Ava asks, “How can a local reseller market effectively against entrenched brands and big box stores?” Local resellers – like plumbing supply, home decor, electronics, appliance showrooms, etc. – fit in the category of value-added reseller. The key is the value-added part – a reseller is typically more expensive than a big box retail store…
Magdalena asks, “What should be marketers’ main focus – numbers or creativity and innovation? Why?” The idea of asking someone to choose being qualitative or quantitative is inadvisable. People have natural aptitudes, and asking them to focus on something that isn’t their strength tends to yield mediocre results. The more important focus choice is whether…
Adam asks, “What is customer experience? Is it the same as customer service?” Modern customer experience management, as a discipline and a profession, is an amalgamation and evolution of four sub-disciplines: Voice of the Customer (1993) Design Thinking and UX Analytics, AI, and Big Data Champions and Defenders Watch the video for full details and…
Hamid asks, “Should my business deploy a chatbot for marketing and customer service? What are the reasons or risks?” Chatbots – and any form of automation – promise a programmatic, uniform customer experience. There are two considerations for making this decision: Cost to match the current customer experience Quality of the current customer experience Watch…
This toilet paper dispenser inspired me to share some thoughts on customer experience, business strategy, and what companies do most wrong: put themselves before the customer. Can’t see anything? Click here to watch on YouTube.
Transparency is a popular term in business these days. Let’s examine why, what transparency is, and how to create more of it in our organizations. Why Transparency Matters Trust is the foundation of a relationship. The more trust we have, the better our businesses function. Transparency builds or restores trust of stakeholders (employees, investors, partners,…
Here’s a brief thought exercise. Would you hire this employee? If they were on your staff, would you retain them? Punches the clock exactly, and refuses overtime without significant compensation Does the absolute minimum work possible to not get fired Spends their free time outside of work promoting themselves relentlessly Spends half their time at…
Service is the dominant form of industry these days. Everything is a service; in fact, -as-a-service is appended to an enormous number of industries. We have software-as-a-service. (the online apps economy) We have platform-as-a-service. (the API economy) We have vehicles-as-a-service. (the ridesharing companies) We have space-as-a-service. (home and office timesharing apps) Yet how many of…
Customer experience, or CX, has been and continues to be a hot topic for businesses seeking higher marketing ROI and longer customer retention. As with any seemingly new topic, we’ve lots of jargon to contend with. What is CX? How is it different from previous efforts to retain and grow customer loyalty? Let’s dig into…
The most innovative marketers routinely pick up new things, try them out, and succeed or fail. Why are marketers struggling so much to adapt to artificial intelligence and machine learning? In this series, we’ll explore machine learning and artificial intelligence to build a foundation for understanding the field – and how it applies to marketing.…
