Author: Sally Hooton

Chris Merrington (pictured) tells how to influence, engage and inspire potential customers.

My youngest daughter and I were cooking a Chinese meal. She was preparing the vegetables for a stir fry and I was preparing the chicken dish. She served up her dish, I served up mine. In her vegetable stir fry was some asparagus. However, it was the wrong end of the asparagus! I asked her where the asparagus tips were. She said, ‘in the bin’. I explained those were the ends to keep, the harder ends were the ones to be binned. She said, ‘I’ve never seen or cooked asparagus before.’

We muttered quietly at each other. Whose fault was it? Mine! How often at work do we assume and expect other people to know what we mean and have had the same experiences as we have? How often do we get annoyed when they get it wrong when probably we are to blame?

I have been working with various clients in my workshop “Facts Tell, stories Sell” to uncover and craft their business stories. Great business stories can differentiate your business from competitors and can inspire and create a powerful vision for the client in their mind’s eye. You can use them for new business presentations, add colour to case studies, tell existing clients to consider other parts of your business, to attract new employees and to warn clients to the danger of doing nothing or taking the wrong course of action!

Stories are one of the most powerful ways to persuade someone and I believe aren’t used enough in business presentations. A story is a fact wrapped in an emotion that can compel others to take action. We are wired to listen to stories and they have universal appeal. It lets the listener decide for themselves and is a soft sell compared to simply stating the facts. The listener doesn’t feel ‘sold to’. Stories allow reflection and connect with a client often on an emotional level. People also remember stories long after the facts they were told.

In a nutshell stories can help you win business.

What makes a great story? Knowing the right story to tell and telling the story right are crucial. Ideally it should be short and punchy while painting necessary detail. Be clear on your purpose of telling a story. I find the best stories are those that are true and resonate with the audience – typically, those which have happened to me and are true. Stories about success and failure are often powerful. Mistakes and their learnings are typically good sources as they have an honesty and authenticity which can build trust.

What are the typical mistakes in stories and story-telling? Cliche stories and telling other people’s stories are normally a mistake. Rambling unnecessarily will bore the listener and lose their interest. There is a fine balance between too much and too little detail. Don’t start with cliches such as ‘Once upon a time…’ or ‘Let me tell you a story…’. Lack of clarity will spoil a story where the audience can’t see the point.

When shouldn’t you tell a story? If your client is impatient or tight on time it could be frustrating for them to listen to your story.

There are many different story structures which I teach on my ‘Facts tell, Stories sell’ workshop. One of the simplest is Situation, Complication, Resolution. You set up a Situation that the ‘hero’ faces which resonates with the listener. Followed by a Complication, challenges or problem, often one familiar the listener. There is then a Resolution, ideally unexpected, to the problem. Some of the stories i’ve told have involved disastrous business situations because they didn’t have insurance, that’s why im recommending Professional Indemnity Insurance companies like constructaquote.com

For example, I was running a workshop for a client and all was going well (Situation) and the fire alarm went off. We all had to evacuate the building. I was concerned this would throw out my timings (Complication). Outside the client’s building I found myself in conversation with the CEO about my work and their business needs. Within a few months, a handful of workshops are booked by this same client directly as a result of my conversation with the CEO (Resolution). what’s the point of the story? That what we see as a problem can be a wonderful opportunity.

I have found within my ‘Facts Tell, Stories Sell’ workshop there are usually wonderful untapped stories within my clients’ businesses – a goldmine of business stories to differentiate, to demonstrate and to persuade clients and prospects. Many years ago, there was a UK TV series called ‘Tales of the unexpected’ – what unexpected stories are waiting to be discovered in your organisation? Start building your collection of business stories.

Chris Merrington is the author of Why do smart people make such stupid mistakes? – a practical negotiation guide to more profitable client relationships. Chris regularly consults and runs workshops for senior management and sales teams in the areas of Negotiation, Trusted Adviser Selling and Winning New Business. He can be contacted at chris@spring8020.co.uk

Richard Edwards looks at what makes an exhibition giveaway effective – and what is just a waste of money.

Are giveaways at exhibitions a great way to build your brand, attract footfall and generate new business? Or are they a waste of time and money that end up being ignored or simply thrown in the bin?

The answer is some are some aren’t. In other words, not all giveaways are useful.

So how can we make sure that your giveaways and other freebies are useful in helping to convert business? The key is to align giveaways with your key objectives.

Pinning down your key objectives should be your first step. Then it’s time to think about what type of giveaways will best help you achieve them.

Here are my top tips:

Objective 1: Gaining awareness
If you’re hoping to gain more brand awareness from your exhibition then your giveaways should focus on visibility. Frequency of impressions is a key indicator as to how memorable your brand will be, try getting the best and the most affordable exhibition display stands, to impress your visitors. As such, your giveaways need to be designed entirely around your brand name and logo and be the type of item that people would actually use, preferably in a working environment.

Some ideas that Quatreus has seen work well include:

• An environmentally-friendly tote bag
• Branded post-it notes
• Branded teabags
• Something for children

Objective 2: Advertising your brand messaging
If you have certain brand messaging that you want to convey at a trade show, then your giveaways could provide useful visual reminders and/or include extra detail beyond just your branding. For example, a print and fulfillment company might be able to demonstrate their personalised printing process on a small scale, printing visitors a personalised business card to take away with them.

Many companies still choose to produce brochures however these are often lost among the pile and may never be read. One way in which Quatreus has helped clients combat brochure overload is to send the information as a digital attachment, straight to the visitor’s inbox, while they are still on your stand.  This technology, called qbit, allows you to form an instant and lasting connection with trade show visitors without loading them up with expensive and heavy printed brochures and pens.

Some other creative ideas for you to try:

• Witty t-shirts 
• Branded USB drive 
• A clever gadget or app 

Objective 3: Making contacts
Traditionally gathering contacts was done simply by exchanging business cards, but the sheer scale of modern trade shows makes finding the right business card afterwards an event in itself.

Offering cool freebies as an incentive to collect contact details can increase numbers of sing-ups but ultimately provide low-quality leads at a high cost.

Digital signup or contact exchange can be facilitated with an online data capture tool like qbit, possibly in conjunction with giveaways.  There are also QR-codes printed onto signage that can be scanned with a smartphone to reach a signup form. Or a live-tweet screen can provide visitors with the perfect excuse to connect over social media whilst contributing to your marketing effort.

Some other interesting ideas include:

• Demonstrate with their details – Use your product or service to demonstrate using a visitor’s details, e.g. Quatreus might use qbit to help sell qbit, collecting contact details in the process
• Prize draws – Giving away one high value item to the winner of a prize draw can often be more attractive than little giveaways
• Offer coffee – Good-quality free coffee or tea is the holy grail of trade-show giveaways, and the advantage of offering it is that it keeps visitors at your stand while they drink it

Conclusion
Whatever objective you decide to pursue at your next trade show, the important thing is to think creatively. If you can come up with a creative item that is fun or useful, and which represents your brand and/or USPs, then it will draw in visitors and you will remain in their consciousness long after the trade show has finished.

Richard Edwards is a director at Quatreus, which specialises in creating face to face experiences that strengthen relationships and improve communication – for both internal and external audiences. 

The key to successfully changing the customer relationship and driving end to end self-service has to be accurate, in-depth customer information that encompasses the entire customer lifecycle, from lead acquisition through contracts to orders and complaint resolution. John Cheney (pictured) outlines the role of CRM at the heart of any web-enabled customer strategy.

Changing business model

Offering web enabled services to customers – whether business or consumer – is no longer a nice option, it is essential. Businesses now have diverse opportunities for transforming the quality, timeliness and engagement of the customer experience – just look around at the Wi-Fi enabled Kindle support or the provision of location-based services to mobile customers.

Get the online strategy right, and organisations can not only embed customers within the business, improving retention and increasing average customer value, but also significantly reduce costs in the process. However, while the web provides a number of ways for organisations to change the way they interact with customers, these services can only be delivered successfully if they are based upon accurate, detailed, up-to-date customer information.

Unfortunately, few organisations are yet to realise this vision.  Many have made the mistake of taking a website development route, which has simply created another information silo. Others have enabled customers to raise support calls via an online trouble ticketing system – but that constrains the web portal to a specific sub set of information and, in turn, restricts the employees, teams and/or departments that have access to the data. At the same time, companies are looking to implement an online CRM system that will provide sales staff with online access to information and, at best, allow customers to undertake self-service updates of basic contact information. The problem is that none of these developments work together; resulting in a fragmented and flawed online business model.

Tactical Deployments

These web enabled deployments have been tactical solutions in response to specific operational requirements and taken in isolation they make sense. Adding a web front end to a trouble ticketing system undoubtedly makes it easier for customers to lodge complaints or support requests out of hours; while offering access to an online document portal enables customers to adopt a self-service method to check contracts or order statements rather than call or email – saving time for both parties.

However, the business implications of failing to join up these processes can be significant. With siloed information sources, it is far too easy for a customer services team to waste resources by providing support to a customer that has not renewed its contract; or for the online sales process to automatically accept an order from a customer with a poor credit history.

These tactical solutions may deliver short term wins but they are not sustainable in the longer term. Organisations need a far more effective way of embedding every aspect of the customer interaction and relationship within the business – and that means taking a strategic approach.

CRM Enabled Strategy

At the heart of this transformation must be a single source of information that encompasses every aspect of the customer interaction – from initial lead generation through to contract, order history and customer support. And the best place to hold that information is within the CRM. Integrating this central resource of customer information, that includes everything from financial transactions to customer preferences and order history, into the website enables an organisation to leverage existing investment whilst creating an end to end solution that delivers a seamless experience for customers.

Of course, this model allows the business to provide customers with self-service access to information that would previously have required a telephone call or email – from copies of invoices to outstanding orders. It allows a customer to track a product inquiry or on-going support issue 24×7. It also enables customers to update information, place orders and make payments online at a time that suits them. Essentially, enabling self-service online activity reduces the burden on the organisation, significantly cutting costs and driving down the administrative overhead.

However, a CRM enabled web strategy offers even more. By capturing every customer interaction in one place, both off and online, the business can gain new depths of understanding that can be used to transform the customer experience – from tailoring information to reflect customer requirements to exploiting better customer insight to drive effective cross- and up-selling activity. For example, if a customer is constantly logging support calls about a certain product, the organisation can automatically present content that leads the customer towards relevant training courses or highlights the benefits of a product upgrade. The online content can similarly be tailored in response to a prospect or customer who has responded to a specific mailshot, for example by presenting a relevant case study or product offer.

Critically, because every interaction is captured within the CRM, the business is continually improving its customer understanding and can use that insight to enhance the experience, increase average customer value and meet retention objectives.

Conclusion

Web enabling the business is now a fundamental component of any corporate strategy. But this does not mean building this functionality directly into the web site on its own; the result will be a complex, unmanageable mess of separate integrations with three or four separate back end systems. Instead, the CRM system should be the hub of the entire customer relationship strategy, providing a single platform to support all business transactions both on and offline.

With the right approach to CRM enabling the web strategy, organisations can deliver customer self-service and improve the quality, timeliness and relevance of information and services. The result is stronger customer relationships, reduced costs and a chance to exploit customer information to improve up- and cross-selling. With customers increasingly demanding an integrated online business model, can any organisation afford to miss out on this opportunity to consolidate, integrate and improve the overall customer experience?

John Cheney is CEO, Workbooks.

Be mindful of CEM challenges, says Udesh Jadnanansing (pictured).

On an almost daily basis, I speak to companies about their thoughts and strategies on providing the best possible customer experience and it’s fair to say that the vast majority view it as a high priority on their business planning agenda.

However, in the real world, the challenge is often converting great ideas into a practical operational plan that can really improve the customer experience.

In my experience, there are four key pitfalls that many organisations face when searching for the right Customer Experience Management (CEM) strategy for their business and it is worth all management teams being mindful of them and planning to avoid them:

Departmental silos

It’s very easy when you are setting up a CEM programme for it to become a project for just one department, rather than involving the whole organisation. You want to develop a consistent customer experience that emanates from across all your departments and is an integral part of your brand values. I like to envisage it as the ‘DNA’ of your business, it should be part of the way the organisation operates and letting the programme fall into small isolated silos will make this very difficult to fulfil. The CEM strategy must involve the entire organisation and all of its touchpoints to achieve this.

Think of your business from the customer point of view – they will not see your organisation as a number of departments but as a single entity. Customers only see your products or services offering and are looking to get a particular job or need fulfilled by your organisation – anyone from outside the business is unlikely to care how it is organised. Implementing a CEM strategy for just the contact centre may fail to cover other parts of your business that are also customer-facing – such as your stores/branches and the customers they serve, for example. The entire organisation and all its parts need to take ownership of CEM and ensure that the strategy is carried out wherever a customer comes into contact with it.

CEM is more than just the tools you use

In contrast to what some software providers would have you believe, integrating a CEM software platform into your processes is not the complete answer to delivering a great customer experience. Technology is a great tool, but on its own it is just a facilitator and not a panacea for all your needs and goals. When developing a CEM strategy, it’s important that it is a strategic choice encompassing the whole organisation – ultimately, it is the people within the organisation who will drive forward the changes that are implemented, not the technology that is used. To fully embrace a new CEM strategy, a company needs to work from the outside in, to ensure it works efficiently to benefit customers and addresses their needs, rather than simply being designed to fit convenience internally. This can be a real challenge for many organisations because it involves really listening to customer feedback and acting on their actual needs, rather than delivering preconceived brand promises about great customer experience and excellent service. While there is no clear vision that focuses on cultural changes, even the most advanced IT solution will fail to properly implement an effective and fresh CEM programme.

Focus on positive customer feedback as well as the negative

It’s all too easy to simply focus on the negativity from dissatisfied customers, as their voice will often seem the loudest. Obviously managing customers that are at risk and making them happier is a vital part of any successful CEM programme – but what happens with those customers that genuinely really love your products and services? These customers are ambassadors for your company and its offering. Additionally, they offer a lot of valuable insights and positive feedback on the things you do well – this will show you exactly why they are so enthusiastic about your business, preventing you from changing your proposition and inadvertently discontinuing the very things your customers like!

Focusing on the positives is also hugely beneficial internally, giving your team pride in what they provide, demonstrating why your business makes the offerings that it does and boosting the self-esteem of the whole organisation. Additionally, sharing positive feedback publically has been shown to boost revenues markedly and adds great kudos to your reputation.

Fully understand the digital experience

Many people tend to underestimate the complexity (or often over-complexity) of their business’ digital channels. It’s very easy for organisations to plan and develop their digital channels so that they are more complex than traditional touchpoints, whether they need to be or not, sometimes simply because the functionality is available. Prospects and customers can perform many tasks and services themselves through one website portal – searching for product information, managing their online account, using self-service tools, asking questions online through IM and obviously buying new products. This is a very different proposition to a more traditional contact centre call which will typically be done for a specific purpose or issue, such as a specific service related question for example. It’s important to understand this and ensure you are meeting your customers’ needs and expectations fully.

Your digital offering is also another area where it is vital to avoid being reliant on isolated departments within the organisation. This will make it harder to offer a consistent service but equally, makes it harder to correlate any feedback or insights back to all parts of the business. The technology is now available to ascertain exactly how visitors are using your website and to ask them questions about what they like, what they don’t like and what they would like to see in the future – when it is most relevant for them. This offers a much wider view of the digital customer experience and consequently helps to get a much clearer understanding of the whole customer journey and its suitability for your clients.

Udesh Jadnanansing is founder and managing partner at Mopinion.

Simon White (pictured), of Protravel, discusses how brands can differentiate themselves from the competition without lowering prices. 

 How to catch consumer’s attention in supermarkets is an ongoing challenge for FMCG brands. Money-conscious behaviour that came about because of the recession is now entrenched for many and, as a result, some brands are continuing to promote on price for fear of losing sales. ‘Buy one, get one free’, ‘50 per cent off’, or ‘25 per cent extra free’ all attract the attention of consumers during those few seconds when they are at the supermarket shelf making decisions about what to put into their trolley, but these all cost the brand money and ultimately devalue it.

So what can brands do if they want to attract consumers yet maintain their margins and avoid price-led offers? Added value on-pack promotions can achieve that goal and are one way for a brand to differentiate itself from the competition. Few consumers will remember a slight price discount on their tea bags for very long, but they will remember something like a family day out, or a weekend break. Promotions such as ‘buy this for your chance to win’, ‘buy this and kids get a free pass to…’ or ‘buy three of these and get….’ enable a brand to engage with its customers and potential customers on a level that is not price-related and can be run for a fraction of the cost of giving product away or discounting.

Given the potential packaging issues with some retailers, many brands are opting to use vouchers either as part of the packaging or as a Fix-a-Form® leaflet-label when space for the promotion is at a premium. However, due to cost, timing and space not every brand can run an on-pack promotion.  In these situations many will opt to communicate the message near pack on point-of-sale material, directing the consumer to an online or text entry mechanic. Proof of purchase is always desirable and this can be achieved by asking consumers to upload a copy of their receipt, for example. For competitions, entrants should be asked to retain their till receipt so in the event they win the brand gets that link to purchase.

Choosing the correct mechanic for the promotion is paramount, and this varies depending on the audience, the reward and the product or service being purchased. For example, if the reward is a free flight then it is quite reasonable to expect the customer to download a claim form, stick a stamp on and post it in. However, for a competition entry then a text to win or click to win would make more sense.  It is still the case that older people are more comfortable using the post, whereas younger people prefer text, email or apps. The use of URNs and an online mechanic allows enhanced communication with the consumer, plus the opportunity to reinforce the brand messages and collect essential data. Collector schemes also remain popular as they increase repeat purchase and allow data collection.

What is vital is to ensure that the mechanic is seen to be relatively quick and simple to do by the target audience in relation to the prize or reward on offer in order to generate a high level of response.  To achieve this, many brands are using a redemption mechanic which enables them to take a fixed fee approach. This allows them to budget for the promotion and offer more big prizes or a larger reward for the available budget while allowing somebody else to take the risk on the level of redemption.

An on-pack promotion is a focused marketing tool that is highly effective in influencing purchasing decisions. And for those brands that really get it right, the added value provided by positive PR and social media buzz can boost the impact of a promotional campaign hugely.