As the marketing leader in your organization, you’ve likely been asked to play a pivotal role in the customer experience (CX). Justifiably, many CEOs are charging CMOs to embrace this responsibility and shift their focus towards understanding what drives customer loyalty. And marketing is taking the baton by gathering actionable insight through a range of voice of the customer programs to create positive brand experiences and stand apart from the competition.
This is a trend we have observed firsthand as several of our primary stakeholders are customer-focused marketing executives. As the head of marketing at Satrix Solutions, I believe this makes perfect sense. I’ll outline why.
Marketing the Customer Experience
One client of ours competes in the rapidly evolving financial technology industry. The marketing team oversees the Net Promoter Score survey program as one of the key performance indicators used to guide strategic investments and establish the impact of marketing spend.
Beyond owning the data, marketing orchestrates the company’s CX strategy by messaging the results across the organization. By creating awareness internally, they deliver an industry-leading offering and service experience. Another important payoff of the marketing department’s involvement in CX is a strong reputation as a customer-centric organization, which has differentiated them from others in the marketplace. This has led to a measurable impact on sales performance.
Without a clear line of sight into the customer experience, marketing leaders are taking a shot in the dark when it comes to understanding the full brand experience. How can marketing leaders create a well-coordinated CX strategy and demonstrate their value for this intensifying strategic initiative?
Building Customer Trust Through Marketing
What is an important aspect of the customer experience? Trust.
To gain the customer’s trust, it is critical that your organization delivers on its brand promises. When this happens, customer loyalty is earned and your positive reputation in the marketplace will stand out. Ultimately, the impact on your company’s revenue growth will be felt as well. That’s because loyal customers stay longer and spend more.
But before customer loyalty materializes, marketing should first identify customer needs and expectations. Without these insights, it is difficult to gain a clear understanding of buyer personas – from pain points and challenges they’re facing to value drivers and the solutions they are seeking.
To obtain this level of visibility, you need to solicit feedback from existing, former, and prospective customers. This is where voice of the customer programs can truly benefit your marketing agenda.
What Can Marketing Leadership Learn with CX Research
With greater demand for CX marketing and the results you are expected to deliver, it is more important than ever to make data-informed decisions. I previously authored this article on how to ensure customer survey data quality. It’s a great primer on how to generate quality, trustworthy, and representative data – all important considerations for your CX marketing efforts. Here are four programs you’ll want to manage as part of your CX strategy:
1. Customer Satisfaction Survey:
A well-designed customer satisfaction survey takes the guesswork out of how customers feel about your company. When properly executed, it will yield actionable insights and rich data on what is driving loyalty or what is frustrating customers. As the company takes steps to address pain points, marketing can communicate important enhancements that are a result of customer input – so not only are you providing evidence that customer voices are being heard, you’re also building a strong foundation of trust.
2. Net Promoter Score Survey:
Many marketing leaders are familiar with Net Promoter Score (NPS) as a straightforward measurement tool to monitor customer loyalty and predict company growth. Customers are grouped into three categories based on their response to the NPS survey – Promoter, Passive, or Detractor. Naturally, marketing can turn to Promoters for testimonials and case studies. But are there more opportunities for marketing to leverage this group of raving fans? Evan Klein, Founder & President of Satrix Solutions shares more ideas for marketing in this article, Cozy Up to Promoters as Part of Your Winning Strategy. There’s also a link in the article to download our EBook on Designing an Effective Net Promoter Score Survey.
3. Competitive Benchmarking Study
A competitive NPS benchmarking study is also a valuable CX program for CMOs. It’s a blind study that is administered by a third-party, like Satrix Solutions, to obtain relevant, trusted, and timely NPS data across the industry competitors you care about most. Marketing can gain a competitive advantage by using the information gathered to bolster your strengths relative to others in the marketplace.
4. Sales Win Loss Analysis
The final program I’ll touch on is the Sales Win Loss program. The sales and marketing leaders we work with use the insights uncovered to establish a comprehensive understanding of the key drivers of won or lost sales opportunities. For example, one software company that has engaged Satrix Solutions is refining its messaging to maintain a market-leading position based on the feedback we’re receiving. Additionally, the marketing team now has greater clarity into the competitive landscape, including how they compare on features/functionality, client service and support, as well as cost/value.
Evolving Accountability for CX
Marketing leaders face a lot of pressure to keep up with changing markets and business dynamics. No longer can a single department claim ownership of the customer experience. Stand out companies recognize it requires cross-functional collaboration and must be fully embraced by the C-Suite.
By tapping into the voice of the customer, marketing is better equipped to understand market perception, the advantages and disadvantages of your products or services, and how your messaging or positioning is resonating with decision-makers. Armed with this information, you can maintain a cohesive brand experience and drive customer loyalty.