Guest Blogger Lisa Arthur: Get Engaged -- The Value of
Two-Way Communication
As marketers, we know that our customers are evolving and we must evolve with them. The question, of course, is "How?" To reach today's buyers, whether they are in B2B or B2C, we must engage them. Customers want to be connected with on an individual level and made to feel like they are a part of the buying process. We can't simply abandon traditional marketing tactics, but we must leverage social marketing channels, as they enable levels of engagement never previously available to marketers.
Marketers must evolve with our customers, or risk becoming irrelevant. Remember the four P's of marketing we all learned in Marketing 101 - product, price, place, and promotion? The same principles still apply to marketing, but we must rethink the definition of place. No longer are we just talking about a physical location, but we must now consider a brand's online presence.
Marketers must recognize that consumers aren't turning to social media just to voice their complaints about a certain brand. While that certainly does happen, many consumers are looking to engage with brands, initiate or join in conversations, and feel like they are a part of a product's development.
As customer demands evolve, we as marketers must evolve with them. But far too many organizations have failed to see the writing on the virtual wall. In a recent survey of B2B and B2C marketing professionals, Aprimo asked the question, "Do you keep up with your customers' favorite media platforms?" The results were a bit shocking. We learned that only about one third of respondents are researching their customer's preferred media channels.
Obviously, marketers can't simply establish a social media presence and expect a Twitter or Facebook profile to manage itself. Marketers must think strategically in your social marketing approach. You must review what people are saying about your brand and you must also respond. It is imperative to establish and maintain two-way conversations and engagements with your audience.
The fact is that customers don't simply want to engage with a brand, they expect engagement. They expect to receive marketing content that is personalized and targeted specifically to them individually, based on past preferences or buying behaviors. Perhaps most important, customers expect to be engaged in real time. If someone comments or submits a question to a brand via Twitter, the individual assumes that it will be acknowledged and addressed quickly, if not immediately.
While technology has, in a sense, taken the person out of marketing, it has actually enabled marketing to become more personalized. Marketing in today's world is about two-way conversations and technology has enabled us to connect with our customers in ways that are more individualized than ever before. The companies that get it and engage in such a close relationship with their audiences are the ones best-suited to maintain a loyal customer base in today's consumer-driven world.
The value of an engaged, responsive approach to social marketing is simple: customer loyalty and satisfaction. The process focuses on the customer and the customer realizes that the approach is no longer about a product, but about an individual need.
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About the Author: Lisa Arthur is CMO at Aprimo. She's leading discussions on the marketing revolution at www.aprimo.com/revolution, including the fourth imperative, "Engage Customers with Conversation," which focuses on the issue of two-way dialogue.
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