Kevin Harrington // marketing // blog

Are you focused on flogging stuff or building relationships? The difference is substantial but often misunderstood. 

Doug Levy has written an interesting article titled 5 principles of breakthrough success in the “Relationship Era”. Levy talks about the history and evolution of business through the following phases:

Product Era: The focus is solely on transactions.
Consumer Era: The focus is still on transactions, but the idea of trust enters the dialogue as a way to persuade people to transact more.
Relationship Era: Trust between a brand and consumer is mutual. Trust and transactions are seen as distinct, and both are important. 

I especially like his succinct principles for a relationship: 

Principle 1: Clarify purpose
Principle 2: Commit to sustainable relationships
Principle 3: Connect with authenticity
Principle 4: Treat customers as partners
Principle 5: Engage 

My thanks to Sarah Derry #sarahderry for telling me about this article. Read the complete article.

It’s the contrasts I find interesting. In a couple of hours opinions of a business and it’s brand image can change so quickly.

For the worse: a McDonald’s cashier swearing in front of my children. Unacceptable and I paid for the privilege of that.

For the better: ASDA, who aren’t high on my list, had a manager on the checkout genuinely wanting to know the customers view of their range and the shopping experience.

Which business is going to improve the most? It really is no contest is it? If they had conducted a Net Promoter Score on the same day it would have shown them poles apart.

Petrol price surveys

I  was waiting in a line to pay for some petrol at my local BP garage. The delay was caused by the usual number of people buying sausage rolls, milk, cat food and occasionally petrol.

The phone rang and a member of the staff answered the phone. The caller, presumably a competitor or their agent, asked the price of unleaded petrol and diesel per litre.

The BP cashier looked out of the window at the gantry sign with the price indicators and answered the caller by adding 1p per litre to the price.

Does this go on all the time? Is this kind of lying ethical? Whose interests are served by these tactics? Should a retailer allow themselves to be observed employing these tactics?

I personally feel that it is bad for the retailers brand image and it is unethical. It also serves to hold prices higher. This is unless everyone knows the tactics and it is all a daft game.

And what if the caller were a consumer or a price comparison website? This would then result in less business for the retailer that makes their prices appear higher than they actually are.

All very odd. Any thoughts on this?

Green landscape

A lot of companies thought that being environmentally friendly would be an issue forced on them from Brussels. Well, I’m sure it will be for the laggards.

But now there is evidence that the green credentials of a company has a measurable impact on opinion and sales.

See http://www.marketingweek.co.uk/item/56676 for the article.

Creating customer evangelists

The excellent book Naked Conversations quotes the book Creating Customer Evangelists and states that if you want your customers to be evangelists for your business you must:

1. Continuously gather customer feedback.
2. Make it a point to share knowledge freely.
3. Expertly build word of mouth networks.
4. Encourage communities of customers to meet and share.
5. Devise smaller offerings to get customers to bite.
6. Focus on making the world, or your industry, a better place.