In today's cluttered and overstimulating times, it's easy as marketers and salespeople to get too distracted by gimmicks or too daunted into relying on old, outmoded standbys. Somewhere in the middle is the secret sauce, as we learned with hilarity from marketing expert Scott Stratten at DS Graphics' exclusive reception during DMA 2015 at Empire Restaurant in Boston.
Loyal customers and DS Graphics' core marketing and sales team watched in awe as Stratten -- best-selling author of the books UnSelling, UnMarketing, QR Codes Kill Kittens, and The Book of Business Awesome -- led us through, face-palming example by example, what not to do when trying to grab customers' attention and why we can never take our eyes off the prize: customer service. Because bad attention is what you get when you rush to use the latest marketing and sales gimmicks and end up doing it completely wrong, as Stratten and his co-author (and partner in life) Alison Kramer learned when researching The Book of Business Awesome -- which led to the case studies featured in the flip side, The Book of Business UnAwesome, and their subsequently best-selling Un- series. As they say, "The cost of not listening, engaging, or being great at what you do... is UnAcceptable."
Here are 4 ways to change all that by un-selling and un-marketing your brand, as shared by Stratten at DS Graphics' DMA 2015 reception:
1. We're all customer service. Every. Single. Employee.
Each time you touch a customer, you have an opportunity to change the top-of-mind keyword they associate with your brand, as Stratten showed with an example featuring luxury hotelier Ritz-Carlton and Joshie the Giraffe (which you can watch in full in this video).
"Create an experience so amazing that someone can't help but tell others about it, and you're sure to succeed."
Because the brand prides itself on excellence, they turned a simple occasion of a child's lost toy into an opportunity for whimsy and world-class customer service, effectively turning the popular association with their brand from "luxury" to "care." The dad whose son left Joshie behind at the Ritz, himself the founder and CEO of a capital firm, affirmed that in these incidences "exemplary customer service distinguishes your brand, builds repeat business, combats price competition, and even improves employee morale. This is something I've always told my staff -- create an experience so amazing that someone can't help but tell others about it, and you're sure to succeed." Customer service and branding are one and the same, now and always.
2. Context is key. (Yes, ALL marketing and sales pieces.)
Do your customers, and your creative team, a favor: don't just stick things on your collateral because you think you should, you think it's cool, or just because "you have room." In his book QR Codes Kill Kittens, Stratten details (through hundreds of case studies) how marketers have taken something that worked perfectly fine -- the humble QR code, used for decades on concert tickets and hospital ID bracelets for quick & efficient scanning -- and turned it into the laughing stock of consumer marketing.
Placing huge QR codes, which need to be scanned by your smartphone's camera, on billboards and on the backs of buses, in cell phone-restricted areas (such as in-flight on commercial aircraft) and in email signatures, is just ludicrous. Think about the contextualization, the end-user experience, and the actual implementation of all marketing actions you're asking of your customers before putting those marketing pieces out there in the world. Don't use a marketing gimmick just because you can, but because you actually should. Watch this clip with Scott Stratten on the do's and don'ts of QR Codes from another of his talks for more what-not-to-do marketing pieces.
3. Customers trust you less than lawyers. Earn their trust back.
"Integrity is not a renewable resource, and only you know when it's been compromised," Stratten said. Marketing and customer service are completely entwined in this brave new branding world of ours, especially in the case of outlets like Twitter and YouTube, where your social media team better be prepared to respond fast...and correctly for your brand, just as your customer service team would. Stratten gave three incredible examples of inbound marketing as customer service and branding opportunities that turned a potentially negative experience positive, effectively making brands look better even after a faceplant than they did before (or simply reinforcing their awesome-ness and relevance).
"Integrity is not a renewable resource, and only you know when it's been compromised."
In an exchange with Delta, the flight crew acted poorly and rudely towards Stratten, but the social media team responded immediately to his outraged tweet with a simple, yet sincere, apology. In a viral video where a FedEx employee was caught on security camera tossing a package -- and breaking a brand-new computer -- Senior Vice President of Operations proactively released a video acknowledging the PR disaster, effectively making the brand look better than they did before the foul-up. Transparency is everything today, and marketing happens in real time, so make sure you're listening and reacting 24/7. If you're not, you might miss the opportunity to have fun with your customers, too, as in the case of Men's Humor and Taco Bell -- or as they say, "Anyone Can Be Cool, But Awesome Takes Practice."
4. Embrace social media. (Yes, ALL of you.)
There's no escaping it any longer: If your customers are human, they're on social media, and ignoring a social media strategy would be like ignoring a strategy for any other major communication channel like email or television or radio or print. Think about these staggering statistics: Even though MySpace lost out in the popularity contest, it still has 51 MILLION monthly users. Think about that. Facebook, which won the popularity contest, has 1 BILLION DAILY users, or approximately 1/7th of the HUMAN RACE.
If your customers are human, they're on social media.
Sure, there are more social media platforms out there than even an expert like Stratten can keep tabs on, but listen to your employees and find out where they spend their time so you can create stickiness within those communities, whether that's Instagram or Reddit.
Melissa Massello is a serial entrepreneur, marketing executive, content strategist and consumer journalist who's had the distinct pleasure of working with DS Graphics for nearly 20 years.