Is customer service a dying art?

This post questions whether the quality of brands’ customer service is too often neglected, while the beginning and middle parts of a customer’s brand journey, (more commonly understood to be the customer experience), take not only the marketing spotlight, but the budget as well.

The final stage of the customer journey is arguably one of the most significant. This is the point of transaction engagement. This is the point at which a customer’s journey translates into a purchase decision. Currency is traded for product or service. The customer must necessarily feel engaged with the brand emotionally to increase likelihood of the ‘experience’ being sought after repeatedly. If the customer service falls short after a customer’s seamless multi dimensional ride of alluring brand messages, quirky digital media marketing, engaging retail promotions, experiential marketing efforts and even solid press… if the final customer touch-points disappoint on any emotional level, the brand increases its risk of losing that customer and then some – let’s not forget the frightening power of word of mouth.

Knowing that customer service falls smack bang along the journey, be this at the end or during the brand relationship, why do brand guardians, their marketers, brand managers and agencies consistently botch up the final detail? Receiving good customer service is synonymous with fine dining. If you are nudged out the door too soon after paying the bill, the bitterness lingers.

Facebook wants brands to get liked

Facebook’s Like button is a curious brand metric that most of us take as read. But what does it really mean and to whom? A report conducted by social media specialists, Lithium and the Chief Marketing Officer Council, in the US, surveyed 1,300 consumers and 132 senior marketers to find out. The report, posted on http://www.allfacebook.com – the Unofficial Facebook Resource, makes statistically clear that both marketers and consumers have different understandings of the “Like” function. As an aside it is possible that initially Facebook may have undervalued the strength that the “Likes” function is proving to offer brands, and it is being made increasingly clear by on-line media that marketers will be left behind if they don’t start using this data strategically.

I thought it would be an interesting exercise to track the movement of Facebook Likes for brands that received press in last week’s online editions of AdNews and B&T Weekly. Here’s what I found - Facebook Likes. A couple of observations that I think are worthy of a mention are:

- If your brand is speaking to the media about current brand marketing activity, make sure your online presence is up to speed.  Grant’s Whisky has no Facebook presence and using Facebook as a holding page is just disappointing.

- If the global brand’s Facebook presence is that much more dynamic than the local presence, there’s work to do. It was a challenge to locate Coca-Cola Australia, so when a brand is choosing a Facebook name, be smart about it.

- Telcos have traditionally produced some of the most dynamic TV campaigns we see, yet Vodafone and Optus’ Facebook presence visually lags behind. Laziness?

- Lastly, isn’t there something oddly inconsistent with a major publishing house not having a strong presence online?

Brand consultancies getting editorial

Perhaps brand consultancies have finally reached a level of maturity in Australia to be detected by both client and media radars. A decade ago it was all begging and bribery to successfully place a brand consultancy news story, unless you were dealing with a UK journo or a niche trade title. But here we are in 2012 and B&T has run three online stories already this week not to mention the run Campaign Brief has also given a few. I aways knew it was just a matter of time, even if journalists continue to insist on referring to corporate design work as ‘logos’ rather than identities.

Pronto Software has unveiled a new identity as it expands it’s business into a range of local and international sectors. I especially like Managing Director, David Jackman’s stand against conformity when he said – “ In creating this new branding, we have made every effort to produce something unique and different that would challenge the relative conformity of the entire Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) and Business Intelligence (BI)space.”

For the entire story see the following link –   http://www.bandt.com.au/news/marketing/pronto-software-rebrands-with-interbrand

Melbourne brand agency Paper Stone Scissors has won the creative account for Highpoint Shopping Centre after a four way pitch with unnamed agencies. Paper Stone Scissors will be tasked with rolling out the new brand direction, owned by the GPT Group, as part of a $300 million development project set to be completed by the end of 2012. WOW – this story’s even sitting on the front page of Campaign Brief’s website today. http://www.campaignbrief.com/

Thirdly, Melbourne brand agency Tank has appointed Crystal James as client services director. The newly created role, to be based out of its Melbourne headquarters, signals the business’ growth which is forecast to double over the next two years. James formerly held the position of business development director at rival agency RCo Brand Communications where she was business development director. (Again please use above B&T link for full story) and visit Tank’s website on http://www.tankbranding.com.au/

Innovation absorption

I’m like a kid in a candy shop when it comes to lists, especially when it gives me a numbered list of worldwide creative ideas. Take a look - http://www.trendwatching.com/briefing/#happiness

QuickerFeet than you

Timing is everything whether you’re a marketer or a consumer. Let’s be honest, brands miss out on business just as often as their consumers miss the right deal, but only due to bad timing. Introducing Quickerfeet, a technology that finds consumers and promotes relevant offers when the time’s right and in the right location.

On 15 February this year, US company  Valuevine Inc. launched Valuevine Connect, a location analytics technology for retail chains, restaurants, franchises and multi-location businesses. The technology’s Australian licence will be carried by The Bendalls Group and will be launched some time in June. Available as an iPhone app, the benefit to consumers will lie in having the choice to receive marketing messages that are relevant to them at the right time.

In the US Valuevine’s technology works by pulling together online consumer content posted on review community sites such as Yelp, City Search, Facebook and check-in social media sites Foursquare and Gowalla. It then uses this information to provide marketers with reports showing consumer trends and activity.

Consumers should be celebrating the new-found channel of power that social media has enabled. It’s integration with commerce is one of the most intelligent and useful applications of market information the digital age has seen.

http://socialtimes.com/quicker-feet-iphone-app-promises-this-type-of-ad-50-off-if-you-come-to-our-store-within-5-minutes_b43546

Sex and smokes used to work

Blow in her face and she'll follow you anywhere

This copy line for Tipalet cigarettes marketed to men, will give you a laugh! How bold we once were.

As a follow up to the last post, I came across some interesting work showcased on Lovely Package, a comprehensive and good looking packaging blog worth visiting. Check out the student designs for Nomad Self Lighting cigarettes by Matthew Smiraldo, Norway’s Andreas Fossheim’s packaging for cannabis cigarettes (if they were legal), and Derek Hunt’s packaging for X Tobacco. Cool stuff.

http://lovelypackage.com/category/tobacco/

Tiger milks death

Mr. Woods isn’t the only product or cause that has used death in some way to motivate customer response. In pondering the use of a dead man’s voice in a major ad campaign I came across some unrelated and diverse examples in the media where death plays its role. The reality is, in whichever way it’s used, it’s shocking but powerful.

Moxie Sozo is the design and advertising agency responsible for the Haiti Poster Project. The same idea has helped raise money for Hurricane Katrina victims in 2005 and the California fire victims in 2007. Two recent poster additions to the Haiti Poster project from Pentagram’s Harry Pearce and Justus Oehlerand are profiled in the latest issue of Creative Review.

http://creativereview.co.uk/cr-blog/2010/april/haiti-poster-project

A peculiar story in the British media that ran in February was about Channel 4 TV’s search for a terminally ill patient who would be willing to volunteer to be mummified as part of a documentary. The ads read: ‘We are currently keen to talk to someone who, faced with the knowledge of their own terminal illness and all that it entails, would nonetheless consider undergoing the process of an ancient Egyptian embalming.’ And the surprise bonus is that the chosen candidate may be forever on display in a museum! How cool is that?

And back to Tiger… CBS asked Ad Week’s Barbara Lipford to explain what she thought of the campaign -

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Rs7KpA9vlo

Finally, and let no more be said, you gotta love Ad Busters’ graphic spoof depicting Wood’s relationship with Nike.

http://www.adbusters.org/blogs/adbusters-blog/tigerwoods.html