Marketers seeking customer relationship, loyalty and experiences

Just looking at the two plain terms Experiential and Marketing, we can dissect each and then combine them to see how to apply them in our real life scenario.

Experiential is all about the WoW factor (some may disagree) on the part of the customer. Marketing is the way the process of moving goods from company to consumer (not to be confused with the logistics). So we are talking of emotions and logic. But emotions make the the corporate world uncomfortable.

Marketing prides itself on numbers and finiteness and tangibility. The efficiency-oriented operations are full of logic and predictability, so one tend to treat the customer accordingly. The perception is that since emotions cannot be managed very well and are difficult to fit into pie charts or reports, they must be ignored. Thus emotions are treated as the type of irrational behavior from which we must shy away.

A purely logical customer will shop for the lowest price every time and will demonstrate no loyalty at all. The cost of doing business with customers will be high, because each time marketer will have to “acquire” them again through expensive incentives.

Relationships, Loyalty, and Experiences, are emotionally loaded terms.

Relationship means making an emotional selection and sticking with it. The stronger the relationship, the longer it lasts and the deeper the commitment. This is exactly what one wants the customers to do with the products and services. Develop a deeper, longer commitment to brands, even if they are not the cheapest on the market.

The problem with emotions, however, is that many of them occur in a nurturing environment. They demand mutual commitment in order to deliver commitment. In the long, uncomfortable affair companies have with emotions, they have tended to exploit the customer’s emotions but not to communicate their own. Understand that relationships and loyalty require reciprocity, and you, the company, need to initiate the relationship.

So unleash the power of emotions to create differentiation in your products or services.
Allow people to add their emotional touch to the overall customer experience, and by doing so, create preference and positive experiences in the customers’ hearts.
Build a mechanism that demonstrates to customers your sincerity and authenticity, so they will be willing to forgo the next price cut from the competition and prefer your products— despite the higher price.

Emotional customers are customers who care; customers who share their views with the world; customers who pay you a premium and stay for the long run. They are usually profitable customers.

Hitting the Tip of Emotional Branding

Wow! So people are reading it. Atleast I can say so from the mails and feedback I received directly.

Would appreciate if you could post these on the site so that others can get a feel of what you feel.

As stated earlier, the site is not about sharing just case studies, but building a community of people who can discuss on experiential marketing.

It is known that when people participate actively in the sales process, they become more engaged, and their retention rate of key product information increases dramatically. Fuelled by the demand for new ways to reach increasingly sophisticated and selective customer audiences, companies are rapidly incorporating dynamic, experiential encounters with rich interactive technologies into the marketing mix.

The likelihood of a customer being prepared to make an informed buying decision is dramatically increased. Many companies are now leveraging virtual product experiences, enabling them to deliver experiences that are consistent and compelling, helping them to better reach their audiences and make relevant emotional connections to customers. This leads to more informed buying decisions and, ultimately, enhanced customer satisfaction and loyalty.

Customers expect to interact with products in such a manner as to reveal their behavior, features and advantages. Companies that create engaging unique campaigns to promote their products, no matter how obscure, will get consumers excited about participating in social marketing campaigns.

In a tech driven world, fun and engaging e-marketing gets the word out and will steer consumers your way. The most successful experimental marketing campaigns involving interaction between product and consumer should aim to generate a lot of press and word of mouth buzz.
Jargons like Information super highway, Internet, enabling e-experiences and as technology becomes more and more sophisticated, so do customer demands for interactive experiences.
Companies are seeking to employ successful experiential marketing should look to:
• DO - Don’t Overwhelm: Providing sufficient information
• CC: Deliver Consistent Communication across sales channels;
• TIE - create a truly interactive experience; and
• TEQDM (Take Them) - Tap into those “Emotional Qualities” that drive the customer’s Decision-Making.

So a simple 4 point strategy to start Experiential Marketing, but are we getting into some amount of emotional branding.