The race for relevance:
Understanding the modern consumer
December, 3rd HANOI
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Speech Summary
Change in all forms presses down on every industry and consumer goods is no exception.
Technological, Economic, Social, Regulatory and most critically from our retail partners and shopper expectations. To survive (and thrive) every brand needs to exert a greater force against these changes, otherwise we will be crushed by them. To survive and ensure our businesses are future focused, we need to have the courage to embrace new directions. Excellence in Execution is also about excellence in better connections with our customers.
It would be arrogant of us to assume that we can continue to run our business in the same way over the next 10 years as we have over the past 10, just as it was arrogant for Kodak to think digital photography was a fad, or for Nokia to believe their scale would protect them against the iPhone. Arrogance kills entire brands and industries, and it could kill your business faster than you think. As retail customers and shopper/consumer expectations change, alongside our business landscape, so must we.
Staying relevant is key to survival and so we aim to focus on what our customers value. It is in exploring and understanding the values of the modern customer connection, we can build a business for future success.
Take your eye off what your customers value and you run the risk of becoming irrelevant. We discussed five key values during the Brand Camp keynote.
01/Blue Dot Centricity
We need to place our customer at the centre, not the brand, product, or our own ways of working. The customer is not some inconvenient truth at the end of a customer journey. They are the BLUE DOT – the pulsing centre point around which everything must revolve.
Everything comes to the customer today. Why go to a restaurant when Grub Hub will deliver to your home? Why go out on the streets to flag a cab when Uber will deliver on to your door? Why use an expensive orthodontist when you can straighten your teeth with mail-order clear braces? Consumer goods are no different. We have a commodity experience in-store for the most part, something we need to challenge. We have been product centric for too long. We need to shift from a product to a solution focused in-store and online.
The Blue Dot Customer is about the philosophy. Place the customer at the centre in everything we do.
Carrying the Blue Dot metaphor farther, no one would open Google maps and follow someone else’s blue dot on the map – you are only shown your own. The modern customer expects to be treated personally; made feel special, have heavily customised product and service at every touch point.
Sometimes we utilise technology to do this at scale. Every time I arrive at the airport car park, the barrier reads my vehicle registration, the barrier automatically lifts and my visit is auto-charged to my credit card as the WELCOME KEN message appears on the ticket terminal. No matter how many times I do this, I feel like James Bond. I feel recognised.
Make them feel special by connecting personally with them. Move away from commodity experiences. Think about how your business can better connect the brands with your local market in a way that makes the shopper feel like they are at the centre.
Q1. Are you running a truly blue-dot business?
Is the business orientated around the shopper/consumer or retail customer or your own product/process? How can you focus more on that ‘blue dot’ and make it personal and all about them?
02/Expectant
Customers expect it to be right, first time, every time. There is no room for inconsistencies in how a customer is treated today. Ultimately Customer Experience has become the battleground for success, and in that reality, we need to strive for better.
No longer is a customer delighted with expected levels of product or service. You must push past satisfaction and expectations into the ‘excite & delight’ space if you are to cut through with today’s customer. They rightfully demand more from every brand they invite into their lives.
Recall that diving board analogy – your customer is at the very top in terms of their expectations of you. They want it, and they want it NOW, and they want it about them, particularly relevant in the consumer goods business, traditionally a commodity led one.
Think about how to delight your customer in unexpected ways, regardless if they are retailer, shopper or consumer. The brands need to connect beyond mere product functionality. It is only through going beyond expectations that we build brand advocacy and tribal belonging, an empowered customer. You need to be different from others in your industry. These hero brands need to be allowed be the superheroes they are within the consumers lives.
Remember those Harley Davidson and Red Bull tattoos – that is what we all want. An empowered consumer who will go out and sell your business for you. We all need a Swiftie army.
In a highly competitive market, what truly differentiates your business? The brands that invest in CX and strive to go beyond any and every customer expectation lay down the foundations for Customer Lifetime Value.
Q2. What have you done recently to go beyond customer expectations?
Where is the evidence relating to ‘surprise and delight’ in the business?
03/Collaboration
There has been a shift in society, from Passive to Active consumption. This means that no longer are consumers just happy with being the ‘end point’ in a customer journey. They want to play a more active role even within and along the production process. They don’t want the label ‘consumers’ anymore – they want co-production rights.
It was the difference between a YouTube video (passive > consumed) and a Tik Tok dance craze (active > take part). It is Taylor Swift inviting her fans to co-create.
We need to stop seeing the consumer as another transaction, more market share, more revenue. As brands, we need to shift from ME to WE. We need to learn to signal a collaborative approach along the customer journey, a together approach. This is even more important with our retail customers in collaborating to achieve brand objectives and also internally, winning together, brand and distributor. Recall those synchronised swimming and Formula One videos. Together is the route to success.
Seek ways to collaborate with the consumer, retailer and each other, to tear away the line between us : them.
Q3. How can you tear away that line between 'us and them'?
How can you do a better job at inviting the customer in and using the amazing brands to build genuine connections?
04/Phygital
We now live in a ‘Digital First World’ – a world where we all reach for our digital devices first to answer any question or solve any problem. The digital Immersion is only going to increase with the coming Metaverse reality and as AI and Robotics converge alongside customer expectations. Consumer goods will never be the same again.
Every brand proposition has to be part Physical, part Digital. Customers now expect digital to drive their experiences. If you are not leveraging your assets on digital, you are 50% invisible as a business today.
AI is set to change every industry. Most importantly, it will unleash a new set of customer expectations around hyper personalisation and relevance for customers. Be ready for that fourth-dimension connectivity. We need to be one of the industry leaders in AI. Unleash the customer data you already have, using AI to hyper personalise.
Return to your business and ask yourself how you can better engage across digital in your local market. How can you build and leverage digital assets to win the race for relevance? Don’t get left behind playing with only one side of the Rubik’s cube.
Digital is not about new channels, AI and contact points (although it is those things too). Digital is simply our societal reality today, and your customer of tomorrow expects that reality of your brand and business too.
Q4. As AI and eCommerce continue to grow..
Are you running that 4D business, ready for all current and future digital connections with customers?
05/Relational
Ultimately, building Customer Lifetime Value and Customer Intimacy is about building Relationships. It is about moving away from the ‘transaction’ and moving towards a model that is based around putting the Relationship at the centre. This is why CX has become such an inherent part of most companies’ strategy.
It is only when emotions are engaged do we build relationship, when the customer ‘feels’ something. We need our brands to become a trusted partner in life for our customers, not just another product proposition. This is a new space for many distributors, traditionally product, logistics or process centred.
The more we embed emotional response and authentic, compassionate customer interactions in the customer experience, the more we build that bond with a customer. We achieve both scale and depth of connection. This again is true of both retailer connections and consumer/shopper ones.
Look for ways to build significant relationships, with depth, authenticity and purpose. Recall the Taylor Swift fan enraptured with experiencing the product. This type of engagement only comes when there is a significant relationship related to the brand. We have the brands, we simply need to foster the connections.
In our future deep-fake, AI-fuelled world, authentic relationship will be everything.
Q5. How can you do a better job at building true emotive relationships with the consumer through the brands?
How can we dial up solution and experience over straight product?
More content from Ken
To get a more detailed feel for Ken Hughes content, check out his Blog – The Blue Dot Consumer. Widely read by those in the marketing, customer experience and retail worlds, it is full of in-depth discussion and content relating to all things consumer.
THE BLUE DOT CONSUMER: CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE REDEFINED
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For those too lazy to read blogs, and to view further visual content and past performances from Ken Hughes, check out the YouTube channel where he discusses all things consumer and customer experience related.
