Moving that static database where you ‘buy’ customers to a healthy, engaging, vibrant business community isn’t going to be easy, no one said it was. It’s also a long and windy road too. However, the only limitations to it are what you place on it, not your customers, nor, the community you already have. There is a clear step by step approach that I feel is appropriate using some leading edge thinkers for help and bit of my own brain power.

In simplistic terms, you need to understand that all community members are equal but they will have and want different roles. Participate and engage in different ways! In the past we would grade our customers based on A, B, C and D or whatever denomination that was. That’s a little outdated. Using a mix of Frank Reichheld’s model and Charlene Li and Josh Bernoff’s model in the book “Groundswell” can provide a great solution to getting to grips with the dynamics of your community.

Identifying the following groups is essential to planning your reputation and marketing campaign where you can engage with individuals, maximise the intelligence and intellect and ensure you communicate the right things at the right level.

I suggest these are the critical game players in your business community:
1. Pillar influencers - significant influencers, they are not afraid to challenge you, intellectual about the future and have the ability to refer potential customers.
2. Connectors – well connected either online or offline or both
3. Promoters – people who promote, without any incentive, what you do
4. Passives - people who buy from you on a regular basis but who can also become promoters with some encouragement
5. Collaborators who could also be co-creators

There are sub groups of people that are important but these are your main ones. These members will significantly shift your business towards the new competitive advantages of innovation, engagement and building relationships with the relevantpeople.

What’s non-negotiable is the fact that the groups are made up of people. People have replaced products, connections bind communities and, with that, comes the rocky movement from broadcasting at customers to being social with your community. It’s a hell of a challenge, but at the route is building the right relationships with the right people.

There is a lot of dispiriting going on. There must be something in the air. I’ve made a list:

1. My local Caffe Nero’s not offering free wifi.

2. Companies House making it nigh impossible for you to do business with them, as their website is an entanglement of mush thats completely unusable.

3. The Chelsea Building Society devaluing houses, so on paper you have less equity and they can charge you a higher interest rate. Nice way of promoting customer retention.

4. Biscuits that you used to get in your hotel room, but you don’t now. Cut stuff from behind the scenes, not on the stage!

5. People like lawyers, accountants and public sector workers thinking they have a right to be aloof. Get your parachute chaps, you’re heading for a big fall.

6. People still trying to ’sell’ stuff. Features and benefits is just so yesterday.

7. People using social media to broadcast. In the past we just had companies doing it, now we have thousands of individuals.

8. People who just show up at work, dream all day about doing something else and never get round to it because they didn’t take time out to find their passion and purpose.

Just thought I’d dump that. Ah, feel much better now……..

Disrupting the status quo is every leaders prime role. It’s a stark contrast to the ‘command and control’ days of previous business models. Companies need to think about disrupting their relationships with their customers. Yes I did say that! We are far too complacent about them. We need to change the game with openness, transparency and moving from a culture of ‘managing the customer database’ to sowing the seeds of creating a ‘community’ around our brand. Something that will be at the heart of every business in the future.

Look at this model I created. It’s by no means perfected….months of R & D will do that but it shows a shift from an inert account management regime to a community model that will be full of life and vibrant.

Database →                        Relationship →                 Community

You can look at www.club.lego.com/en-US/default and www.harley-davidson.com for great examples. But it won’t be easy, it means unlearning stuff that’s ingrained in our minds. After decades of disappointing relationships, we now have the ability to gain impressive inroads into true partnerships with customers that really do change the dynamics for the better.

Truth is, we are struggling to get off first base. For many it will be a leap of faith, for others a simple transition. But it does require a deliberate plan to achieve it. And. ironically it starts with the database. More on that tomorrow…..

Business in the past was valued on it’s financial performance, it still is. Increasingly, it will also be based on influence, followers and fans. If we own something we try to protect it. In fact, we can become over protective. For years we have been conditioned to think that we own stuff at work; our team, our customers, our products. Tesco thinks it owns it’s suppliers!

This over exuberance can be detrimental, if not a tad delusional. We can spend lots of money defending something that we actually don’t own. The future, we know, will be based on the value of our relationships with our fellow humans. You can only part own a relationship. You will only part own a product as we collaborate more, you have never owned your people, especially in a war for talent. And customers just ain’t buying that ‘priviledge’ thing anymore.

You don’t own the buildings you work in, you probably don’t own that car you drive and your company probably only lease that computer and mobile you use. We need to shift our mentality from one of ownership to partnership. That way we can work positively on the things that really are meaningful and rationally focus our efforts.

People will often say that your brand is like Marmite, they either love it or hate it. Your retort should always be, as long as people don’t find us indifferent. These ARE times for ’sticking your head above the parapet’ and ’sticking out like a sore thumb’ as long as it’s for something exceptional of course.

Being in an indifferent position is fundamentally a difficult place to be. Customers don’t see you and therefore ignore you. It becomes inherently difficult to build any traction on the customer loyalty front. Many companies initiate the worst action with poor consequences by trying to buy customers through traditional marketing tactics. That only gets you bad profits which you can’t sustain over the long term.

Better have a smaller list of customers who love what you do, promote what you do and buy more of what you do again and again. Rather than the ‘yeah whatever’ group that aren’t listening. Those that hate you…..well that’s just life!!!

Are you keeping people out or inviting them in? It costs very little to pick a great customer who has fabulous ideas and creates value for your business and then mix him/her up with a few of your other customers and let them come up with the next developments you need to make. Imagine how that may impact your reputation too!

A friend recently told me about a change the organisation he works for (a corporate) are going to implement at a cost of hundreds of thousands. They had received one piece of feedback from a customer who was displeased. Turns out only 9% of other customers agree with that complaint. It seems the organisation are more interested in rapid problem solving than logically making the correct decision.

Survey and respond to the right customers needs. Know you’re top 20% of customers as they are probably delivering 80% of your profits, give or take. These are the customers who are likely to become advocates of what you do and will constantly refer without any incentive.

Never randomly survey your whole customer base, its not efficient. Always gain feedback from all of your top 20% and then take a random sample from the rest. The top 20% are you’re most valuable customers, it would be crazy to miss even one out.

What’s your churn rate? How many customers are you losing per annum? How close are you to companies in the mobile, financial, travel sector in terms of poor retention rates? True customer loyalty brings about long-term sustainable growth and that’s what really matters.

It’s interesting asking small business that question; what’s your leakage and how much are you spending on marketing to plug that leak? The results can be staggering. Some company’s I’ve spoken to have a 25% churn and are spending around 25% of turnover on new customer acquisition by buying growth, crazy and absolutely mad. In fact, it’s the most expensive route to growth.

So do you have a strategy of buying growth through promotions, sales pitches and bribery, or, are you organically growing through unabashed, superb customer experience and word of mouth.

Those implementing, measuring and growing through true customer loyalty are the ones who are spending very little on marketing and that dreaded word advertising. Increase your customer retention rate by 10% and what will that do to your bottom line?

In London at the moment at the Online Marketing Show. Last night whilst waiting for a friend, I bobbed into a wine merchants. Okay it wasn’t your ordinary Oddbins but it did prove that you can put customer experience into practice, by hell you can.

Apart from the outstanding courtesy and respect that was afforded me, I now know about:

1. Sulphites and how they affect wine making

2. Bio Dynamic Agriculture – this was a new one on me, fascinating!

3. How fragile wine making is and why its considered an art, a craft and a vocation

I came away with a modestly priced bottle of wine, yet had my experience enriched because the guy who served me believed it was his job to educate someone who appreciates wine (I’m obviously getting to that age) but who doesn’t really know the first thing about wine production and how it impacts on what I buy. I couldn’t get away. Absolutely fabulous, it cost them nothing. Just shows what you can do, if you make sure you have the time…actually you really can’t afford not to.

Phew! The books are now uploaded and ready to be viewed and purchased. Hope you like them. Take advantage of the free marketing book I wrote a couple of years ago first so you get a taster of what they are about!

Click on the links to the right or just go to the ‘My Books’ section on this page. Happy reading!