Your marketing department needs a consumer marketing strategy

Consumer marketing strategy

Beyond the latest marketing techniques and strategies, conversations have always been the starting (and ending) point of marketing. Gone are the days where ‘one-size-fits-all’ was the only approach you needed. Today’s holistic approach to your consumer marketing strategy means that you need to treat customers with emotions and experiences. After all, CRM is the new marketing.

With ever-changing advancements in technology, businesses are constantly required to keep up with the latest trends, and to listen to their customers so that they can adjust their strategies accordingly. While it may feel overwhelming and challenging, the good news is that businesses will always have control over their relationships with their customers. It’s their customer service that’s the problem.

Customer service is a powerful weapon in your consumer marketing strategy

Today’s customer does not need help to navigate through websites or find what they need. They’re incredibly intelligent as is, and they know what good customer service feels like. Be it from Apple, Netflix or Amazon, a customer expects every customer-to-brand interaction to be equally intelligent.

In order for businesses to create successful customer retention strategies, they need to understand that customer experience is more than efficient in-the-moment service. It’s about encapsulating the entire lifecycle of your customers. Consumers have lost their faith in gimmicky mass marketing campaigns and would rather place their vote in what their experience has been thus far with a particular brand.

To win customers and build deeper, more valuable relationships, brands need to provide touch points throughout every moment of the customer journey. This quality of service will retain long-term, happy customers. Here are a few tips on how to create better customer experiences for your business:

Establish emotion along the customer journey

When you’re creating your customer marketing strategy, you need to look at how your product can delight your customers. It’s not always about delivering a better product but more about working on your customer experience when delivering the product. Visiting your website or store might be the first experience a customer has ever had with your brand. And that type of ‘first’ experience should be filtered into your client relationship management plan and customer retention strategies.

Speak to customers every day

A once-off ‘wow’ is not enough to keep customers interested in your business. You need to be speaking to them and communicating with them every day. If you can’t reach them on social media or via your website’s chatbot, you can reach them with SMS. Text messaging is still one of the highest engagement boosters. If you integrate text messaging into your consumer marketing strategy, you can ensure that you’re always connected and engaged with your clients without being disruptive and invasive.

Weave your business into the customer’s lifestyle

Retaining customers doesn’t stop at delivering great service and products. It’s about constantly looking for innovative ways to connect with customers in moments that matter. You need to look beyond your product collection and at the bigger picture. For example, think about ways that your product or service can influence other market spaces surrounding your product base. Leverage these opportunities and try to find innovative ways for your product to support other industries too.

A memorable brand doesn’t just deliver one incredible experience that fades after a while. An innovative brand is constantly looking for ways to deliver an end-to-end experience with their customers, no matter what they do. Take Disney, for example. Not only do they bring children exciting new movies, they’ve created a theme park, a cruise experience, and additional mobile apps to bring their purpose to life.

Don’t follow the trends, create your own trends in current markets

One thing is for sure, your consumer marketing strategy needs to be centered around your customers’ wants and needs, but it does not need to be led by your customers. You have direct control over the experience they have with your business and the conversations you have with your customers. It’s up to you to find new and innovative ideas that your customers haven’t even thought of and market those differently.

Marketing starts with the customer

No matter what type of product or service you offer, the reason for your trade is to add value to your customers’ lives. At every point in the customer journey, you need to be connecting and communicating with your customer. By broadening your horizons and introducing Clickatell’s omnichannel customer service solution ‘Touch’ to your customer marketing strategy, you’ll instantly be able to resolve customer queries via your website, social media channels, and chat apps. So, start boosting conversions and customer loyalty today! Read about how to win customers at every stage of the customer lifecycle in our recent article.