A Focus on Building Customer Loyalty in 2017

2016 was a tax­ing year for many peo­ple, and mar­keters are sure to see some of the neg­a­tive effects of the year’s chal­lenges as they reach out to con­sumers through­out 2017. Although the future might look uncer­tain, CMOs can still be encour­aged by the many oppor­tu­ni­ties for redefin­ing brand pur­pose and con­tin­u­ing to shape gen­uine cus­tomer expe­ri­ences in 2017. Sev­er­al con­trib­u­tors of our exclu­sive con­tent on CMO.com touched on some of these oppor­tu­ni­ties and how mar­ket­ing lead­ers can make the most of their efforts this year.

Alas­tair Cole, chief inno­va­tion offi­cer at The Engine Group, began the week by dis­cussing sev­er­al of the chal­lenges mar­ket­ing lead­ers will face in 2017, not the least of which is an area where they can gen­er­ate sig­nif­i­cant value—the cus­tomer expe­ri­ence. Because cre­at­ing cus­tomer expe­ri­ences is not just about sat­is­fy­ing the demands of cus­tomers, but also about boost­ing a company’s bot­tom line, CMOs are tasked with dis­cov­er­ing where to focus their efforts make the great­est impact. Cole shared five pil­lars for CMOs to pri­ori­tise this year make the most of their efforts.

CMO.com asked senior mar­keters to iden­ti­fy the trends CMOs should be look­ing out for in 2017. John Allert, group brand direc­tor at McLaren Tech­nol­o­gy Group, described the tur­bu­lence of 2016 as a time when peo­ple learned they could no longer trust the peo­ple they once blind­ly looked up to. Mar­keters, he said, shouldn’t brush this off but watch out for the after­ef­fects of this real­i­sa­tion in 2017 as cus­tomers strug­gle with brand loy­al­ty more than ever before. Simon Carter, vice-pres­i­dent and head of field mar­ket­ing for sales, EMEIA at Fujit­su, echoed Allert’s warn­ing of a “poten­tial­ly bleak future for brands.” Giv­en the out­look, it seems clear that brands will need to focus on cus­tomer sat­is­fac­tion in 2017.

Michelle Mitchell, strat­e­gy direc­tor at Five by Five, dis­cussed the chal­lenges mar­keters face with prod­uct launch­es. It can be a stress­ful expe­ri­ence for many CMOs, giv­en that, on aver­age, 40 per­cent of all prod­uct launch­es fail. Mitchell shared the results of a Five by Five study that high­light­ed the sig­nif­i­cant impact dig­i­tal and social have had on the mar­ket­ing land­scape. To help brands max­imise their launch­es, Mitchell out­lined five key con­cepts for CMOs to follow.

Andrew Roger­son, founder and MD at Grist, shared some tips on how brands can do con­tent mar­ket­ing well in the future. Accord­ing to Roger­son, con­tent mar­ket­ing often fails when it spends more time pro­mot­ing the brand than address­ing read­ers’ needs. Roger­son encour­aged brands to find the con­tent mar­ket­ing sweet spot, which means under­stand­ing and deliv­er­ing on what the brand wants and what the client wants. Fur­ther­more, brands need to take the oppor­tu­ni­ty to work col­lab­o­ra­tive­ly with key clients to shape con­tent programmes.

We invite you to engage with our exclu­sive con­tent on CMO.com and learn from some of the industry’s top mar­ket­ing lead­ers. Please let us know what you think.