to make it happen. I have had the opportunity to work with the management team over the past 6 months and believe we have a real opportunity to drive the business to the next level.

So, for now I will have to give up my mid day walks in the hills and my poolside conference room to take another ride on the corporate train. Wish me luck as I take on this new challenge. My new contact information is deb.eastman@satmetrix.com, but I will keep my Windward account active as well. I look forward to catching up with many of you soon.

Best,

Deb

For more details, here is the press release.

Customer Experience and Employee Pride

2007-07-12T09:28:00.002-07:00

As I logged in today I can't believe it's been a month since I last posted. I guess all those posts were written in my head instead of online. Oh well, that's what happens when you are busy.

In late June I received a comment on my posting "Creating detractors and why you should not use AIT". A previous AIT employee, Steve W writes:

"Sorry to hear about your bad experience, Deborah. I worked at AIT awhile back and your complaints come as no surprise. Let's just say you aren't the only customer they've managed to drive away. There really is no excusing such a poor customer experience. I'm sorry to have ever been employed by them."

Wow, does that say it all about this company's lack of focus on customer experience? How would you like your employees to be sorry they were ever employed by you?

This leads me to an observation. In all the companies I have worked with in customer experience, very few do anything to measure employee loyalty and employee perception of the organizations ability to deliver to customer expectations. What a missed opportunity. While collecting the customer's perceptions and experience is critical to improving your performance, are you missing a key opportunity with your employees to evaluate and improve performance while raising employee pride. Your employees are the ones handling the customer issues, they are quite aware of what you need to do differently. Don't forget this very important stakeholder in your feedback processes.

On a related note, I found this article on Enterprise Rent-a-Car. Enterprise was showcased in Fred's book, "The Ultimate Question". Looks like they take employee pride to the next level investing their philanthropic efforts in areas that matter most to their employees. What a great way to further employee pride. Next time I rent a car, I'm renting from Enterprise.

Blue Cross/WellPoint Changes Detractor to Promoter

2007-06-11T09:11:00.000-07:00

Another customer facing employee makes a difference!

In my last posting I told a story of my painful experience trying to get an allergy prescription refilled. The posting illustrated two primary issues, 1. the connectivity of our health care system from the insurance company, to the physician to the pharmacy, and 2. the customer experience at Blue Cross. At the end of my posting I was clearly a Detractor of Blue Cross and my husband wanted to switch insurance companies and suggested I write the attorney general. When I finished the posting I sent a link to the media contacts listed at the Blue Cross website and asked if they had anyone there that cared about customer experience. Today I found someone does care.

First thing this morning I get a call and an email from Sandy, a Director of Pharmacy services from Wellpoint. Here's an excerpt from the email:

Ms. Eastman - can you please call me to resolve your prescription issue with Blue Cross of California?

I understand you are having problems, and I would like to help.

I called Sandy right away and within 10 minutes she had resolved my problem and made sure I had a lifetime approval for the drug. WOW, she genuinely cared about getting my problem resolved! Then to WOW me even further she asked if I would take the time to explain my experience. I told her the story and she apologized for my experience, explained that they want to improve the connectivity between insurance, physicians and the pharmacy and to improve the overall patient experience. She also shared that I should not have been referred back to my doctor and that they would go back to the recorded call to learn more about what happened. That's the first time I had any insight into anyone actually using the recorded calls.

This story demonstrates the opportunity for organizations to address their experience issues and build customer loyalty. Friday afternoon I was clearly a Detractor for Blue Cross/WellPoint. As I do often when I have bad experience I tell everyone I know and I vote with my dollars. Thanks to the efforts of one individual at this company, I have moved to Promoter status. Why? Because, while Sandy was the hero in this story, someone from the media department routed this internally to get to the right people. This is an organization that is demonstrating they care enough to do something about their experience gaps. Sometimes a bad experience offers a greater opportunity to create Promoters than if everything is going well and you are "satisfied".

Thank you Sandy and Blue Cross/WellPoint for caring enough to do something about the situation and better understand the experience from outside your organizational walls. You have restored my faith in your organization and I'm hoping you can tackle the bigger issues of patient experience. I am impressed and will remain a loyal Blue Cross/WellPoint customer as long as you continue to demonstrate you care.

One last thing Sandy, after you tackle the experience issues, perhaps you can figure out the branding strategy for your company. Blue Cross/Blue Shield/WellPoint NextRX is pretty confusing. I see that you are a licensee of Blue Cross/Blue Shield for California and other states, but there should be a better way to represent the brand to the average consumer who won't Google you to understand who they are doing business with. But that's a topic for another day.

There is no "care" in Health Care

2007-06-08T09:04:00.000-07:00

Perhaps my expectations are not set properly. Are we "customers" of the health care system or financial burdens?

Over a week ago I requested a refill for my allergy medicine. This is medication I have refilled several times, but this time I received an automated notice that my prescription cannot be refilled as it needs doctor authorization. How can it need doctor authorization when my doctor prescribed it to me?

So, I call my doctor and they tell me they have to authorize the insurance company. They ask me the same questions they ask every time, have I taken this or that. Yes, I have tried it all and this is one only medication that works for me. Why would I go through all this trouble if there is a solution I can pick up at the grocery store?

A week later my allergies are getting worse and my evenings are miserable. Today I call again, the pharmacy has no update, the doctor says they sent the authorization to the insurance company and they will send a message to my doctor. I decide to call the insurance company, that's when the real fun begins.

I call the contact center at Blue Cross, go through 5 menu options and get a recording that they are in a staff meeting and to call back. They do not offer me the option of leaving a message, the automated attendant actually said they are in a staff meeting, call back and then disconnected my call. WOW, that's the worst possible customer experience.

Thirty minutes later I call again and this time I skip the menu options and get right to a person. They, of course, can't help me. They transfer me to the "pharmacy" department where I give my member id, birth date, address and describe my problem AGAIN! This agent isn't very friendly, but I'm not very friendly at this point either. She asks me if they filled out a specific form. How am I supposed to know what forms they have to send back and forth? I'm a patient trying to get my allergy medicine, not an expert in claim processing. She tells me I need to call my doctor as they don't have the authorization. My doctor told me they sent the authorization a week ago, so it's clear that I am lost in this inefficient process.

I call my doctor's office again, only to have them tell me they will send my doctor another note. That's helpful!*#! Meanwhile, my eyes are puffy, I'm sneezing and enjoying all the allergens California has to offer. I'm lost in our health care system and I'll probably go down today and pay the $123 for the prescription and put us all out of this pain.

This experience demonstrates another challenge organizations face in managing their customer experience, partnership. How does your ecosystem affect your customer experience? While the health care system may not care if I'm a customer or not, organizations focused on growth need to understand how their partners affect the customer experience and eventually loyalty. If we weren't trapped in health care options based on the selection of our employers, I would be looking for a new insurance company today.

Customer - Company Disconnects

2007-05-31T12:17:00.001-07:00

Yesterday CRM Advocate had a great post on "The Grand Disconnect". They describe a study done by Accenture where they found three quarters of technology vendors felt they deliver an above average service, and half think they are best-of-class. In the same study, 78% of their customers felt they have average or below average service. Sound familiar?

Bain did a similar study where they found 80% believe they deliver a "superior experience" to customers. But when Bain asked their customers, they said only 8% are really delivering.

This is our reality. Companies need to get focused on improving their customer experience or they will feel the pain in future revenue and stock price. They need to build processes to listen to customers at every touch point and find ways to optimize for the customer's benefit, not their own. The cost cutting measures of offshore call centers, automated call routing, lower training budgets and reduced headcount are costing you money. You need to find the balance between managing your profitability and keeping your revenue.

Why do organizations remain delusional about their quality of service? Listen to your customers, not yourselves.

Brand Experience Disconnects

2007-05-30T20:01:00.000-07:00

I recently had some interesting experiences with American Airlines that demonstrate the disconnect most companies have in delivering a consistent customer experience across their organizational boundaries.

In a recent business trip to New York and London I used miles to upgrade to Business Class. When I requested the upgrade a couple weeks before my departure, the agent informed me there was a co-pay for the upgrade.

Bad Experience #1: In their cost cutting efforts, loyalty (as measured in miles) is no longer sufficient for the footrest and poor food. However, since I was on a client engagement and needed to work, I agreed to the charge. The agent took my credit card and put me on the upgrade list.

My upgrade cleared a few days before departure and I headed to the airport at 6:30am on a Sunday morning (ah, the joys of business travel). When I tried to check-in on the website and then again at the self service station, I got a cryptic message that referred me to the agent.

Bad Experience #2: Why can’t they give you some indication of what was wrong from the website so I could plan for this delay?

I head over to the business class check in, waited in line and when I got to the agent, I felt like I was in that scene from Meet the Parents where Ben Stiller stands there while the agent types away, looking confused and spending a lot of time reading screens.

Bad Experience #3: After several minutes I find out that in order to clear my upgrade I need to pay an additional $50 “expedite fee” to pull my miles. I inquired why I was paying this fee when, a. the phone agent never mentioned it, and b. I made the upgrade request at least 2 weeks ago. I was informed that within 7-21 days it was $50 to expedite pulling the miles from my account. In today’s connected world, how can 2 weeks be expediting anything? Because I asked, I had to wait at least another 15 minutes for the agent to learn why this fee applied, delaying my journey to the gate even longer. Why are the agents unequipped to address these questions?

After 30 minutes at the check-in counter we finally sort everything out, I give up and give my credit card so I can get to the gate before my flight leaves and it’s all irrelevant. While walking to the gate, all I could think about was why do I maintain loyalty to this airline that treats me like this. So many people have raved about Virgin and Jet Blue and maybe it was time to forget about status, as it doesn’t really seem to matter any more.

While American Airlines corporate policy and agent education has much to be desired, a flight attendant in New York made a big difference. When departing JFK one morning, I went to turn off my cell phone before departure only to find that my cell phone is missing. I panicked. How would I survive without a cell phone half way through my journey? While people were still boarding I asked if I could go back to the admirals club to see if my phone was there. Not only did he let me off the plane, but also went with me to help me find the phone. We retraced my steps back to the admirals club, then to security and finally found my phone at security. The attendant went the extra mile to help a passenger and gave me one of the most personal experiences I have had with any airline.

This story illustrates the challenge large organizations face as they try to improve the customer experience. Organizations need to look at both the front line employees and organization’s ability to serve customers in a differentiated way. While Michael (the flight attendant) made a difference in my overall experience with American Airlines, he is only one link to maintaining loyalty. American also needs to improve their policies & agent education in order to improve my loyalty. In some cases, the opposite may be true. An organization may engineered an experience to improve customer loyalty, but front line employees don’t provide a quality experience. Remember, both are important.

As organizations focus on loyalty, they need to understand all the factors that affect loyalty and engineer a superior experience at all levels. While individuals can make a difference, your overall experience, and resulting loyalty, is only as good as your weakest link.

Deploying an Effective Customer Experience Management Program

2007-05-03T09:36:00.000-07:00

There is substantial research showing that companies that effectively measure and improve customer loyalty will out perform their competition in profitable revenue growth. This was clear in Fred Reichheld’s book, The Ultimate Question, where he offers a significant body of research that shows a direct correlation between customer loyalty scores and growth rates in several industries. While Fred’s book has a heavy emphasize on business-to-consumer models, Satmetrix, the co-developer of Net Promoter, has many examples of business-to-business models that corroborate the findings. The connection seems obvious, yet so few companies deploy effective programs that deliver the desired result.

I recently completed a white paper that covers a number of critical success factors to consider when deploying a customer experience program that deliver results. I thought it would be useful to share this with those that are interested in the topic. You can download from my company website in the resources and insight section.

Comments are welcome!

Customer Experience Management (CEM) is repeating the mistakes of Customer Relationship Management (CRM)

2007-03-29T13:11:00.000-07:00

Using the carrot or the stick?

Philosopher George Santayana once said, “Those who cannot learn from history are doomed to repeat it”. This is my concern when it comes to employee compensation and customer loyalty metrics.

The goal of customer experience management (CEM) is to improve the customer experience, increasing loyalty and driving growth. Your employees are in the best position to change the customer experience and improve your business. While I am an advocate of measuring employees on customer loyalty and value delviered, one size does not fit all. Know where you are in the adoption curve and design your compensation metrics accordingly.

One of the major failures of customer relationship management (CRM) was that the tools were deployed for the benefit of management, particularly in sales force automation (SFA) applications. SFA was deployed as a way for management to improve their sales forecasting. By having all sales people enter their forecast data into a centralized repository, sales managers could roll up the data to provide forecast by product, by region, by customer. But where was the value for the sales representative? It was another administrative task that took time away from being in front of customers.

As a result, adoption became a key issue. So what did management do to address the problem? Many decided not pay commissions unless they were “compliant” with the administrative tasks – using the stick approach. While this changed behaviors, it never really fixed the problem. The problem would have been much better served by finding ways for SFA to add value to the end user, making their job easier and offering them more value in managing their business – the carrot.

In my work with clients, I see the same mistake being made in CEM. Management wants a measure of loyalty or customer satisfaction. They understand the connection between loyalty and financial growth. They want everyone to be compensated based on loyalty so they can achieve growth. But designing a compensation program around your loyalty measure is just not that simple.

There are two major issues you need to focus on to collect an honest assessment of loyalty and improve it over time.

1. Participation & response rates
2. Action & accountability

Participation & response rates. Getting a measurement of loyalty is only as good as the data that goes into the measurement. It’s the old saying, “garbage in, garbage out”. Organizations need to ask themselves a number of key questions. Who is responding? Are they the right customers? Are they decision makers or influencers in my most strategic accounts? Are we getting a broad enough sample to know our friends AND our foe? Can we identify the detractors so we better manage our future sales pursuits? Have we identified our Promoters and defined a plan to leverage them more effectively? These are important questions to answer when trying to obtain an honest assessment of loyalty.

When it comes to participation it’s important to have both the systems and processes in place to make sure you are collecting insight from the right people. This is different in a relationship survey to your top account vs. a transactional survey in your call center. Design the participant strategy accordingly and then measure your organization on response rates. Most organizations accept 20% response rates as adequate. Fred Reichheld recently raised the bar suggesting that the goal should be 90%.

In transactional surveys, you can move response rates up significantly by better integrating the survey into your process and simplifying the survey so it’s easy for everyone to respond. In relationship surveys to your strategic accounts, a 20% response rate demonstrates a lack of relationship and active involvement from the account team. Active recruitment, leadership oversight and closed loop communication is critical to getting customers involved in your process.

Action & Accountability. Knowing the score is only helpful if you know how to change it. Where does your customer survey data go? Who uses it? How? What commitments are made as a result of the insight? Who is accountable to following through on those commitments? What immediate changes can be made in specific relationships to see immediate results? What consistent themes do you see across relationships or interactions that require investments or organizational changes?

In my next blog posting I will tackles the topic of action and accountability more thoroughly. This is a big topic and I can’t do it justice here. Isn’t taking action the whole point of the exercise? Why would you collect the data if you don’t plan to do anything about it?

I believe strongly that these two areas are much more important than the score itself. The score gives you insight that allows you to assess the health of your business, but without the right participants and without employees’ active response, the score will not help you achieve the desired results.

So, let’s learn from the CRM experience and find ways to make our CEM programs add value at every level in the organization. Let’s focus everyone on improving loyalty scores by collecting an honest assessment of current state, evaluating the ways we can improve the customer experience to increase loyalty and achieve long-term growth. Let's create an environment where management and front line employees work together to understand the drivers of loyalty and make changes to improve it. While compensating everyone on the score sounds good in theory, if you do not design the program correctly it will have absolutely the wrong effect on your employees and your customers. If there is any doubt, consider your last car dealer experience.

Creating Detractors and Why you should not use AIT.com

2007-03-01T09:37:00.000-08:00

I continue to be amazed at how dysfunctional organizations can be. I recently had an experience with my PREVIOUS web hosting company, AIT.com that does such a great job of explaining HOW ORGANIZATIONS CREATE DETRACTORS that I will share it with you for two primary purposes:

1. To illustrate to my corporate readers how organizations create detractors through the dysfunction of how they handle their customer interactions, and
2. To use word of mouth marketing to tell everyone that they should NOT use AIT.com for their web-hosting provider

The morning of February 15th I noticed that my email box was not receiving inbound email. That's strange because I receive many emails a day and I am in the middle of a project that required my client to send me several documents. After placing a call to my web hosting company I learned that they had migrated some Windows servers and had a disaster on their hands as a result. All of their Windows clients were down and they had Microsoft there working on the problem. I went a full day with no email and no communication from my hosting company. I called several times, with long wait times and a few disconnected calls. Not a pleasant experience.

I got busy doing other things and thought, I can live a day without email, and went about my work using my Yahoo account for critical exchange of documents. The next day I called again, and again, and again and spoke with several customer service agents who shared with me their own frustration over the situation including one agent that told me she had been there all night due to the problem and another agent who actually told me that "it isn't our problem, it's Microsoft's problem". I could not believe what I was hearing. My business was down for over 24 hours and they tell me it's not their problem!

To keep this posting to a reasonable reading size I will summarize my UNBELIEVABLE customer experience.

* I was down for a full week with no answers as to when I would be able to receive email again. Keep in mind this is my business, not personal email.
* While on hold I all you hear is how they "put the customer first", and trying to pitch additional services that at the time I had no interest in hearing.
* Several times my wait time was 5 minutes, then 7 minutes, then 11 minutes, then 1 minute and after a while I was simply disconnected.
* A couple of times I asked to speak to a supervisor who I never spoke with and once I was disconnected in the process. They had my phone number, but didn't have the courtesy to call me back.
* After several calls, I was sent satisfaction surveys, stating that my problem had been resolved and requesting that I rated my satisfaction. I would respond to the survey with my COMPLETE DISSATISFACTION with no response from the company or any acknowledgement that they were trying to resolve my problem.
* When I followed up on my "closed ticket", they would reopen the ticket and tell me they would not close it until they spoke with me and confirmed that my problem has been resolved. Several hours later I would receive another survey and email stating my problem was resolved (these email are to my Yahoo account because I haven't received email at Windward for days).
* After several days I found a new web hosting company and switched providers to www.1and1.com (a referral from my web designerweb designer).. ...can you say word of mouth marketing.
* One week later I was back up and running at 1and.com with no word at all from AIT.com. Still haven't heard a word from them. I lost all email sent to me from 2/15 - 2/21. We cancelled out account, stopped payment on any outstanding billings and will tell everyone we know not to do business with them. Silence from AIT.com....

If I had time on my hands, I would have called every media outlet I know to see if I could get this on the front page of the Wall Street Journal or other mainstream media outlets. Ok, so it's not as big a deal as Jet Blue leaving passengers on the tarmac for hours, but it was a big deal to me. It cost me days of productivity and delays in communicating with prospective clients for future projects. It cost me real money!

This story illustrates how dysfunctional organizations are at truly embracing a customer centric culture. The front cover of Business Week this week shows the "Customer Service Champs". There is a story about a Southwest airline passenger with a mess of a travel experience and shortly afterwards received 2 free tickets from Southwest in the mail. All companies have issues; it's how you handle them and how well your processes are designed to address the problems that make the difference between detractors, promoters and neutrals. I don't know if the Southwest passenger is a promoter, but he is clearly not a detractor. My experience shows an organization a clear blueprint on how to create a detractor and I hope I can have a lasting impact on their future revenues by telling everyone I know NOT to buy services from AIT.com.

One last note on the power of word of mouth. Today I received a comment on my "Don't buy Mercedes"posting from June of last year. The comment shared a similar experience with Mercedes and his very positive experience with Lexus describing it as finding "heaven". The Internet provides a perpetual record of customer experience. So this is not a one-time thing, my experience with AIT.com could spread the word for years to come.

Net Promoter Conference Recap

2007-02-01T16:36:00.000-08:00

In my last post I shared my plans to be a guest blogger at the Net Promoter conference. While I was quite naive about the time commitment involved, it gave me the discipline to truly learn from each and every session. I tried to capture as much of the information shared in my postings to netpromoter.com. For those that did not attend the conference you can read about my detailed learnings here.

Throughout the event, there were some very consistent themes. These themes came from those that have successfully applied Net Promoter to their business and achieved business value and growth as a result. While many of the detailed learnings have nuances that you should understand, in an attempt to provide an executive overview, here are my key takeaways.

1. Executive sponsorship. Without this, don't bother! This is the single most important element of successful adoption of Net Promoter. This is not a new way to collect customer data; it's a new way of doing business. That requires the tone from the top. This was obvious in case studies shared by Intuit, Filenet, and Charles Schwab. These organizations had a mandate driven from the CEO with resources allocated accordingly.

2. Organizational alignment. To truly benefit from Net Promoter you have to align the organization around delivering a superior customer experience. Everyone in the organization participates in collecting, analyzing and taking action on the data. This was key to the success at Experian who has enjoyed double digit growth over the last 6 quarters in a highly competitive, mature market.

3. Take action or don't do it! Your organization must be held accountable to taking action on the data. If you don't do this you are likely to do more damage than good. If your customers feel you don't value their input, you will lose credibility. This may seem obvious, but the data from Bain is shocking on how few organizations actual change their business or close loop with the customer after they have taken the time to tell you how they'd like to do business with you.

4. Be patient. While there are opportunities to immediately provide value to your customers at an individual transaction or individual account basis, results will take time. This is a fundamental shift in how you do business and requires culture change and time to see results. Stick with it, drive execution, and you will see results. All of the case studies demonstrated business benefits in driving growth, competitive advantage and improved customer relationships.

As I contemplate the lessons learned and think about how to help my clients achieve results, it's clear to me that this is not about designing a loyalty program, it's about a culture change in the business in every part of the organization. Organizations that do this well will be the market leaders, they will create sustainable competitive advantage that will drive growth.

Something big is happening here. This came to light when I sat next to two gentlemen from Amsterdam that had made the trip over the pond to not only attend the conference, but to visit companies being successful with Net Promoter. Their organization is 100 years old and they shared with me that this is the first time their company has ever done this type of investigation and embarked on something this core to the business.

Could Net Promoter be the next business transformation? While you can debate the relative merits of the metric, you can't debate that serving customers in a way they want to be served drives profitable growth. We must shift from a product centric to customer centric business. The time has come.

Guest Blogging at NetPromoter Conference

2007-01-18T17:07:00.000-08:00

I have been given the opportunity to be a guest blogger at the upcoming NetPromoter conference in New York the last week in January. The conference is sold out and with all the buzz about Fred's book "The Ultimate Question", it should be a great conference. In particular, I'm interested in hearing from companies that have driven increased market share and revenue due to their focus on customer loyalty.

All bloggers out there understand the impact blogs have in spreading word of mouth quickly. Companies need to wake up and pay attention to the experience the customer has with their brand, or find themselves sliding into irrelevance. Perhaps the sold out conference is a sign that more companies have realized this need and want to learn more.

In my first posting, I pose the question, "what is the ultimate question?". See my posting here.

Customer Centric Marketing

2007-01-03T18:54:00.000-08:00

Recently I have been spending time working with clients on a variety of marketing projects and observing various marketing techniques. As marketing professionals, we spend entirely too much time talking about our products and services, defining our brand strategy, designing ad campaigns, visual identity systems and logos. We need to spend more time evaluating our ability to deliver on the brand promise, understanding the customer experience and evaluating our customer advocacy.

Case in point, I have recently done an overhaul of our credit card services. During this process, I observed the customer experience by Wells Fargo, Citibank, Chase and American Express. I experienced each company's call center, website and credit card policies. I can say unequivacably that American Express understands the value of customer experience, Wells Fargo comes in second. Citibank is a neutral with good and bad and I will NEVER do business with Chase again. All of this is due to my experience as as customer of each of these financial institutions and has nothing to do with their outbound marketing efforts.

Chase is guilty of a bait & switch like I have never experienced before, with these guys be sure to read the fine print. American Express on the other hand values long term client relationships and treats you as a valued customer from the day you sign up to the day you terminate your account.

Treat your customers well and they will bring more customers. I love the blackberry ad where they simply state "ask a Blackberry owner", or the Accenture ads where they share the stories of what they have done for customers and the benefits they have achieved. These ads show their confidence in the customer experience and loyalty.

So, stop telling us what is wonderful about your product or service, let your customers tell us. Spend your money on finding ways to treat them better. Build loyalty and let word of mouth be your advertising vehicle. It's a simple formula and likely a less expensive one.

The Power of an Outside Consultant

2006-11-16T09:16:00.000-08:00

Logging on today I just realized it's been over a month since my last post. I have written so many posts in my head, but haven't taken the time to get them online to share. My priorities have been elsewhere. It's interesting because I find the blogging world to be a parallel universe of which I communicate with a different set of people then I communicate with on a day to day basis. But, I'll save those observations for another time.

Lately I've been quite busy serving clients! That's a good thing. I'm doing a couple of consulting engagements that has given me a greater appreciation for the power of an outside consultant.

One of the engagements I'm currently involved in is with my former employer. I'm working with the marketing team on their client loyalty & reference programs. In the month or two we've been working on this project I have found my efforts much more effective then when I was an executive at the company. Here are some of the reasons why:

1. The consultant is not sucked into internal conference calls and meetings. All companies have a tendency to get so internally focused, they spend millions of staff hours on internal conference calls & meetings with the premise that we are "communicating". Unfortunately, this "communication" across teams becomes very time consuming and keeps individuals from actually working on the projects that will help the organization grow or improve their efficiencies.

As a consultant, I get to work each day on the task at hand. I use my talent and experience to help move the project forward, coaching others, sharing industry best practices and collaborating with the business leaders on the areas that will help the organization achieve their goals. It's a much more productive use of my knowledge than sitting in status meetings, attending team calls or whatever internally focused activity my calendar would typically be booked with.

2. The consultant sees the company from the outside in. In both of my current consulting arrangements I have been able to point out how prospects or clients may experience the company and help make changes to improve that experience. The most visible example is the website. Often, companies present the web content in a way they are organized, or they publish content and never go back to update it as their strategy changes.

As a consultant, you experience the company as an outsider. You haven't been immersed in the internal chatter and you can still see things as your clients or prospects may see it. You are able to give an outside in view. This can be very valuable to improving your marketing message, and better understanding the client/prospect experience.

3. Consultants bring a network to your organization. Consulting engagements often require bringing together technology or service providers to solve a specific business problem, or a need to gain access to key executives in partner or client organization. One of the assets your consultant can bring is a track record of working with companies that will allow you to move your project forward quickly and bring fresh new ideas to the table. The consultants network can accelerate your efforts, give you access to individuals you desire and reduce your risk associated with selecting new providers.

4. Many times you can find a consultant with significantly more experience than you could hire. A seasoned executive has a great deal of experience to offer, but may be in a position where they don't want to work full time for another organization, or want the freedom that independent consulting offers. Having an opportunity to bring in these experienced professionals may cost more on a per hour basis, but often deliver significantly more value than a full time hire would bring. Take advantage of these consultants, focus on the outcomes of the engagement, not the billable hours.

Consultants can bring significant value, but you need to stay engaged. Often a seasoned professional can work fairly independently and given your busy schedule, you may be tempted to let them run with the project. However, it is critical to schedule regular progress checks to assess progress and address questions to keep your project aligned with your strategy and expected outcomes. When I have hired consultants in the past I typically did so to fill an immediate need while recruiting, or to bring in specialized expertise. I often didn't take the time to stay engaged and subsequently found myself disappointed in the outcome. Just 10-15 minutes per week can make a huge difference in maximizing your value.

So for now, I'm going back to the consulting tasks at hand. I am committed to help my clients benefit from the power of an outside consultant. Hopefully, it won't be a month till I get the chance to visit the blogging universe again.

Good People at California DMV & OMG!

2006-10-03T20:39:00.000-07:00

This blog posting is a bit off the business path. Today my 15 year old daughter, Gabi, got her drivers permit. A new adventure in parenting and the reason for my OMG in the title. (for those without the teen lingo OMG = OH MY GOD!)

It's an exciting and scary time in my home. While I look forward to the day when Gabi can drive me home from a dinner party where I won't monitor my wine consumption, it's pretty scary to watch your "baby" drive a motor vehicle that is capable of going 100+ MPH. This is a new chapter in my parenting book!

In my feeble attempt to make this relevant to the blogging world, I will say the folks at DMV were great! First of all the appointment system makes all the difference in visiting the DMV. You show up at your designated time and within 10 minutes you are going about your business. That's better than what I get at my doctors office!

Last week when we showed up for our appointment, Gabi didn't do so well. She missed 10 on her written test, thereby giving us the opportunity to visit again! The man who graded her test was truly empathetic. As you can imagine, a 15 year old who already waited an extra month to get her permit still walked out without it. It wasn't pretty. To top things off my Mercedes, once again, malfunctioned and were stranded in the parking lot afterwards, but that's another story.

Today Gabi passed with flying colors. We were fortunate to get the same man who graded her test last time. He remembered her and seemed genuinely pleased that she passed this time. Everyone we dealt with was pleasant, friendly and empathic to a teenager visiting the DMV for the first time (or second).

All in all the DMV experience was better than many of my consumer experiences. California must be doing something right to hire employees that appear to be interested in your needs and willing to serve.

And thanks to their efforts (and hers), I have the adventure of driving with a teenager. Wish me luck!

The real crime at HP

2006-09-28T21:06:00.000-07:00

As I logged into blogger tonight I realized it's been almost two weeks since I last posted. I knew I had neglected my blogging world for a while, but I didn't realize it had been two weeks! I wrote so many blog postings in my head that I guess I hadn't realized they didn't make it to the keyboard.

One of the issues I have followed closely recently is the discussion regarding the HP pretexting. While I understand the privacy issue here, I am disappointed at the whole process the HP management team is going through. After all, isn't the real issue for the shareholders of HP the leaks that were occurring? Isn't the real crime the violation of confidentiality agreements that are critical to running a business?

How could this situation be compared to Enron? The Enron executive purposely deceived their shareholders on the health of the business. The HP executive were protecting the shareholders from the leaks that could impact their efforts to turnaround the business.

As an HP shareholder I have enjoyed the upside generated by the efforts of this HP board and their management team. I feel it's a crime to create this level of turmoil at the company, and to these board members reputations, just as they are achieving success in making HP a great company again.

While companies have been cleaning up their act since the days of Enron and Worldcom, did we need something else to create drama? To generate news? I, for one, hope that they can get this issue behind them quickly and get back to work on the great work they have been doing to make HP a successful business once again.

Consumer Control of your Cell Phone Calls!

2006-09-15T09:48:00.000-07:00

A friend of mine sent me a note warning of new rules that allow telemarketing firms to call your cell phone. I don't even like it when people I don't know call my cell phone, never mind some telemarketing person trying to sell me something. And worse yet, depending on your cellular plan - YOU WILL BE CHARGED FOR THE CALL!

Below is in the information on how to block those calls. I called and it only took a minute of time through an automated system. I received this email earlier in the week, so I am certain the 4 days have already passed. Take action now!

REMINDER 4 days from today, all cell phone numbers are being released to telemarketing companies and you will start to receive sales calls.

.....YOU WILL BE CHARGED FOR THESE CALLS

To prevent this , call the following number from your cell phone :
888-382-1222

It is the National DO NOT CALL list. It will only take a minute of your time. It blocks your number for five (5) years. You must call from the cell phone number you are wanting to have blocked. You cannot call from a different phone number.

HELP OTHERS BY PASSING THIS ON TO ALL YOUR FRIENDS OR GO TO: www.donotcall.gov

As consumers we need to continue to exercise our rights on how, when and where we want to receive marketing messages. This technique would be the absolute worst way to reach me. If I received a telemarketing call on my cell phone I will commit to boycott the company that used these tactics and tell everyone I know to do the same!

CGM Authenticity & Abuse

2006-09-07T16:57:00.000-07:00

Since my last posting on why people blog I have run across a number of conversations regarding who should blog, CGM abuse and related topics that concern me. Blogging is in jeopardy of losing it's authenticity. As blogging becomes more widely used for marketing purposes, there is a danger that it's real value of conversations will become polluted with dishonest marketing techniques.

This is outlined well in Pete Blackshaw's recent posting "Spam, Popups and CGM Abuse" and subsequent article in Ad Age. Here, Pete describes the dangers of marketing "jumping on the CGM bandwagon...needlessly alienate consumers. It's unfamiliar terrain and credibility is at stake if marketers and agencies jump into the space recklessly."

As a specific data point on this topic, I am much more likely to read the blog posting than the article due to the overwhelming jumping, annoying Internet ads that surround his words on the Ad Age website. Ironically, the combination of his blog posting and article illustrates the value of peer to peer communications vs. traditional marketing.

Subsequently I ran across a posting on Forrester's marketing blog titled
Ok so I'm a mercenary and a blog discussion on Unica's website "The Marketers Consortium" that posed the question "Should CMOs blog"?

I am bothered by all this discussion about who should blog, how often you should blog, how marketing should be advertising on blogs....should, should, should. What happened to the Naked Conversations? Why are we assigning all these rules to blogging.

There is no doubt that blogs and consumer generated media are a changing force in the world of marketing. But the true value of the blog is the unfiltered, honest feedback from customers, prospects, partners, consumers, or whoever matters to you. If all these rules are applied don't we jeopardize the true value of blogs?

As I collected my thoughts for this posting, I found a posting on Web 2.0 and crossing the chasm from Shel Israel. Shel is someone who has dedicated a great deal of time to the issue of blogging and in this post he states, "Blogging is not about a ratings war. It's about a tool that is important because it scales people's abilities to have conversations." To this most recent posting I say... "AMEN BROTHER!"

Why People Blog

2006-09-06T20:33:00.000-07:00

I have been thinking a lot lately about the different motivations for blogging. Several articles and postings have brought this top of mind. What I have noticed is there are several different types of bloggers.

1. Bloggers for money. This is discussed in the current issue of Business 2.0 in the article "Blogging for Dollars". The article references sites like TechCrunch that bring in $60,000 per month in ad revenue! Now that's real money. What bothers me about this community is what's the difference between them and mainstream media? Both are building an audience for the benefit of profits. While the new media platform allows for two way conversations vs. the traditional one way editorial, blogging for money loses something for me. Once money is involved, it's a slippery slope from honest, unfiltered communication.

2. Blogging for page rank. This is where I place people like Robert Scoble . He hasn't sold out for advertising dollars yet, but he is extremely diligent about frequent postings and continues to grow his rankings. For me he posts too frequently and fills up my Google reader so I have to wade through the postings to find those that are most relevant. Recently he had a posting that seemed his popularity is both a blessing and a curse. Don't get me wrong, I think Robert is a great guy. When you meet him in person he is charming, engaging and "real". I just don't find his content as relevant to me and my interests.

3. Blogging to share your prospective on issues you are passionate about. This is the blogging community I value the most. It's people like Andy Lark, Pete Blackshaw, Max Kalehoff, Shel Israel that I enjoy reading frequently. They are relevant to me and discuss issues I'm interested in. For me, this is the real value of blogging. No commercial messages, no jumping internet ads, just thoughtful comments in a domain area they are experienced in.

4. Blogging to share with family & friends. This is the MySpace and Facebook crowd. A social platform for communicating with your friends, sharing pictures and posting notes that everyone can see. This is the world my 15 year old daughter lives in and where these is a tremendous amount of insight into consumers preferences and interests. It's a virtual world to communicate with your friends, find new friends and share personal interests.

For me, I live in the later two categories. I enjoy sharing my experiences for my friends and colleagues in a way that I hope to be relevant. Last week in the Wall Street Journal there was an article "No day at the beach" where they discussed bloggers so concerned with rankings that they can't even take a vacation. To that form of popularity I say "No Thank You!".

For big time bloggers that may run across this posting, you may think my segmentation is a "duh", but for many of my colleagues I'm on the leading edge of this new media. As I have had the opportunity to participate in the blogging community I have learned a lot about the value to me, to my business and to my clients. I enjoy sharing that experience with others. That's why I blog.

Podcast Best Practices

2006-08-28T15:21:00.000-07:00

I have become a regular podcast listener and I thought I would share some best/worst practices I have observed as a listener, as well as links to my favorite podcasts.

1. Cut the theatrics and get to the point. Long theatrical beginnings with music, commercial messages, etc may lose your listeners. One technique I find valuable is Marketing Voices by Jennifer Jones. She always starts with a sound bite from her guest that gives you a sense of what's to come. In contrast, I really dislike the "sharing is good" commercial from Sun on the BusinessWeek podcasts.

2. Keep your personal discussions personal. Don't waste the listeners time with discussions only relevant to the people creating the podcast. There was one podcast where I was interested in the title, but the jabbering at the beginning between the participants was so bad I couldn't bear to wait for the real meat of the topic.

3. Make it easy for your listeners to find links to content you mention during the podcast. An example of where this was not done well was Venture Voice's podcast of a new product called Dry Soda. It was intriguing, but she never gave us a url to go to afterwards. I subscribed through iTunes, so it took some time before I could find the link to the podcast and then a link to the company. A group that does this extremely well is Internet Business Mastery. I have learned a great deal from them and almost always go to the website afterwards and find great tools.

4. Keep it short. 30 minutes is about the right length for a podcast. Listeners are likely to be listening while exercising, driving or doing something else. Make your content consumable in a time period that fits this use model. One podcast I enjoy is Across the Sound . They usually have great guests, but at one hour, I start to lose attention about half way through. Remember the use model!

5. If are not a good communicator, don't be a guest on a podcast. It's quite frustrating to hear a speaker with um, ah, well, and all kinds of fillers that are used when people are not good public speakers. This will likely do your brand more harm than good to put a speaker on a podcast that is not articulate. I'll save someone the embarrassment of linking to their podcast. I'm sure you have all heard it before.

6. And finally, a note to iTunes. Please make the URL to the podcast more accessible. Why do I have to go to Google to find the URL when you can provide it in the information section of the podcast.

These are just a few quick tips I have observed. In general I have found podcasting to be a great way to learn new things or hear from the experts in their field while doing something else (driving, exercising, gardening). There is so much content out there to absorb, this gives one another option when you are tired of reading the computer screen.

Here are a few of my favorite marketing & business related podcasts:

Internet Business Mastery
Across the Sound
Marketing Voices
Venture Voice
BusinessWeek
Wired Magazine

Brands and Customer Experience

2006-08-22T13:23:00.000-07:00

Max Kaleoff has a posting today on Brand Experience and Customer Service. This is a critical area of the business to understand in today's world of connected word of mouth. Before when you had a positive or negative customer experience, you told the people in your immediate circle of friends and colleagues. Now, consumers chronicle their experiences on the Internet and potential touch millions of other consumers, and that experience remains on the Internet for search engines to find and serve up to future consumers. It will likely effect other potential buyers of your product or service.

This is the connection that matters. Organizations must evaluate their customer service experience and understand how it impacts future buying decisions. An investment in a positive experience will go a long way to future revenues.

In an early posting this week, I shared my own brand experiences.

Technorati - What's This?

2006-08-21T20:33:00.000-07:00

I was just trying to use the Technorati search engine and without even typing in a search string, I got this message:

Sorry
We couldn't complete your search because we're experiencing a high volume of requests right now. Please try again in a minute or two. We're working hard to make our search results better. Thanks for your patience.

« Technorati Home

I have often wondered why we need a search engine focused purely on blogs when Google and Yahoo can give us everything. If Google and Yahoo allowed a flag of "blogs only" and provided the kind of market research on blogging that Technorati reports, I think Technorati would become irrelevant. Error messages may accelerate that process.

It's all about the customer experience

2006-08-21T14:12:00.000-07:00

As we contemplate the age of consumer control, I have become increasingly aware of my own personal experience with brands and how they effect my purchasing decision. Here are a few stories. I share them as illustrations on the ROI of investing in the customer experience. I believe that all companies should invest in understanding the customer's experience when interacting with your organization. It will make a bigger impact than the new ad campaign or lead generation program you are planning to invest in.

Story #1: Resort at Squaw Creek vs. Hyatt Regency Incline Village
Earlier this month my daughter and I went on a road trip to Lake Tahoe. We had no itinerary, just pointed in the direction of Tahoe and used various online sources to book hotels along the way. One night we booked the Resort at Squaw Creek for $210/night and another the Hyatt Regency in Incline Village for $385/night. Expensive hotel rooms are not unusual for us as we enjoy the finer things in life, but when you pay that much (remember this is not midtown NY), you expect "an experience".

Long story short, we had an amazing experience at the Resort at Squaw Creek and an equally negative experience at Hyatt Regency. This was the exact opposite of what the rates would have indicated. The accommodations, service, staff, food and quality of the Resort at Squaw Creek was equal to many quality hotels I have stayed in such as the Ritz Carlton Half Moon Bay. At the Hyatt Regency, the rooms where more like a Holiday Inn and the service at the Lone Eagle restaurant was horrible! I ended up checking out early and while the front desk personnel tried hard to make up for our experience, I have been left with a negative experience that will effect my choice of Hyatt resorts and guaranteed never to return to this particular hotel.

Story #2: Cingular vs. Verizon
I have been a cell phone user for 20 years, had the same carrier even though my carrier had gone through 2 acquisitions. First it was Pactel Infosystems, then AT&T Wireless and now Cingular. Every couple years I have renewed my contract, got a new phone and paid my bills regularly. About 2 weeks ago I went to the Cingular store to upgrade my phone to an integrated PDA. I planned to buy the Treo and sign up for another 2 year contract. I had the Treo in my hand, the service agent was ready to ring me up and when he pulled up my record he found that I had a payment due in 3 days and could not transfer me from AT&T Wireless to Cingular (same company that has sent me a bill for the past 2 years!) unless I paid the outstanding balance. My husband pays the bills and after contacting him I found that the payment had already been entered to pay through our online banking and could not be stopped. So Cingular gave me 2 choices; pay the bill in the store and when the other payment was received I could submit for a refund, OR leave the store. Out of complete frustration and disbelief I left the store.

The irony is that this is a company that can easily see my track record of paying my bills. However, I could walk down the street to Verizon who knows nothing about me and get what I wanted now without fighting for a refund later. Which is what I did. Several days later I found myself parked in front of the Verizon store in Palo Alto with my old cell phone hanging on to it's last days. I walked in, got served by a knowledgeable representative that showed me the Treo and the Motorola Q. She was able to tell me the pros and cons of each of the phone/pdas and help me decide on the Motorola Q. I walked out with my new phone AND a new carrier. Sorry Cingular, I've moved to Verizon Wireless where they never stop working for you!

Story #3: Bloomingdales credit vs. American Express
My last story is one of call centers. My husband had a bad bill paying day and accidentally overpaid a couple of my credit cards and I found myself with $1100 credit on my Bloomingdales card. I had a smaller balance on my American Express card. I decided to clean this up and have get checks sent to me from both of the creditors. I tried to do it over the Internet, but couldn't, so I called the call center. American Express helped me in a reasonable amount of time with some woman in India who spoke reasonable English, overall a reasonable experience. In contrast Bloomingdales automated call routing system took me 2 or 3 entries to hear the words "you have a credit balance, would you like us to send you a check?" I just about fell over in my chair! I hate those automated call routing systems because typically you type in a bunch of stuff and you still have to talk to an agent and give them the same information again! If all automated systems were as efficient and helpful as the Bloomingdales credit card line, I would value automation more as helpful to me, the consumer, and a cost savings for the provider. A win-win.

It's these experiences that will determine my brand preference, not the obnoxious ads I have to watch multiple times during a TV show or that jump up and down on my screen while surfing the Internet.

Marketers today have to tackle the customer experience. If Marketing has no control over the organizations ability to deliver the brand promise, marketing will struggle in effecting the revenues of the business. You may be able to get the buyers to the party, but if their experience is not positive, it would have been better not to have them come at all.

I would be very interested in hearing stories from Marketing leaders that have found ways to affect the overall customer experience. It's not always part of the marketing role, but it's critical in impacting loyalty and word of mouth marketing. Are marketing leaders given enough organizational clout to drive the change required to service today's consumer controlled market?

Here are a couple of related blogs/articles that share similar prospective.
Customer Feedback, or What I Learned on My Summer Vacation, by Heidi Cohen

Reinventing the Marketing Organization by Peter Kim

Can Passionate, Driven People Really Unwind?

2006-08-02T17:10:00.000-07:00

Last week my daughter, Gabi, and I went on our annual road trip. This one was different than last year in that I wasn't constantly checking my blackberry or leaving the room early in the morning to attend a conference call. I actually had days where I did not touch a keyboard (note: my hands were twitching!).

We left with no itinerary, visited the Grandparents and found ourselves at Lake Tahoe for the week. We moved around a lot but a favorite place was Resort at Squaw Creek. I highly recommend it!

Since returning on Sunday I've been back on in full swing - on the phone, doing email, attending networking events and in business meetings. Today I had lunch with a couple of business colleagues. They are building their own consulting business specializing in B2B search engine marketing after many years of pouring their heart and soul into other companies. They, like many others I have spoken to recently, have encouraged me to relax, disconnect and take time off. It sounds great, but I can't seem to get into that space. Even during my road trip, I had to stop myself from logging on to email, reading through my RSS feeds or writing my own posts. It is hard to disconnect from the connected world.

There are so many interesting projects and challenges out there that intrigue me. I'm not at a point where I can turn that off. But, I do feel there is need for balance. Being with my daughter over the past few weeks has reminded me that you must invest in all aspects of your life. We give so much to our careers, to the companies we want to help be successful, to the people that we work for and who work for us. We also need to take the time to give to ourselves and to our family, to invest in LIFE!

These two professionals are similar to me - passionate, talented, driven people, yet they found a way to regain balance in life. So for now, I seek balance. I'm not ready to disconnect, but I do want to hear about the boys that enter my daughter's life every day. She doesn't keep them around long enough to withstand my business trips, board meetings, annual review cycles, end of quarter crunch, etc.

To Robyn and Ralph, thanks for showing me that you can still achieve great things and find balance in life! You are my inspiration!

Marketers: Is it time to take on the call center?

2006-07-29T13:09:00.000-07:00

This week's BusinessWeek published an article Call Center? That's so 2004. Call center outsourcing is down from 85% of India's business process outsourcing in 2000 to 35% today. India is finding call centers to be the least profitable of the outsourcing business and the most difficult to operate. Read the article for more details.

Does this represent an opportunity to improve the customer experience? After all, when you take the time to a call center and wait for a human to answer the phone, you have a problem that's worth the trouble. When you are met with someone that cannot help you, your problem just got bigger.

This could be a win-win. In an early posting, Blogging and Customer Service, I point to a number of other bloggers talking about the impact of customer service on a brand including my favorite, an article from Pete Blackshaw, Consumer Affairs: The New Advertising Department. It's a service economy and no matter what your product is, the customer experience will dominant the word of mouth marketing about your brand.

While organizations have gone through improving operational efficiencies through deployment of enterprise applications, Internet based self service, and offshore services to reduce costs, have they also reduced the value of customer loyalty? The two things, cost cutting and quality customer service, do not work well together.

In today's connected world, word of mouth spreads fast, far and remains perpetual on the Internet for years to come. Marketers will continue to be challenged in promoting products that do not live up to their customers' expectations. Those fortunate enough to have a product that fulfills the brand promise and delivers a superior customer experience will have an opportunity to leverage this powerful communication vehicle to spread the word of their success. Those less fortunate, where the rest of the organization is not focused on the customer experience, but only focused on the bottom line will be hindered by the communication trail left on the Internet for all to view.

In this article, it suggestions that call center work may return to lower-cost areas of the U.S. I say - PLEASE! As a consumer I would appreciate having the phone answered in a reasonable time, by someone who can speak English well, and who can help me with my problem in a timely manner.

Marketer, take control over the customer experience. That's what people are going to talk about more than your latest ad campaign. If Pete is right, a portion of your $286 Billion ad spend may be better spent upgrading your call center than trying to get your voice through the fragmented media landscape.

Blog Post Frequency, Learning and Relevance

2006-07-27T20:21:00.000-07:00

I have been struggling with what to post lately. Not due to lack of thought, but lack of time and selecting the most interesting topic area.

On one hand I have 5 different topics I think are interesting, but not necessarily in line with my typical topics. On the other hand every time I invest time exploring the blogging world, I find so many interesting postings to read I run out of time to create my own.

The interesting dilemma for a new blogger is that these two areas can create "writers block". I have two questions to pose to the more experienced bloggers:

1. Does your blog need to stay on topic?
2. How do you balance your time between listening and talking?

On question #2 above, I find a great deal of value in participating on other people's blogs. How do you share your collective thought process on your blog? Here are three recent examples of areas I have participated in:

A discussion with Shel regarding blogging adoption in other parts of the world, specifically Hawaii
A NYC VC's posting on the debate of the Long Tail
A suggestion to Scoble to do a video on "how to blog".

I have also invested many hours in reading blogs and listening to podcast to learn more about the collective conversation. It's diverse, and there is so much out there you could spend days/weeks/months absorbing information. Some of my recent favorites include:

The call to action for all marketing professionals written by Peter Blackshaw, Leading Change - Now!
A posting by Ann Handley on What's the Biggest Lie About Blogging?
And a podcast on Internet business mastery that begins with an education on the issue of net neutrality. (Anyone interested in keeping the Internet as an open platform available to everyone should learn more about this).

My point is that there is so much great content that many times I would rather listen than type. This leads to less frequent postings, but more value to me.

The other area I outlined in my opening paragraph is relevance. Given that my postings are mostly about the changing marketing world, I hesitate to share my thoughts on wine tasting, child rearing, team dynamics or consumer experiences. While I've seen some of the masters do it well such as this extremely random posting by Max Kalhoff regarding dry ice, I haven't reached the comfort level of putting these thoughts on the Internet and intermingling it with the otherwise marketing and blogging centric conversation. I suspect this comes with time.

I know some of my friends and colleagues that read my blog haven't ventured into blogging yet. Hopefully my journey gives you a glimpse at what's available and encourages you to get involved in the conversation!

Blogs and Podcasts

2006-07-25T08:38:00.000-07:00

Podcasts are an excellent way to absorb the knowledge available on the Internet when you are tired of reading your computer screen. Here is a recent interview with Sharon Weinbar of BA Venture Partners discussing the opportunities available for entepreuners and investors in social media. She points out that this is a highly desirable investment area for VCs today and lays out several areas of opportunity including translation of apps to mobile devices.

Podcasting allows us to benefit from the experiences of others in a short, but content rich segment. It's a great compliment to reading your favorite blogs. You can do it while you work out, drive, or just sit and listen with a nice glass of wine. It's safer, and likely more productive, than all the yaking we do on our cell phones while driving! For marketers, I highly recommend subscribing to Jennifer Jones, Marketing Voices. An experienced marketing executive herself, she is creating great content around the changing marketing landscape.

Obnoxious Internet Marketing

2006-07-20T17:29:00.000-07:00

Yesterday I was web surfing doing research for our new cell phone applications and found a number of obnoxious marketing techniques. Here are my least favorite:

Somewhere I visited (don't know where) opened a new window which I later discovered offering me a free Treo 700 smartphone. While I usually close these windows as fast as possible, I decided to explore this further. First I was asked for my email address which then took me to another page to give up address, phone number, age, etc. It was only in the fine print where I could find a link to the terms of the offer. It gave a lengthy disclosure including, "FreeProductVouchers.com reserves the right, in its sole discretion, to change its Terms & Conditions at any time". Several scroll bars and disclaimers later, I closed the box and decided to no longer waste my time.

Then there's that bouncing box that screams at you "Congratulations you have won" until you just have to leave the site even if the content is interesting. I can't stand things jumping on the screen! How do you close that box?

After minimizing the window, I came to this window to type a posting and heard an ongoing buzzing sound that sounded like something was wrong with my computer. Keep in mind this is a brand new computer that I spent hours transferring files and setting up. After a minute of panic I found the above site also had a mosquito that buzzed even when I was not active in their window. That's just plain rude!

Another ad I really dislike is on the ClickZ site for OneUpWeb. I find the pink poodle and all the animation distracting. I don't want things flashing at me and jumping up and down while I'm trying to read. I like reading what Peter has to say and don't find the pink poodle to work well with Peter's words on marketing. This company markets to marketing people, I would expect a bit more class than a pink poodle.

While I understand that it's a challenge to get attention in today's world, I question whether these techniques work. My reaction is too ignore them, close the window, and avoid the brands that use them. I prefer the more professional tactics, such as those you find on the right side of a Google search.

In this noisy world, let's find a way to get our message across without jumping, bouncing, flashing and worst of all, buzzing. If anyone has data on the relative success of jumping ads, I would be interested in knowing whether this is effective or just a form of creativity I don't appreciate?

Information Overload * Keeping up with all the great CGM

2006-07-19T16:36:00.000-07:00

As I get deeper involved in the conversation happening across the Internet, I am experiencing information overload. There are so many great conversations out there driven by so many talented people. How do you keep up with it all?

First, I set up my Google reader and subscribed to some of my favorite blogs. Daily I browse new content and go back and read my starred content. Here are some of my favorites of this week:

In the area of consumer generated media, one of my favorite quotes this week comes from Max Kaleoff "Marketers: Don't get burned by consumer generated media" where he is quoted in iMediaConnection saying, "You can no longer market a product that sucks". Isn't that what this is all about, honesty in marketing, honesty in delivery of the brand promise?

Shel Israel pointed to this posting by Douglas Karr where he shares his story of how he increased traffic to his site after changing the name. I think I'll go back to read Naked Conversations again.

Shel and Robert talk about how the Amazon recommendation engine is recommending their book along with The Long Tail and increased their rankings to #575. A great story of the power of influence and recommendation engines. By the way, I just bought The Long Tail as a result of this posting!

Scoble pointed me to Matt Cutts of Google who talks about the challenges of getting accurate metrics. Most methodologies have some bias and constrains the demographics of the viewers/readers/websurfers they address. Isn't there an opportunity to bring that all together into an integrated dataset? As I discussed in a previous posting, I still believe that getting data from Comcast, TiVO and their competitors would give a much more comprehensive and accurate assessment of viewers behavior than the age old Nielsen families.

I also enjoyed the most recent Marketing Voices by Jennifer Jones where she interviews Dave Balter, CEO and Founder of BzzAgent. David does a good job of explaining what's changed in the world of word of mouth marketing. After all, we have all been talking about brands for years, what's different? What's different is the ability to spread the word of mouth message quickly and that marketers have an opportunity to participate in the conversations like never before.

And last, to demonstrate that it's not just about CGM, I really enjoyed the recent BusinessWeek article Your Attention Please where the authors lay out the challenges and opportunities in the changing media landscape sharing specific stories including the innovation at BBC. A must read for all marketers. Several bloggers such as Peter Blackshaw and Andy Lark add their own thoughts on this topic.

The challenge I face is for every great posting you read, there are links to 3 or more other postings that also of interest (as demonstrated by the 13 links above). It's a large content universe with many relevant conversations for your area of interest. How do you keep up with it all? You can get lost in this media landscape and spend hours reading, learning, and participating in conversations relevant to your area of interest. For those that don't have the time this week, hopefully I pointed you to some that will interest you.

Professional relationships last longer than business cards

2006-07-18T15:38:00.000-07:00

I feel truly blessed by the people that have contacted me since my announcement. People who worked for me, worked with me, vendors, partners, employees and colleagues from other companies I have worked for and with. Many offering to work for me again, some interested in talking about what they are doing to see if I'd like to join, some asking for career advice, and most telling me of the impact I have made and appreciating the energy I bring to an organization.

I have a sign in my home office that reads:

Success: to laugh often and much; to win the respect of intelligent people and affections of honest critics and endure the betrayal of false friends; to appreciate beauty, to find the best in others, to leave the world a bit better, whether by a healthy child, a garden patch or a redeemed social conditions, to know even one life has breathed easier because you have lived. This is to have succeeded.

If one measures success by this, I declare my life successful. Thank you to everyone for sharing your thoughts with me. Stay tuned, the pool will get boring soon enough.

Here are some of my favorites excerpts from my email box:

Your bottomless well of enthusiasm, creativity, and confidence always kept things exciting for us. I will miss the rush of energy that you always bring into the room.
You're someone I respect a lot and believe in your talents.
I was delighted by the leadership and vision
I have been so impressed by your energy and focus
Would love do something together with you some day!
You'll be missed more than you can simply imagine :)

A New Adventure

2006-07-17T09:40:00.000-07:00

Dear Friends & Colleagues,

Last Friday, July 14, started a new chapter in my personal and professional life. I have learned a lot from the last 2 years but now it's time for a new adventure. Thank you to all that contributed to my learning along the way.

This transition gives me the opportunity to pursue a dream. When I met my husband, Jeff, 12+ years ago he was an engineer and I was in sales. We collaborated on a product for distributed object-oriented technology and subsequently took three products to market and launched his, then, very successful consulting practice. Since that time I got sucked into the corporate vortex. I found people I wanted to work with, assignments to challenge me and opportunities to gain new experiences in new areas of business.

During this time, however, I have continuously wanted to find a way to build a business that could afford me the freedom to be at home with my 15 year old daughter before she leaves home. Two years ago when I left BearingPoint, I had intended to pursue this path but got excited about the opportunity to join Biz360 and didn't pursue further. At the time, we had built a cell phone application which we did not launch/take to market as I got wrapped up in my new responsibilities.

We have currently identified several additional applications that have promise. So the plan is to pursue this business further. To build mobile applications that can be downloaded to cell phones/pdas, marketed through word-of-mouth and consumer generated media. I am building the business plan now and hope to get our first application out by end of summer. My 15 year old daughter and her friends are a great source of ideas and we held our first brainstorming session last Friday night =)

More details to follow as our plans develop. For now, I'm enjoying putting on shorts and flip flops instead of suits and pumps. My goal is to get through the rest of the summer in my vacation attire limiting business clothes to no more than 2 per week. The pool is at 80 degrees and I'll have to decide whether to swim before or after lunch. I have worked for 30 years solid (started at 16 as a customer service representative for my father's company). This is a much needed break and an opportunity to evaluate what I really want to do with the rest of my career.

To my friends and colleagues at Biz360, carry the ball forward, best of luck to you, I'll be rooting for you poolside =)

Corporate Blogging and Reputation Management

2006-07-15T08:52:00.000-07:00

There was quite a stir this week over a posting a summer intern made on Jeff Jarvis's blog on behalf of Dell. Personally I find the blog posting unbelievable, even for a summer intern. No matter what he thinks of Jeff and his postings this was unprofessional and bad etiquette under any guidelines. Richard Edelman called it "A Serious Case of Malpractice", well stated Richard.

The irony is that early that day Scoble posted a recommendation that there be a "two-week moratorium against saying anything bad about a new corporate blog" and was positive about Dell's attempt to participate in the conversation going on to offer design and marketing advice. This, too, was well stated. What I find refreshing about Robert's postings is he is fair and reasonable. He welcomes new comers to the blogging world and uses his readership to promote the good aspects of consumer media.

What I observed about this set of postings is that Dell has recognized the power of consumer media and is listening and participating. There is so much great information out there on a customer's experience with your brand, both your products and your service. How much money have marketers paid trying to collect this information in a traditional fashion and only been able to get a sampling? This is the marketers gold mine of customer data, but only if you want to hear the truth. Once you hear what is being said, you have the opportunity to respond. Using the power of blogging, you can share your plans to improve the areas that need improving and provide additional information to defend your brand's reputation. One of my favorite case studies on this is the story of Six Apart in the book Naked Conversations. Sorry you have to buy the book to get the story =)

It's too bad this intern had to get this started on such a bad note. Now Dell has to dig out further and has more damage to it's reputation. As for the summer intern that posted:

Chris Says:

July 11th, 2006 at 1:29 pm
Hey Jarvis

I honestly think you have no life. Honestly? Do you have a life, or do just spend it trying to make Dell miserable. IÂve been working with Dell the past three weeks researching trashy blogs that worms like you leave all over that frigen blogosphere and I cant honestly say that Dell is trying to take a step towards fixing their customer service. They hire guys like me to go on the web and look through the blogs of guys like you in hopes that we can find out your problem and fix it. But honestly I dont think you have a problem Dell can fix. Your problem is you have no life.

Chris, the advantage of being a summer intern is that you get to try out possible career options to see what you want to do when you enter the workforce. May I suggest your reconsider yours, communications does not seem to be an innate skill of yours.

Measurement, Measurement, Measurement

2006-07-12T18:56:00.000-07:00

Wow, it's been awhile since I've been here. What a great break. Everyone needs to completely disconnect and enjoy life once and a while. I noticed even Richard Edelman took some time off over the 4th and left his blog for over a week. It gives one prospective and an opportunity to think.

On the topic of measurement, I have been thinking about the article in the Wall Street Journal earlier this week on Nielsen's plans to measure which commercials are actually watched and which ones are skipped over or channel changed. I would link to the article, but of course it's behind the user authentication where content providers still don't get the new world of media. Fortunately, Google News helped me find this article from the LA Times which describes their plans.

What I don't get about this plan is why TiVo or Comcast OnDemand don't provide this data directly since they have the device? Why do we need another device in a sampling of homes when the device that people use to fast forward or change channels is already smart enough to capture and report this data? Am I missing something?

In any case, it's obvious that Nielsen is trying to navigate the changing landscape of the digital world. They were smart buying BuzzMetrics so that Pete, Max and others can help them in the CGM space, but how well are they integrating it all together for marketers?

The challenge with marketing measurement today is that influencing your target market is a combination of activities that create awareness, preference, demand and eventually loyalty. Brand studies can give an indication of awareness and preference, CRM systems and online traffic can measure demand, and companies like Satmetrix can measure your Net Promoters. Companies such as MarketingNPV or MMA can bring all the metrics together for you in a scorecard that can help understand the effects of the marketing mix. But are we measuring the overall brand preference in the market?

I believe their is a great deal of work to do to pull all of these silo based measurement systems together and innovate on a brand preference measure. What creates brand preference, how does that translate to brand value, how does that translate to brand equity that translates to shareholder value. We can't measure marketing by the number of people that watch our commercials. We have to measure by the number of people that when given a choice, will select your brand.

Gone Sailing

2006-07-01T06:55:00.000-07:00

I'm off for our annual sailing trip to the Delta. For those of you in the Bay Area and into boating, this is the boating party of the year. Thousands of boats gather for the fireworks display hosted by the Hilton Family off Mandeville Island. Here is a story from 2002 my husband wrote about the event, full of great pictures.

While we could have Internet access on the boat, we have chosen not to. It's a time to disconnect from the connected world we live in and connect with family and friends. We entertain ourselves the old fashion way by reading books, playing cards, talking about life, and just relaxing.

So for the next week I won't be blogging, but if you are at the event, you can find me aboard Bebe L'Amour.

Brand Loyalty, Blogging and Contact Lenses

2006-06-29T20:05:00.000-07:00

I have a recent experience with Brand Loyalty that I want to share.

For many years I have worn contacts and my eye doctor always subscribed the J&J Accuvue lens. Recently I changed eye doctors for convenience and insurance purposes and my new doctor subscribed a lens that provided more oxygen and would be better for my eyes. Long story short, I was not happy with this lens so my doctor put me in another brand.

During my trial of different brands, I had the opportunity to meet with our client at J&J who owns the Accuvue brand and most recently launched the Oasys brand. My company, Biz360, tracks trends and issues in the eye care industry as well as specific brands such as Vistakon's Oasys and their competitors. As I was discussing his needs in building awareness around the Oasys brand, I felt exposed in the brand of lens I was wearing at the time... A loyalty of reciprocity I value.

After 3 visits, my doctor finally gave me a sample of the J&J Oasys lens. Ironically, I felt it best met my needs. I have subsequently met with my doctor and we mutually decided this was the brand for me. Why did it take 3 attempts to get her to recommend this lens? It was clearly the winner in my eye comfort and overall experience.

I write about this because I wonder, did my loyalty to J&J drive me to this conclusion or did I truly experience more comfort with this brand? I believe I was objective through the process, as if I was part of a market research project. But, why did it take my eye doctor 3 tries before she recommended the Oasys brand? Did the other manufacturers offer higher margins? Spiffs?

The relevance here is brand loyalty. For whatever reason you feel an affinity to a specific brand, you will select that brand due to your loyalty. Depending on your personality and influence in your social circle, you could also effect others decision to select that brand. If that loyalty is broken due to product quality, customer experience or unreasonable pricing, that's when you turn a promoter to passive - or worse to a detractor. This may be the case with Shel's posting of United Airlines recently.

People attach to brands, your experience with the brand will move the barometer from these key loyalty measures. Mining blogs offers organizations the opportunity to get unfiltered feedback on brand loyalty that can guide strategy and effect future growth.

Are you listening? I expect my colleagues at J&J are....

Blogging and Customer Service

2006-06-28T20:11:00.000-07:00

Customer Service Exposed!

One of the benefits of blogging is an opportunity to share personal experiences with a company's customer service. As a community of blog monitoring and measurement providers, we talk about how blogs provide insight into consumer opinion, trends and issues that matter, and protecting your brand. Monitoring blog conversations also offers a significant opportunity to audit the quality of your customer service and it's impact on your brand. Here are several key stories.

I recently had a conversation with Shel Israel where he subsequently blogged about Why Support Matters? Great conversation. You can see by reading his postings his experiences with Lenovo, washers & dryers, and most recently United Airlines/United Vacations. In his brief discussion regarding United on the blog, he didn't point out one of the most important points about his experience. While United Vacations is not a part of United Airlines, they do leverage the United brand. Consumers experience, both positive and negative, with United Vacations will reflect on the United brand. Consumers don't care about the organization structure, they care about the ability to meet their needs. Shel's run around United Vacations uncovered the disconnect between them and United Airlines (not the same company). It doesn't matter, he will likely avoid United anything in the future. Now that he has also blogged about it, what will this cost United in loyalty?

I also ran across a posting from Tim Dyson where he refers to the recent AOL service incident that a consumer recorded, posted on the Internet and subsequently ended up on CNBC. The customer service agent was fired, but what damage did AOL suffer by the publicity of this one individual? How many other consumers called to cancel their AOL subscriptions as a result of reading the blog or watching the segment on CNBC?

In a recent ClickZ article from Peter Blackshaw, he describes what he would do if he was asked to take over the call center. A veteran marketer and leading promoter of Consumer Generated Media, Consumer Affairs: The New Advertising Department, lays out a compelling story about how the customer service department should move beyond being a cost center to providing more strategic value in market research, advertising and word of mouth marketing.

Consumer generated media, blogging, social media, whatever you want to call it, provides an outstanding opportunity for customer service professionals to collect feedback on their service. After all, how many of those after the call surveys have been sent and what is your response rate?

While I don't think we will change the corporate structure to put call centers in the hands of the CMO, I do think marketing professionals have an opportunity to audit their organizations customer service quality and better understand the consumers total experience with your brand.

I will say again, it's the customers experience of your ability to live up to your brand promise that will determine success. In this age of consumer connectivity, word of mouth travels fast and far. What will your customers say about your brand? Are you listening?

P.S. Peter Blackshaw, if you are listening, please remove that obnoxious pink poodle from your ClickZ site. It's distracting and annoying. You have great insight to share and the poodle does not properly reflect your brand =)

Marketing in a time of mass change, Web 2.0 and accountability

2006-06-27T08:53:00.000-07:00

I have spent most of my allotted blogging time in the past few days browsing the vast web of available information. There is so much out there, available for everyone to read. Consumer opinions about brands, thought leaders prospective on where the market is going, case studies of success and failure, and research on a variety of subjects.

My reading path started with people I know. Following my own blogroll, I found a number of links to blogs and research studies of interest. As I absorbed all of this information, it is obvious that the world of marketing is changing. The world of how businesses communicate with, and listen to, their customers is changing. How will this change the marketing function?

In a study by CMO Council, they found that marketers lack direct contact with customers. Another New York Times article "To Charge Up Customers, Put Customers in Charge" identifies opportunities for marketers to engage customers with the brand and help in designing relevant products. (Disclaimer: this link will not provide full text unless you have a New York Times login. This is a topic for another time. What do publishers do in this time of mass content availability? Why bother reading articles behind a registration page when so much is available to me for free?)

While marketers need to get closer to customers, there is this vast sea of information already available and being discussed on the Internet. Marketers should be required to get out there and find it, read it and participate in it. They should get out of the office, visit customers and employees to learn more about their organizations' ability to deliver on the brand promise. After all, that's what the brand promise is all about - a PROMISE to deliver value, to serve a need.

What is evolving is a more honest landscape. Companies will be held accountable to deliver the value promised. What is critical to success is how well does your organization deliver on the brand promise? Everyone is watching. No matter what advertising dollars you spend, what consultant you bring in to craft your value proposition, what PR agency you hire to take your message to market, the customer is in control. They have the megaphone to tell the world about their experience with your brand. Are you listening?

It's a challenging time in marketing with several factors.

* NEED FOR CUSTOMER INTIMACY. Get to know your customers. According to the CMO Council study referenced earlier, most marketers rely on their CRM systems to help them understand their customers, yet 40% rated their systems as "weak". Get out and talk to someone, even if it's only on the web!
* MEDIA FRAGMENTATION. The media landscape continues to change. Consumers are in control of how and if they consume advertising messages. TiVo, RSS, satellite radio and of course, the Internet, are disruptive technologies that is changing the way marketers get their message to market.
* SOCIAL MEDIA. The connectivity of consumers and the ability to easily publish your experiences for all to see, creates a brand free for all. Anyone and everyone can discuss your brand and with the push of a button publish their opinions globally to millions of "would-be" consumers.
* WORD OF MOUTH AND VIRAL MARKETING. How do you leverage this powerful consumer connectivity to spread the messages you want about your brand? How do you manage communication of messages you don't want in the market?
* THE AGE OF ACCOUNTABILITY. How do you measure everything you do and still maintain a "sandbox" to try new things? What measures matter most? (see my last posting)

I propose that marketers create a "listening" budget. Marketers spend nearly $500B in advertising annually, take 1% of that ($5B) and allocate a separate budget to listen to customers. As a benchmark, it is estimated that the blog monitoring market was $20m in 2005, we have a long way to go!

Before you tell the world how great your product is, listen to what customers will tell others. That's the marketing channel that has the most impact today.

Brand Building and Marketing Measurement

2006-06-23T15:07:00.000-07:00

I have been talking with other marketing professionals lately about the challenges we face today in the "age of accountability". I completely understand, support and agree with the need to measure the effectiveness of your marketing investments. But does every measure have to be leads?

At a recent CMO roundtable dinner I asked a colleague about how they measured the effectiveness in other geographic regions, she very promptly answered "I know exactly how many leads they generated". At CMO Council Marketing Performance Measurement forums every speaker talks about how their efforts translated to leads and eventually sales.

What happened to building brand preference? Customer loyalty?

While I clearly understand that businesses exist to make money and that money comes from leads that turn into sales, what about the activities that create preference and loyalty? These activities happen earlier in the consideration life cycle and cannot be directly tied to revenue.

As marketers, have we succumbed to the measurement game and only offered up the easy metrics? The metrics everyone already understands. The metrics we can get out of the CRM system. Is this the only one that matters? At a conference in Las Vegas I heard Pat LaPointe of MarketingNPV state "measure what matters, not just what you can".

Don't you think that brand building investments translate to higher response rates in demand creation? Aren't you more likely to response to direct marketing campaign from a brand you know, and trust? Don't you think that interacting with customers and providing them value throughout the life cycle of their experience with your brand builds stronger loyalty?

This topic really came to light for me when reading Charlene Li's recent posting on blogging ROI (a must read). Who can argue that in a business where you sell the knowledge of your people, that communicating WITH your market is not a good thing? While Charlene is backing off the $1m number she threw out, I agree with her premise entirely! Blogging gives her a communication vehicle to share her insights in real-time, and more importantly she can collect feedback that will make her research more relevant to her audience.

Building brands takes a multi-discipline approach to marketing. This is especially true for start-ups where you are not only building a brand, but in many cases you are creating a category. This requires market education and continued communication about why the product or service you offer is better than the current state.

Can we find a way to appease the measurement gods, while staying true to our trade? Let's not get caught in the measurement trap and forget that building brands and creating markets require you to do things that can only be measured by how many people you have shared information with.

We MUST continue to find ways to attach marketing activities to financial outcomes. However, while industry accepted measures are developed, we need to continue investment in building awareness, brand preference and customer loyalty.

Today, I found a posting on the Blackfriars blog that stated "consumer must be brand aware, brand attributes must be delivered as a brand promise, and the brand experience must live up to the promise. Any break in the sequence is the difference between success and failure". This cannot be measured in the currency of lead generation alone.

The Adoption Curve of CGM and Blogging

2006-06-22T16:42:00.000-07:00

This week I attended a few events that gave me the opportunity to talk with several marketers from different industries. What became clear to me is that there is a real difference in understanding of blogging and consumer generated media. While some of my collegues in the media analysis business may consider me a late comer, I have found I am representative of the next wave of adoption and still ahead of many marketers.

There were the early adoptors, mostly the technical community talking to one another, this seems to be the class of Robert Scoble. The word spread, creating a buzz about this new form of "consumer generated media" and thanks to companies such as Six Apart and Blogger, blogging tools were created for the common man (or woman). As critical mass formed on the Internet, marketers began to explore the opportunity of participating in and listening to this new media. Organizations such as Intelliseek (now BuzzMetrics) and Technorati began to show the world how consumer generated media can be searched, read and analyzed. The buzz amplified.

I'm part of the next wave. The wave of marketers that have been exposed to the opportunities presented by blogging and consumer generated media and facinated with the possiblities. Thanks to books such as Naked Conversations and conferences such as WOMMA, I have heard a number of case studies and learned much more about the world of consumer generated media.

As I talk with our clients (CMOs, VP of Marketing, and VP of Corporate Communications in the Global2000), many believe this is either a phase that will pass, or irrelevant to their business. This is especially true of B2B marketers. B2C marketers have the most to gain at this point and appear to be more serious about getting involved. Some want to figure out how to advertise in this new media, some want to participate and create buzz, and some want to mine blogs for consumer insight. There are several opportunities to participate and leverage this new space for competitive advantage.

One thing is clear, the majority of marketers are still trying to figure it all out or have yet to identify this as a priority. For those of us in the business of providing analytics on CGM, we must continue the education and push the adoption forward. Every talk I have heard on the subject recommends you listen first and then talk. We (Biz360, BuzzMetrics, Cymfony) provide tools to mine through 2 million + postings per day to collect the insight companies need on their brand perception, consumer trends, and competitive insight. This is a great way to "listen" when there is a great deal of content.

My company, Biz360, shares many examples of the type of analysis available on our site MarketIQ. This may appear like a self serving commercial message, but my intent is to demonstrate the power of analysis of this content and to move the adoption forward.

It's a new media landscape. One that will have profound impact on how we consume information. Everyone should be evaluating the landscape and deciding how it is relevant to your business. I suspect there are very few companies that will not find an opportunity to benefit from this information source. Use the Internet and you will find many stories and tips of how to get started. Good luck and please share your experiences with us along the way.

Don't Buy Mercedes

2006-06-21T06:58:00.000-07:00

While the title of this posting may seem irrelevant to our industry, it's highly relevant and here's why.

First, let me just restate, don't buy a Mercedes. Three years ago I bought a convertible CLK320. Since I was 18 I had dreamed of having a convertible Mercedes. Once my daughter was old enough and finances were strong enough I finally got my car. Since that time I have found myself on a first name basis with the service department, in and out of service for one reason - Mercedes quality has definitely declined. While I could go on and on at the ridiculous things that have gone wrong I want to make this relevant.

Yesterday I attended and presented at the WOMMA Basic Training. When I arrived at the Hilton in SF my Mercedes trunk would not open, leaving my speaker notes and laptop locked inside my car! During the conference there was some debate on the measurement of word of mouth online vs. offline. One of the studies presented showed that 90%+ of Word of Mouth is offline. My collegue from Nielsen BuzzMetrics blogged about that last night .

When I got up to make my presentation I started by sharing with the audience my dissatisfaction with being a Mercedes owner, and suggested to the 100 or so people in the room that they not buy a Mercedes. I have also shared this with all my collegues at work and anyone who sees my "beautiful" car and says "how do you like your Mercedes"? You can imagine my answer.

So, while there is a large percentage of word of mouth that happens offline, until we find away to get an RSS feed from people's mouths it's going to continue to be difficult to measure it's impact on your brand. However, if you assume that the online conversations are a proxy for what is happening offline, you see the opportunity to better understand the perception of your brand and what is top of mind to your target audience.

If we use my Mercedes experience as an example, I would agree that the majority of my Mercedes bashing has happened offline. To Mercedes that means that this posting (and any other postings like it) represents only a fraction of the people that have been told "Do not buy a Mercedes". If they were smart enough to mine blogs for consumer sentiment, they may find the impact word of mouth is having on their brand and multiply that by at least 100 since one online conversation may translate into 100s of offline conversations.

This weekend I think I'll visit the Audi deal. Audi owners have shared nothing but stories of satisfaction.

Web 2.0, Virtual Communities and Global Neighborhoods

2006-06-19T22:05:00.000-07:00

There is much discussion about the changes and opportunities created by Web 2.0. The Internet infrastructure combined with tools for the average user have created an environment where all of us can participate and communicate with others that share our interests.

This weekend my Father and I were talking about his role as President of the Rotary Club in his region. The challenge in today's fast paced world with both the husband and wife working is finding time for fellowship and participation in your community. Web 2.0 is enabling individuals to participate in communities and build relationships online, at whatever time of the day you find the cycles.

Reading blogs of individuals I will be meeting at the upcoming WOMMA conference gives me some insight into their latest thoughts and opinions on common topics. This will allow me to build more meaningful and relevant relationships.

So, my observation is that our online discussions enable more meaningful offline discussion and allow us the opportunity to build relationship and participate in communities we may not otherwise have the opportunity to be involved in due to the demands of our everyday lives.

Our competitor, Cymfony, announced a new initiative today called Influencer 2.0. This appears to be targeted at educating the market on the opportunities for listening to and participating in the Web 2.0 world. Given the lessons of adoption in PR Measurement, this level of education is critical to moving the market forward and increasing adoption. I look forward to the conversation.

Tribute to Fathers

2006-06-19T11:37:00.000-07:00

Yesterday I had the opportunity to spend the day with my Father. Even though he only lives 2.5 hours away, we don't do it often enough. I'm glad there is a "Fathers Day" that creates the need to make the drive.

My Father has had such a major impact on my life. He is still one of the smartest people I know. He tought me about business, politics, parenting, and life. And even at my age, he influences my thoughts and decisions.

He always has an opinion about almost everything. So, yesterday I set up his blog to share those opinions with everyone else. The power of word of mouth extends again.

Here's to all the Fathers I know. Remember the impact you have on your children.

Thank you Poppa for your wisdom! Now it's time for you to share it with the world!

Blogging, Web 2.0, Brands & Customer Insight

2006-06-17T09:12:00.000-07:00

I am excited to join in this new community of blogging. I woke up this morning and started browsing my favorite blogs before my coffee or my workout. For those that know me, they know this is extremely rare.

As I browsed around learning more about this world, it has become increasing clear to me how important Internet discussions are to brands. In less than one hour I read about American Airlines, Microsoft , Lenovo, Dell , Google and Lego .

The opportunity for these companies to collect customer feedback and evaluate market sentiment toward their brand (and their competitors) is significant. Experiences with the brand, product feedback, and service experiences are discussed openly and offer so much for those companies interested in listening to the market. Today the market research market is $20B. Much of this is to collect consumer opinions, gain feedback on product ideas, and collect a better understanding of customer requirements. There is an increasing opportunity to leverage the web to accomplish these same objectives.

I also saw how video logging can put a human face on the biggest of brands. The Channel 9 interview with Steve Ballmer and Bill Gates was more like a home video than an orchestrated MSNBC interview. It "humanized" some of the biggest names in the technology market and made the news much more interesting to watch. For me, it showed the "softer side" of Microsoft as Ballmer talked about how he worked for Bill for 26 years and Bill has worked for him for 6 years. Clearly more than a professional statement, a statement of feeling.

After all isn't brand equity built on the feelings of a brand. The feeling of trust, the feeling of stature, the feeling of loyalty? Reading stories and watching interviews without all the production & packaging makes a brand real and creates feelings about that brand.

As for my own brand building efforts. I am on the journey. Today I found when I typed my name into Technorati, someone else blogged about a podcast I recently did with Jennifer Jones of podtech.net. Yesterday I received my first comment thanks to my new friend, Shel Israel. So far, my experience in this blogging world is a positive one. I think I'll keep on blogging.

Building Brand Equity in the Blogosphere

2006-06-15T21:27:00.000-07:00

I just returned from an event where Robert Scoble and Shel Israel (authors of Naked Conversations www.nakedconversations.com) shared their experiences and vision regarding blogging and other social media. It was entertaining and informative. I asked Robert about how you build readership on your blog. He described what sounded like a journey over a few years of participation in various social media. The question I still have is how does an unknown blogger (like myself) build readership and brand? Robert had the benefit of the Microsoft brand halo and being one of the first in this new media, but what about the rest of us?

I read the book, I'm practicing the art, I'm asking the experts, so time will tell whether I get the results. It will be helpful as I meet with other marketing executives dealing with this same issue. If you have brand awareness & site traffic, you can leverage your existing assets. For those building a brand, launching a new company or new product, how do you leverage this new medium to build awareness, advocacy and eventually demand for whatever it is you have to offer the world? Robert, Shel, I seek your wisdom...

I also wanted to say I was quite relieved to hear Shel express similar sentiment regarding blogging tools (see my last posting). It seems that while Shel is technical enough (or persistent enough) to get things working, his wife is not yet up to par with the html skills of the technical community. Thank God I'm not alone! Perhaps this helps us understand the demographics of the blogosphere and understand that blogging tools are a gating factor to extending the demographics to a broader audience?

2006-06-14T14:00:00.000-07:00

Well, I think I'm finally ready for the public. It was not as straight forward as I thought. I wonder how many of the 40m+ blogs that technorati tracks are actually active. If everyone has to edit HTML code and upload pictures to a separate site, perhaps several would be bloggers "abandon the shopping cart". I wanted to participate, so I pushed through the challenges and got it done. I didn't even need my 15 year old daughter's assistance, although I'm sure she could have cranked out that HTML code for me.

Ok, let the blogging begin...

Blogger Tools

2006-06-13T23:04:00.000-07:00

Well, I've been trying to put my blog together in my spare time. Between 12 hour days at the office, a 15 year old daughter, a husband and finding a little time for myself, it's hard to dedicate the time to set up the blog. Postings seem to be easy enough, but note to the blogging tool companies - make something easy enough for busy professionals that want to get in the game!

It's not intuitive, not easy to use, requires too much technical know-how...whatever.

But, once I get the framework up and running, I'm certain I can handle this editing capability on a daily basis.

2005-12-05T10:18:00.000-08:00

In one of my favorite places, Amsterdam

The Beginning

2005-12-05T09:54:00.000-08:00

Well, today I finally started my own blog. This is clearly a medium that continues to grow in use and potential impact on business. Given that I'm in the business of helping companies monitor blogs, I thought it only appropriate I participate and truly understand it's power.

I was inspired to begin from a posting by Tim Dyson regarding the state of measurement in the PR community. Take a look at the dialogue http://siliconvalleypr.blogspot.com/2005/09/measurement-does-anyone-really-care.html.

I always have an opinion and see this as a vehicle to express my opinion and collect others. I look forward to the conversation.