How to Connect With the Always-On Customer

Always-on customers are always connected and truly empowered in a way that allows them to engage with brands wherever, whenever, and however they want. It comes as no surprise that mobile is a big enabler of this level of customer connection as is the prevalence of Wi-Fi, the Internet, and new technologies.

The Always-On Customer Defined
Picture a guy sitting upon a mountaintop on his cellphone. What is this person doing? Is he taking a selfie or tracking the vertical feet he’s about to ski? Maybe he’s thinking about springtime and trail running, and he’s researching new gear to buy. This is the picture of the always-on customer. The fact is, we don’t know what he’s doing on his phone on that mountain — but, we could know, if he decided to engage with our brand.

Challenges to Reaching the Connected Customer
The biggest challenge in reaching the always-on customer is just being ready for when the customer engages with your brand. If the guy on the mountain is engaging with your brand on his phone, are you able to respond with a personalized experience in that moment? According to Economics Intelligence, 63 percent of consumers feel “numb” by the lack of personalized campaign experience. Clearly, the opportunity is there, but brands aren’t always ready for when those opportunities happen. Brands often have a mere millisecond to make an impression on a customer — for better or worse.

While the marketer can set up the dynamic aspect of the customer journey, the whole notion of the next best action can be a real challenge as well. You want to make sure the next action is cohesive with where the customer is located on the journey or in the context of that interaction. The context could include things like the day of the week, the time, and even the location; but, it could also be the emotional state the customer is in at the time he or she encounters your brand. For example, the customer could be angry. Let’s say, she ordered a product online but received the wrong product. Now, she’s either e-mailing, participating in an instant chat session, or calling a call center. So, in that context, the customer would be frustrated because she had a poor experience.

Expectations of the Always-On Customer
The need to pay attention to context reveals that always-on customers bring certain expectations to the brands with which they interact. This, of course, means that connected customers are not only empowered, but also demanding. One of the primary expectations of the always-on customer is best pricing. The customer who is always connected is looking for a five-star experience but only wants to pay a two-star price. This goes for experience as well. If a customer is researching a car, for example, he wants instant access to research and answers to his questions. Customers are also looking for consistency of experience. When experiences are good, being always-connected means they’ll tell the world about it. Unfortunately, the same connection allows them to share negative experiences as well.

Reaching the Always-On Customer
The way to reach the always-on customer is to consider a strategy in which the notion of a customer journey comes into play. This begins with acquiring the customer, but then the journey is continuous, and hopefully, lasts for a long time. The continuous piece is where the marketer must be ready to engage the customer at any moment. Marketers need to deploy intelligent, static-type tactics to ensure the customer is engaged and shopping frequently. There’s also the dynamic aspect to considering how to be ready for customers who engage with brands when least expected.

Marketers also need to centralize data and utilize the single, or complete, view of the customer to have a single source of the truth for assets. Then, they must have a common decision hub for creating business rules regarding how to not only identify who a customer is, but also what the next best action should be for that customer.

The always-on customer presents many challenges, but the opportunities to reach these customers, personalize their experiences, and earn their loyalties are significant. Is your brand ready?

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from Digital Marketing Blog by Adobe https://blogs.adobe.com/digitalmarketing/campaign-management/connect-always-customer/