How many companies, brands, marketing and sales folk actually match the customers steps to buying?
Is your brand really on the same path as the customer’s journey?
Marketo, one of the leaders in marketing automation tools for nurturing prospects through the journey to customers, recently posted a very good piece on the customer journey — How Consumers Decide: Marketing for the 5-Step Model . Many marketers I talk to say “Yes” to the question above, but when we do a proper customer journey mapping exercise, it turns out some and not all the information is there thought rarely is it in the order a customer wants it, the way they want it and many times it is not in the places where they could/want to see it.
Do a mini exercise on one customer group/cohort — make it easy and just do a simple offline/online journey e.g. one we did for socialKO (a new product we are seeding) …
Now that you have completed the similar exercise, start addressing these key 5 steps, in order, and by the end, ask yourself, do you score top marks?
Step 1: Up front does your message identify and recognize their “problem” or “opportunity” the way the customer sees it?
Step 2: Can a customer find information on how you solve “their problem” or understand the “their opportunity” — i.e. is the information easy to understand (from the customer lens) and is it in places where they will look, search or see it?
Step 3: Can the customer validate your brand, product, solution … is the best choice to fit their needs compared to their real or their perceived competitor options in the market. (Note: it is their real or preceived options — not yours) — so do you pass the competitive analysis test?
Remember the power of customer opinions — they are all over social media now — so make sure it is easy for people who love your product to shout about it to all in their social graphs.
Step 4: Can the customer easily buy your offering? — hold on, not quite that quick to answer — there are a few more points:
- Available — is it readily available in the market — retail (brick & mortar) or online (eCommerce)?
- Easy — can I buy it online with between 1 to 3 clicks?
- Online = mobile now, so can the relevant information be found (easy to view) and be purchased on an smartphone?
- Social to Buy — if they see your offering or a recommendation on facebook, twitter, pinterest, instagram, etc … — is it easy to find out how to buy it?
Internal focus — can you attribute which marketing messages on which channels affected the customer’s purchase? And does it really matter where they bought it, as long as it was a positive experience they are willing to share, especially if you are lucky enough to provide products people love!
Step 5: Will the customer come back for more and will they tell all their family, friends, peers etc … how great your offering is, what a great brand you are OR what a terrible experience they had?
The journey has only just begun and you need to embrace the life cycle, not from a product perspective but from a customer perspective!
Did you score top marks — honestly — did you?
