Social – the great leveller

Like, share, win.

In the new world of Comping, social is King. From ‘explaining-in-five-words-why’, to ‘share-for-a-chance-to’, news feeds are constantly spammed with an oft-overwhelming stream of noisy brands’ attempts at eliciting a response. Some do it in a slick, clever way, some make you want to poke yourself in the eye.

The beauty of social is the levelling of the marketing playing field. Not just for the big boy brands with the huge marketing budgets, a well-run, brand-aligned social strategy is within the reach of any business that bothers to invest and nurture it.

Birchover Hotel Apartments is a small, family-fun company of two boutique hotels. Boasting an impressive awards resume, the Derby hotel is also ranked in Trip Advisor’s Top 25 Hotels in the UK 2015 and the Nottingham branch, #1 on booking.com, despite opening a mere 11 months ago.

Beautifully decorated suites, spa-like tubs and all the added luxury you’d expect, the hotel aesthetic doesn’t disappoint.

Competitive advantage? Not a bit of it.

So how to differentiate?

Birchover’s latest Facebook comp is an opportunity to win a weekend break. So far, so same. To enter, you must nominate a special person who deserves a break. Don’t want to put it out there for all to see? The option’s there to email direct.

Nice touch.

After emailing off my entry, I get a ping straight back. From the owner. At 10pm.

Warm, grateful and sympathetic, Carl thanks me for entering the competition and shares personal information. Unexpected and delightful, it’s a real warm-fuzzy moment of insight into the brand.

Head on over to Tripadvisor and the brand promise continues to ring true. Excellent reviews, personal thank yous and honest conversations that build real relationships.

As the popularity of weekend breaks and staycations continues, the-beautiful-weekend-retreat finds itself in an increasingly competitive market. Differentiation on price isn’t sustainable, devalues luxury positioning, and before you know it, you’re into Groupon territory.

What owners Carl and Lisa have done beautifully is to capitalise on and invest in the opportunity to speak directly to customers and to listen when they speak. And the results speak for themselves.

Retention is cheaper than recruitment and the power of Word of Mouth is amplified exponentially across social. Invest in this, nurture it, do it better than your competitors.

Bottom line, you’ll do better than your competitors.

Bear & Hare. And don’t really care

From the title of this blog, it wouldn’t be hard to guess that this piece will have something to do with the retail giant that is John Lewis.

Stepping up the game in the fight for the consumer pound this festive season, John Lewis’ Christmas ad is rumoured to have cost a staggering £7 million.

Dividing the nation in their opinions, it’s had a distinctly Marmite-like reaction.

There’s no denying that it’s a fantastic piece of animation and totally on-brand. Traditional, whimsical and quite beautiful, it completely sums up the values of John Lewis in one delicious little bundle.

Or does it?

John Lewis offer a loyalty card to their customers. No purchase necessary, the card entitles you to a lovely cup of coffee and slice of cake in one of their restaurants. How lovely.

Well yes, lovely if you have an email address, not so lovely if you don’t.

Like many of our older relatives, a friend of mine’s parents and grandparents have been John Lewis brand loyalists all their lives. For every milestone and major purchase.

Every birthday, every christening, every celebration, every Christmas.

And like many of the older generation, Matt’s folks wouldn’t dream of going anywhere else. Unprompted by sale signs and rival advertising, shopping at John Lewis is about the experience; the wonderfully trained sales person, the beautiful and spacious layout, the carefully wrapped purchase and the lovely cup of coffee and slice of cake.

 After applying to get his parents and grandparents a loyalty card, Matt was informed that they needed an email address. Matt’s grandparents are in their 80s.

 After writing a very well argued and articulated email that spoke of his family’s long and loyal relationship with the brand, Matt received this:

Dear Mr. Woods,

I am writing in response to your email regarding your parents and grand parents not being able to sign up for a my John Lewis membership.

For each account, we do require a separate email address in order to get a my John Lewis membership card. I understand that your parents or grandparents don’t have an email address but unfortunately, to get a my John Lewis membership card they would need one.

You are able to create free email addresses for your parents and grandparents through any of the free providers i.e. google, hotmail and yahoo. If you signed them up for an email address you would then be free to sign up for a membership card.

Yours Sincerely,

Jonathon O’Keefe

my John Lewis

 Please visit our web site at www.johnlewis.com or contact us at myJL@johnlewis.co.uk. Alternatively, you can call us on 08456 100 312, lines are open 8 AM – 9 PM Monday to Friday, 8 AM – 8 PM Saturday and 10 AM – 6 PM Sunday, where a customer service representative will be happy to assist you.

Oh.

For a combined 150 years of brand loyalty and an estimated £75k in revenue, Matt’s folks are to be rewarded with…nothing. No lovely cup of coffee. No slice of cake.

Now I get it John Lewis. Signing up and email addresses gets you lots of lovely data and improves your CRM. Your strategy might also be to encourage younger, more tech savvy people into your stores, both online and on the High St.

I also understand that the older generation are getting older and that the concept of life time brand loyalty is a somewhat outdated one. Some marketers claim it doesn’t even exist anymore. That we’re all switchers and variety seekers, hurtling from one deal to another.

Well this is one marketer that disagrees.

As the offer on the High St becomes distinctly ‘samey’, the only way to retain customers is to love them and to reward them for loving you back. It goes without saying that attracting new customers is essential, but what about the ones you already have? The ones you’ve had for years. The ones who never shop anywhere else, and although they don’t have Facebook, Twitter or regularly ‘Pin’ things from your website, will remain loyal to you until the end.

Could Matt’s folks sign up by filling in a form? Of course they could.

And as well as giving their own details, they’d probably also tell you lots of lovely stuff about their families and friends too.

The sad reality is that Matt’s family will probably forgive you and will continue to shop with you, because that’s what they’ve always done. They’re of that generation. But as they sit down for their lovely cup of coffee and slice of cake, it’ll be that little bit harder to swallow as they remember that they’re not special enough to have had it on the house.

Matt however, probably won’t forgive you. Matt’s of the next generation. He’s far less loyal and far more likely to be seduced by your rival’s flashy Christmas ad. And guess what, although Matt has an email address, he doesn’t have time for a lovely cup of coffee and a slice of cake.

One to think about John Lewis.

You can’t buy love – the slippery slope of buying social attention

Like this.

Like it.

Like me.

LIKE!

Facebook is a shouty place. Major brands vie for attention along side little ones and everyone is just desperate to be Liked. As this noise intensifies across social media in the way it has across traditional media, is paying to ‘up’ those numbers such a really bad strategy?

Yes, yes it is. And here’s why.

Firstly, a little about how it’s done. Paying for likes can be done in several ways.  Some are quite simply empty likes, fake accounts that bolster your numbers; yet add nothing to your engagement.

Others are gained through putting your page in the face of more people, through email marketing, blogging or websites.

The former often results in a massive spike in fans, shortly followed by a massive drop. These new fans arrive at your page after having been lead there by a blog or website they already have an interest in, so they pop along, have a look around and decide it’s not for them.  Unlike.

At best, this gives you an unrealistic idea of how your account is performing, at worst, you’ve wasted money on recruiting people you don’t want and (even worse) you’ve risked the wrath of facebook…

If facebook suspect you’ve got yourself Liked in this way, they can disable certain parts of your page or even delete you all together; erasing all your fans, all your content, all your data.

Not cool. Not cool at all.

The difficulty comes in the fact that it’s human nature to see large numbers as a measure of credibility.

In the same way that we wander past a restaurant and disregard it because it’s empty, we do the same online.  A recent study suggested that you’re 33% more likely to like a post if someone else has liked it first, and it’s not hard to understand why.

We like things that other people like because it suggests it’s trustworthy. Someone’s tried and it and it’s good. Come in, there are loads of us!

Should we disregard our numbers altogether? No, of course not, but it’s not just about numbers, it’s about who cares enough about you and what you’re saying to take the time to talk back; through likes, through shares, through comments.

Ultimately, winning at facebook is all about the long game. It’s a social network and needs to be treated as such.

In the same way as you would get to know a person as you begin a friendship, the same can be said for the way we behave online.

It’s means finding out what your fans like, what they find benefit in and what they want to share with their friends and other people like them.  Very much like the way you behave in a friendship you’ve had for two years compared with one you’ve had for 10.

You know each other, you trust each other, you know what to expect and crucially, you’re more likely to listen when they talk.

Growing your fan base slowly means attracting and retaining an online community of interested and engaged fans. Fans who’ll create content and who help shape your future direction. Fans who’ll be useful and fans who’ll be advocates.

Now that, is priceless.

Kiddi couldn’t care less

For you Nottingham mamas & papas with children under five, you will have invariably heard of megastore Kiddicare, located at the Castle Marina retail park.

 

Dwarfing the forlorn looking Mothercare next door, its sheer size begs a closer look.

 

Once inside, it continues to impress. Attention to detail, fabulously spacious, it has a well thought out customer journey and loads of little extra cool bits that appeal to both kids and grown ups.

 

Last Sunday, lured by the 10ft SALE! signs, we ventured in with The Animals to buy a car seat.  The store was packed, but the staff member was friendly, knowledgeable and just the right amount of flustered that we felt sorry for her rather than annoyed.

 

After a long rigmarole, waiting and finally having the seat fitted, we went to pay and the car seat become suddenly ‘out of stock.’ Bit annoyed, but hey, shit happens.

 

Paid anyway and the seat was booked to be delivered to store the next day, with a phone call to announce its arrival.

 

The phone call never came.

 

Strike one.

 

Drove to the store around 6pm and lo and behold, the car seat was waiting for us.

 

Bit put out. Husband had taken the day off work and been at home all day with The Animals.

 

Apologetic, empathetic and understanding, the chap who came over in the first instance was great and after the right amount of ‘sorry’, he went forthwith to fetch the next level up in the chain of command.

 

And then it started to go horribly wrong.

 

“Hi, I’m Leanne, the assistant mgr, what can I do for you.”

 

Leanne knew what had happened, the staff member had already explained. This wasn’t alluded to, mentioned or acknowledged. Well now I’m already annoyed before we’ve started.

 

After explaining. For the second time in three minutes.

 

“Oh, sorry about that. I can offer you two coffee vouchers.”

 

Er, I didn’t ask for coffee. I didn’t ask for anything. Why was this an automatic response to the fact that my poor other half had been off work, waiting for a phone call that never came? No, I’m not sure either.

 

“Well, that’s all I’m prepared to do on a £45 car seat.”

 

Oh dear. Fail Leanne, fail.

 

Leanne had no way of knowing my value as a customer. How much I’ve spent, how much I plan to spend or how much value my word of mouth can be calculated at.

 

 

 

All Leanne succeeded in doing is convincing me that only customers perceived to be high value by Kiddicare are worth retaining.

 

I don’t believe this to be true.

 

What I do believe to be true is that your employees are the value deliverers of your brand. That little bit extra, the warm fuzzy and the reason to return.

 

Investing in your staff means investing in recruitment processes that have your brand values woven through them; and selecting the right people in the first place. It means proper training, proper incentives to stay and empowering staff to make sensible decisions.

 

Moral of the story? Your staff can make or break you, everything  else is just basics and can be purchased next door at Mothercare.

 

Introducing Franco…Costa’s secret weapon

I’m a massive fan of Costa. In my opinion, it kicks the arse off Starbucks, Nero and all the other major coffee chains.

 The coffee is smoother and just suits my palate. But anyhoo, this aint actually about coffee.

Franco is store manager at Costa in theVictoria Centre in Nottingham; and the epitome of everything you ‘d want as an employee and communicator of your brand.

Friendly, interested and animated, he knows his customers, his coffee history and around 95% of his regular’s orders off by heart. That’s about 70 drinks.

 So what makes the Francos of this world so valuable?…..

If Costa coffee was rubbish; would I drink it? No. But come on, that’s just basics.

 Any chain can prepare good quality coffee and serve it hot, on time and with a smile. But to be honest, as good old Maslow might point out, that’s really only satisfying the most fundamental of my needs.

 What keeps me coming back is Franco’s energy, his greeting (“ah Miss Leila, tall latté to go?”) and his genuine passion for his job. It’s infectious, it makes me smile and it puts me in a great mood for the day ahead.

Successful brands are those that look after their Francos, nurture their enthusiasm and use this as the basis for recruiting, training and retaining an army of Francos.

In a world where you can buy (actually pretty good) coffee from McDonalds and do your banking with Tesco,  the only way to differentiate your offer is through that augmented level of customer service.

Costa, hope you’re looking after Franco?

 If I was Starbucks, I’d be sniffing around…..

Getting Facebook – Nottingham City Transport do ‘conversation’

Those who know me well know I use public transport.

Why?

Well, couple of reasons really. Nottingham has a great transport network,(award winners in fact) and riding the bus gives me the chance to read, do my  emails or if I so wish, listen to the trials and tribulations of fellow passenger’s love lives….(No way Britneh? He’s been seeing Shania this whoooole time??)

Nottingham City Transport is the principal bus operator in Nottingham, with 340 buses providing services across the city, seven days a week.

Their drivers can be a bit hit and miss (definitely depends on the route, some have been directly recruited from some manner of Hitler inspired training camp) and could do with a little bit of customer service training/Prozac. However, what NCT are doing fabulously well is facebook.

Become a ‘fan’ on facebook and you’ll get up to the minute information about any delays, changes to routes and useful ideas for tickets you should buy to save you money.

Updates are witty, conversational and the feed has been updated by a real live person (shock horror) not an RSS feed (my pet hate)

Nottingham City Transport

“It seems the rumour mill that started on Pathfinder 100 about us cancelling/changing the route has spread to our Go2 Orange 36 (dunno why). Once again, we’re pleased to say that the rumours about our 36 are all just twaddle, the route isn’t changing, but we do have lots of exciting improvements on the way this year! “

 

What this serves to do is give the customer an insight into the brand personality of NCT telling us that this is a company who are approachable, helpful and have useful stuff to say.

NCT  have realised what many other large companies haven’t. Social networking should be used a two-way conversation with your audience where you invite comment and respond directly when you need to. Simply using these sites as a vehicle to push out messages is outdated and in some instances counter-productive.

NCT could have set up a feed directly from their website. It would have been easier (and cheaper!) to run. But what kind of updates might we have got?…

“The 21 on the purple route is facing major delays.”

“Bus 79 to drop to four buses an hour from 31^st March”

“Pathfinder tickets available now”

Two of these updates disappoint me; the other gives me no incentive to buy.

Instead, NCT  have invested time and resources in a member of staff to actually ‘manage’ their social networking channels and the result offers customers a clear benefit if they sign up as a fan.

What they’ve done isn’t exactly rocket science. Managing these channels properly gives you direct access to your customers in a way that isn’t possible though traditional communication methods, so why wouldn’t you invest time and money in a channel that gives you that?

Now, if the drivers weren’t so damn mardy…..

Mary, Mary quite contrary – did she get it right with Estate Agents?

 

 I’m a big fan of Mary Portas She’s confident, ballsy and clearly knows her stuff. Her hair’s a bit dodgy, but we’ll forgive her that.

 Really enjoying the Secret Shopper series on Ch 4 and have agreed with pretty much all her advice so far.

 Except last week…..

Ms Portas turned her formidable eye on the UK Estate Agency market. Uncovering what we pretty much already knew (slick lines, fake tan, spikey hair and too much aftershave), Mary proceeded to rip apart London Estate Agency Martyn Gerrad. A family business, handed down to son Simon by dad Martyn, the company pride themselves on great customer service, transparency and honesty.

 Cue Mary, her undercover cameras and acid tongue……

 Mary quite rightly pointed out that a lack of knowledge about a property, ridiculous sales patter (‘West is the new South facing..’) and bored disinterestedness does not a great sales experience make.

 However, her assessment and advice was based on selling houses that (in the words of Mr Simon Gerrad) ‘sell themselves.’

 One was a lovingly restored four bed family home in a great part of London; the other, a luxury flat.

 How would her advice pan out when selling a tiny, crack filled sh*thole in the middle of Peckham? Hmmmm, I wonder…

 My advice would have been….

 Knowledge check sheet

Quite right that an agency should know about the property they are selling, but they don’t have time to do an in-depth assessment of every property. A simple vendor check sheet with some key questions, would give them enough information. I’d suggest a balance of lifestyle questions, ‘What’s the most fabulous thing about this house’, mixed with some real facts ‘How old’s the boiler.’

 Let customers learn about the local area

Divide properties up by location and give some background on the area. The local schools, access to transport links and the amenities close by. Match property info to the demographic you know will be interested. Large Victorian property in leafy suburbia? Mention the excellent organic deli just minutes away…

 The Pros AND the Cons

Hmmm, tricky one. While it’s important to be transparent and honest, it’s essential that information is presented in a way that makes it attractive to buyers. I want you to sell my house after all! This is challenging, but information must concentrate firmly on the Pros. Yes, it might be a smaller property but its two minutes from the underground. Garden is small but there is room for some patio furniture and no need to mow the lawn.

A picture paints a thousand words

 So important but overlooked by many many estate agents. Invest in a decent camera and even some photography training for your staff. A well lit and well composed photo is inviting, attractive and makes me want to see more. Am I suggesting that you mislead the potential buyer? Not one bit, just show the house in its Sunday best.

Helpful, informed, passionate….unexpected

 

KRCS are an Apple retailer with eight stores across the UK.

Working on an iphone app for a client (very clever, more to come later), we come across a leetle problem. Namely, I speak Marketer, they speak Techy.

I don’t know what platform I’m running, what computer language the system speaks or whether the app and the wotsit it will be compatible.

Cue a trip to KRCS in Victoria Centre, Nottingham.

Greeted by a smiley chap, I explain my problem (can’t download the test version of the app) “Right,” he says. “You got it on a memory stick? Give it to me and I’ll load it.”

Fabulous, I think.

Cue second problem, the download instructions are for a PC. Ah, not good.

Depsite a visible shudder at the mention of the word PC, smiley chap suggests I go and get my laptop and he’ll load it for me.

Brilliant.

Half an hour later…..

Back with laptop, a bit of a fiddle and still not working. Frustrated and want to throw laptop. Cue calming by smiley chap and a suggestion that he uses his own ipad in the back to load the test version of app on my phone. I’m encouraged to take a wander around the shops for half an hour while he ‘sorts it.’

Half an hour (and one tall, calorie laden mocha) later…

App on iphone! Cue fanfare, skipping and general happiness 🙂

So what’s the moral of the story…

Firstly, right from the off, smiley chap knew there would be no sale. He simply wasn’t in it for that. There was no pressure to buy a shiny new wotist or sales patter around why PCs are shite, any condescending babble, or worse; bored, disinterested attitude. Smiley chap clearly loves his job, loves what he does and has a genuine passion for good customer service.

Now, this could be a co-incidence, smiley chap could just happen to be in that job because he was at the right place at the right time. I beg to differ. A quick scan of other service encounters in the store showed similar smiley chaps really enjoying what they do.

Fabulous example of a company that have got it spot on. Invest in your recruitment process, invest in customer service training, invest the people who are the face of your brand and your customers will feel it. Better still, they’ll tell all their mates.

KRCS…I’ll be back.