This article sends you Chief Marketers on a scavenger hunt within your small business. Just search, for now. Discover and learn for now; well apply later. We are looking for three things: 1. Look for places to touch the customer. Identify those likely places you can plant a sweet something. 2. Listen for customer phrases or comments about your service. Let her tell you those sweet somethings that youd like her to pass on. 3. Ask customers a key questionwhats your favorite thing about our store? Rephrase it however youd like, but ask, when appropriate. Remember, not all staff will be comfortable doing this; dont punish the ones that arent. Now is a fantastic time to use that Bloom Team to help you out. Sit down with them prior to the start of the scavenger hunt and brainstorm with them. Many of them are in contact with your customers. Draw out their good ideas and then put them into action. Remember, right now you are just hunting, just uncovering, positive ways you can affect and improve your brand. The goal is to reinforce your brand to the customer as often and as subtly as you can. Mistaken marketers think branding only happens on a logo or an ad; master marketers know branding blooms in all those small day-to-day interactions between the customer and your business. Most of these interactions are dimly lit. Its hard to see all of them, and difficult to map them out. Well, its time to shine a searchlight on as many of them as you can. Its not enough just to find the right phrase, (in #2 and #3 above); its just as important to find the right place to deliver the phrase back to the next customer (#1). In another article well discuss techniques on communicating the brand back to the new customer. For now just look for what and where. We suggest you run the scavenger hunt for one month. A time limit brings focus and a little sense of urgency to a task like this. Remember, just dig in and discover. Raw material is what you are looking for right now, not finished product. You are looking for a few veins of ore, now. Youll smelt it into 14K product, later. Remember: Brand (who you are) + Package (your Face to the Customer) + People (customers and employees) = Marketing Success. 2006 Marketing Hawks |
