How Situational Marketing improves CX
How often after doing your online research of a product and then buying it, do you get bombarded with advertisements and promotions for that product you just purchased? No doubt you see offers for the product much cheaper than you what you paid – and sometimes even from the company you just bought from.
Annoying is an understatement, right?
Instead, organisations should be using data, combined with some behavioural science thinking to execute situational marketing initiatives.
I know, I just reread that sentence and it sounds a bit doublespeak. Let me explain in practical terms with an example.
Fan Experience Number 1
Let’s suppose that I’m a fan of a football club and I visit their online store to buy their latest hoodie to keep me warm in another wintry lockdown. I’ve been to the site a few times and checked out the product and on this next visit, I pony up the cash and buy the $100 hoodie.
A week later, it arrives and I’m well pleased with my purchase – Happy days.
The following week, I get an email from the Club offering 40% discount on the exact same hoodie I just bought with a big “Buy Now” button beckoning me to shop.
No doubt I’ve been targeted by my browsing behaviour identifying me as a good target.
That joyous feeling I had from buying the hoodie has turned into buyer’s regret and left me feeling like I have been screwed over having paid full tote for the product.
Good targeting – poor execution and bad customer experience.
Now let’s apply some situational marketing using the data that the Club has on me and turn this negative experience into a positive experience.
Fan Experience Number 2
Let’s say I get the email from the Club offering 40% discount on the exact hoodie I just bought. But instead of a big “Buy Now”button, the offer says.
“We noticed you bought this hoodie just recently and we would hate for you to miss out on this discount, so we’ve credited 40% of your purchase to your account for next time you visit our store. Every dollar you spend at our store goes to supporting our team and making our club successful. Thanks for being a great supporter. ”
And then a button that says, “Shop Now” or “Visit our Store”.
Which offer do you think would create the best fan experience?
Which one do think is going to create more revenue for the Club?
Which one will give me confidence to buy from the store without fear of missing out or overpaying?
Which one am I going to tell my friends about?
No brainer, right?
Unfortunately, too many organisations are failing to leverage the data they have and the knowledge of their customers to make their experience positive. Situational marketing is all about being very personalised and relevant with marketing communications to the customer at that point in time you are connecting with them based on their needs, preferences, recent transactions, and situation.
You will note that there are a couple of subtle (ok maybe not so subtle) nudges in the Fan Experience Number 2 email copy to motivate the fan to come back to the store and buy more merchandise because a) they have a credit and b) it will help “our” club.
By saying “our” club, it makes me more responsible for the welfare of the club because I’m a part of the club. Of course, I want to help “our” club.
What the Club has done well in the second email is be personal by applying the 4 R's of personalisation:
a) Recognise: They identified me the person, across my interactions from browsing to buying and engaging with the Club.
b) Remember: They’ve checked into my recent purchase behaviour to ensure they remember what I have bought, what type of member I am and how I like to engage with the Club.
c) Relevance: They’ve presented an offer that is very relevant to me, based on my history and interests and my most recent interaction with the Club.
d) Recommend: They’ve understood how I might feel towards the first offer and adjusted their recommendation into something that will appeal to me based on their knowledge of me as a fan from my behaviour, preferences, and interests.
From an execution perspective, this is about as simple as it gets to pushing out an email campaign through your martech platform of choice (and forgive my very basic email examples - design is not my thing).
Above all else, they’ve applied marketing to match the situation and focused on delivering a great customer (or fan) experience. They’ve:
considered context
created emotional connection
cared about how I will feel and what actions they could take to optimise that experience.
Now this is a very simple example and there are a raft of techniques and approaches that can be applied using situational marketing and personalisation by using the data we have on customers. And it doesn’t require massive investments in programming, technology, and marketing.
But it does take a considered approach, understanding who your customers are, access to all the data on your customer’s interactions and effective use of fit for purpose marketing technology.
When we talk about engaging fans at metafan, we review any programmed communications to ensure they meet at least one (and preferably more) of the six fan engagement principles. We place ourselves in the position of the fan and ask,
"Does this offer..."
1. Give me what I need
2. Help me solve a problem.
3. Save me time, money, hassle, risks.
4. Show me you understand me.
5. Show me that you Listen to me.
6. Demonstrate you Respect my values.
If it doesn’t, the question needs to be asked, “What’s the point?”
(I’ll talk more about the six fan engagement principles in my next post.)
For now, I’d encourage you to look at your last few email campaigns and ask whether they met any of these principles, or were they purely for your own objectives?
#situationalmarketing #cmo #fanengagement #data #customerexperience #cx
Note: Graham Plant is CEO of metafan, a company committed to helping organisations understand and engage their fans through data and insight.