the human factor - Aimia [PDF]

THE HUMAN FACTOR FIVE WAYS TECHNOLOGY CAN BUILD REAL RELATIONSHIPS

INSIGHTS

Cindy Faust, Vice President, Global Product Marketing Martin Hayward, Senior Vice President, Global Digital Strategy and Futures

PEOPLE

BETTER RESULTS

PLATFORM

On your journey from chaos to competitive edge, Aimia unites unmatched global expertise with our highly configurable secure loyalty platform to give you a loyalty advantage unlike any other. To see how our loyalty insights can deliver results for your business, visit us at aimia.com.

© 2014 Aimia Inc. All Rights Reserved.

The Human Factor / 1

AUTHORS’ NOTE

In this edition of Insights, we explore the impact of technology on customer loyalty. In an era of increased competition and ever‑rising consumer power, in which a plethora of digital platforms and devices rule, every company is leveraging technology to build brand loyalty with consumers. The challenge: smart phones in hand, those customers have growing expectations of trust, commitment, and reciprocity from the brands to which they offer their loyalty. In short, the onus is now on marketers to add the human factor to their technology platforms to build real relationships with their best customers.

In a recent blog post, Gartner analyst Andrew Frank used director Spike Jonze’s Oscar-nominated 2013 film Her as an example of a piece of popular culture that illustrates the desire for real relationships on both sides of the technology divide. In the movie, Joaquin Phoenix’s character asks Samantha, his intelligent, virtual personal assistant: “Samantha, are you HER?” Samantha answers: “No, but nobody could know you better than I do.” While Samantha may represent an extreme example of the “Uncanny Valley” effect — that invisible line that marks the point at which artificial intelligence moves from drawing us in, to repelling us, and then back again — it’s a useful metaphor for the importance of the humanizing element to technology. While we may sometimes overestimate our ability to build enduring love between our customers and our brand, innovations across the digital landscape have the potential to make customer relationships more seamless, more connected, and more personal than ever before. That’s because the rise of cloud computing, mobile technology, and state-of-the-art loyalty platforms now give marketers the power to harness customer insight to deliver personalized, relevant offers and experiences at the right time and place, and through the channel

of the customer’s own choosing. Data‑driven loyalty programs, social media scoring and monitoring, advanced analytics, and robust campaign management platforms are now poised to deliver true one-to-one consumer relationships. At long last, technology can now fulfill the promise of returning us to the days where the corner shopkeeper knew everything about the customer. When we err in this mission, it’s often because we mistake technology for the ends, rather than the means. No matter how sophisticated it appears, marketing technology is only as useful as its ability to build real relationships with consumers. The danger: that marketers will focus on cost savings, or the ability of technology to deliver short-term promotional impact, at the expense of customer relationships. Customers crave an experience driven not solely by technology, but also by the “human factor” — the sense that on the other side of that digital platform lies a company that offers solutions to improve their lives, cares about them, and values their loyalty. In this edition of Insights, join our authors as they offer five best practices for building the human touch into technology-based marketing. We may be a long way from having our customers fall in love with our brands the way Joaquin Phoenix falls in love with Samantha — but we can certainly leverage technology to make business more personal.

Table of Contents 2 Introduction 4 The Digital Deluge 6 I: Customer Collaboration 8 II: Experience Control 10 III: Customer Centricity

12 IV: Blending Humanity 14 V: Employee Engagement 16 Conclusion 18 About the Authors © 2014 Aimia Inc. All Rights Reserved.

2 / The Human Factor

INTRODUCTION

From the labyrinth of interactive voice response (IVR) customer service lines, to email marketing message overload, to privacy‑challenged social networks, the press and the internet comment boards are filled with tales of consumer technology woe. So while consumer adoption of technology is at record levels, it’s worthwhile to ask the hard questions about our reliance on it. Are we using technology for the benefit of our customers, or merely to lower our operating expenses? Does our reliance on technology to interact with our customers abolish the human touch? Do we really place the user experience at the heart of our technology strategy to build value in our customer relationships? For technology to deliver on its promise, we must know the answers to these questions.

“Today, the integration of technology with the customer experience has reached a tipping point: we can leverage technology either for short-term gain, or to deliver long-term loyalty.”

A few years ago, research firm Gartner predicted that by 2017, the average CMO technology budget would exceed the CIO’s budget (Gartner High Tech Tuesday Webinar Series “By 2017 the CMO will Spend More on IT than the CIO,” January 3, 2012). Today, this prediction seems ever more prescient — but the danger is that our adoption of technology is far outpacing our ability to wield it wisely. According to a recent Accenture survey (“CMOs: Time for Digital Transformation or Risk Being Left on the Sidelines”), the majority of marketing executives believe that analytics, digital, and mobile technologies will transform marketing. While more than a third of executives surveyed expect digital spending to account for over 75 percent of their marketing budgets within five years, only 62 percent believe that their company currently provides a good customer experience. For a cautionary tale about the power of technology to outpace marketing acumen, consider the rise of social media. In the pre-social past, consumer complaints were limited to actual word-of-mouth interactions, and were therefore virtually invisible to marketers. A bad experience might result in a dinner-table complaint, and failure to resolve the issue might force your customer to take her business elsewhere, but the relationship damage was typically limited to that single customer. Today, however, social channels make every failed service interaction potentially viral. Many marketers dove head-first into social media without first considering its impact on customer relationships — and many have paid the price. Today, the integration of technology with the customer experience has reached a tipping point: we can leverage technology either for short‑term gain, or to deliver long‑term loyalty. Technology can make relationships, or it can break them. Our choice is clear:


we must keep technology human. We must use technology to build trust, demonstrate commitment, and deliver reciprocity. To that end, marketers must focus their technology efforts on these five best practices: 1. Collaborate with your customers. Marketers and technology providers must collaborate with customers at each stage of the adoption curve, leverage customer insight to course correct, and implement changes that reflect customer needs. 2. Cede control of the experience. For technology to facilitate real relationships, use it to place control of the brand experience where it belongs — in the hands of your customers. 3. Practice customer centricity. By focusing your marketing efforts on collecting, analyzing, and acting upon data correlative and predictive of customer value, you can unite technology with humanity to build real relationships. 4. Blend technology with humanity. Through the collection and analysis of customer-centric data sets, you can find the optimal blend of technology and humanity for your business — ensuring that you can deliver a consistent customer experience across channels to build relationship value. 5. Engage employees in the journey. To infuse your customer-facing technology with the human touch, employee engagement is critical to success. To build strong relationships, technology must empower your employees to deliver differentiated customer service in real time. In the following pages, we’ll explore each of these best practices in more detail. Join us as we explore the future of marketing and recommend a path forward.


THE TECHNOLOGY DIVIDE The data below comes courtesy of a recent Accenture survey of marketing executives on the future of marketing. From the survey data, one truth becomes clear: While marketers are racing headlong into the digital future, our ability to leverage technology to benefit our customers often lags behind. AREAS OF FUNDAMENTAL MARKETING TRANSFORMATION OVER THE NEXT FIVE YEARS (% AGREEING) Analytics skills will be a core competence of marketing

42%

Digital budgets will account for 75 percent of the marketing budget

37%

Mobile will account for over 50 percent of the marketing budget

35%

Marketing will become more of an on-demand information provision function

34%

Marketing, sales and customer service will be merged into a single function

34%

We will not know what a marketing campaign will look like in advance: campaigns will unfold in real time depending on the individual needs and intents of each customer across every device and channel

32%

Earned media will be more important and receive more support than paid and owned media

27%

Marketing and IT will be merged into a single function

26%

CMOs will be the most important relationship for CEOs surpassing the CFO and other C-suite executives

21%

We will be known as a digital company

78% of marketers agree that marketing will undergo a technological transformation in the next five years.

21%

62% of marketers agree that their company provides a good customer experience.

Source: Accenture, 2014 “CMOs: Time for Digital Transformation or Risk Being Left on the Sidelines.” © 2014 Aimia Inc. All Rights Reserved.


THE DIGITAL DELUGE

Once upon a time, marketers enjoyed a captive consumer audience. Successful mass-media campaigns could easily hit the mark and boost brand awareness, product sales, and customer loyalty. Today, we find a dramatically altered landscape: technology has fragmented and disrupted traditional media, mobile devices have placed the internet at our fingertips, and new digital channels have led to always-on marketing. The very tools we hoped would lead to marketing nirvana are instead leading us to a marketing dystopia, with savvy consumers tuning out our messages and voting with their feet. But is there a way to stem this troublesome tide?

“We stand on the cusp of a golden age of customer relationships. But to arrive at this moment, we must first bridge the digital divide between marketers who want to exploit data, and consumers who demand choice and control over their digital lives.”


The answer, in short, is yes. Signals and Systems Telecom’s Big Data report, “The Big Data Market 2014‑2020: Opportunities, Challenges, Strategies, Industry Verticals and Forecasts,” predicts that this new data economy will be a $76B market by 2020; the good news is that this data explosion now offers us unprecedented opportunity to gain deep customer insight and build more relevance and value into our customer relationships. But just as in the last technological revolution, the rise of Big Data creates serious challenges for marketers — and if we don’t use data wisely, we risk scaring away consumers with the very tools we hoped would help us understand them better. These challenges include: > Marketing fatigue. According to Aimia’s 2012 Digital Loyalty Survey, the marketing messages consumers receive often fail to meet their expectations: one in five consumers express regret for liking a brand online, while one in four regret registering with a company or brand website. With consumers now bombarded with often ineffective messages across devices and channels, only those marketers who deliver timely, relevant, and personalized messages will cut through the clutter. > Privacy issues. Location-based technology now makes it possible for us to reach consumers outside

of the transaction, wherever they are — online, in the store, or on the sidewalk. But if marketers exploit this data to chase short-term profits regardless of transparency and consumer control, they will face both customer backlash and legislative scrutiny. > Data overload. The 2014 CMO Survey by McKinsey & Co. reveals that spending on marketing analytics is expected to rise 72 percent over the next three years, but most projects fail to make use of those marketing analytics. Marketers are justifiably excited about the power of data, in particular unstructured data from social media, video, and other sources. But if we chase data for data’s sake, we risk drinking from the fire hose. Companies suffering from data overload often lack the time and resources to properly mine this data for insight, let alone translate that insight into action. We stand on the cusp of a golden age of customer relationships. But to arrive at this moment, we must first bridge the digital divide between marketers who want to exploit data, and consumers who demand choice and control over their digital lives. To cross this chasm, we must choose the proper future for marketing, one that retains a core element of humanity. In the following pages, we’ll walk through the steps towards building a future of real relationships.


THE FOUR FUTURES OF MARKETING In his Aimia research brief “The Four Futures,” author Martin Hayward postulates four potential futures for marketing based on two variables: consumer control over their personal data, and the use of data by marketers to build relationship engagement. Only the future of real relationships, in which marketers leverage data to build longterm customer loyalty, will allow us to fully realize the optimal impact of digital marketing.

HIGH DATA CONTROL

PAY TO PLAY REAL RELATIONSHIPS RATIONAL ENGAGEMENT

EMOTIONAL ENGAGEMENT

OFFER ANARCHY

THE HUNT FOR AFFINITY

LOW DATA CONTROL



I: CUSTOMER COLLABORATION

In the early days of Automated Teller Machines (ATMs), consumers were confused by them — they stood only outside of banks, you couldn’t talk to them, and they were only open during business hours. ATMs seemed a poor substitute for interaction with a live bank teller. Over time, however, consumers taught banks how they preferred to use ATMs — during off hours, and in places where they couldn’t make it to an actual bank. Over time, ATMs evolved to deliver 24/7 convenience, extending banking services everywhere from airports to restaurants and many points in between. The collaboration between banking automation and consumer feedback made ATMs the technology success story they are today. When it comes to striking the right balance between technology and human interaction, marketers are on a similar collaborative journey with their customers. Mobile wallet technology, for example, is now in a similar position as ATM technology in the 1980s — a solution in search of a problem. Says Kasey Byrne, Chief Marketing Officer for Atlanta-based Cardlytics, a technology firm offering transaction-driven marketing for electronic banking, “Is it easier to pull out my phone versus just pulling out my card? If you’re going to interrupt a time-sensitive activity like checking out, then it needs to be a really good customer experience.” To enjoy mass adoption, mobile wallet technology will need to undergo a similar collaborative push-and-pull between technology providers and consumer needs. So it will go with every consumer‑facing

technology — from CRM software, to marketing campaign automation, to data analytics, to social media sharing, marketers and technology providers will need to collaborate with customers at each stage of the adoption curve, leverage customer insight to course correct, and implement changes that reflect customer needs. Sometimes, the easiest way to collaborate with your customers is to sit down across the table from them. For example, the leadership team of Commonwealth Bank of Australia (CBA) hosts customer lunches to get their views on what the bank can do better. According to Angus Sullivan, Executive General Manager Cards, Payments, Analytics and Strategy at CBA, this face-to-face collaboration helps keep senior leadership connected with the front lines. In addition, CBA has used a subsidiary bank to pilot a Facebook app that allows customers to vote on ideas to improve the banking experience. “Being ‘world class’ in the digital and technology space is a goal, but we want to make sure that the great experience is an even better experience that customers value,” says Sullivan. “This is just as much a winning proposition.” In theory, the goal of any consumer‑facing marketing technology is to replicate the human touch. Successful technology allows marketers to perform at scale activities that once only took place in the corner shop: technology now allows us to learn more about our customers’ habits and preferences, to make recommendations to them, and to provide personalized service. For some businesses, technology represents a return to the high‑touch past; for other businesses, it represents a bold new future. Take consumer packaged goods (CPG) companies, for example: in the past, CPGs have had little direct connection to their customers, relying


instead on second-hand relationships through retailers. Today, technology has opened up the opportunity for CPGs to foster direct consumer relationships. CRM databases, brand loyalty programs, campaign management, websites, social channels, and online communities now allow CPGs to form collaborative relationships with their best customers. The Kellogg Company, for example, has developed active social listening programs that leverage real-time consumer conversations to capture deep insight into category and brand trends. “There are fewer constraints than ever for our brands to have a direct relationship with the consumer,” says Brian Broveleit, Kellogg’s Director, Global Digital Strategy. “For example, we can tailor the consumer experience of a loyalty program based on insights at household level, or deliver more relevant advertising messaging based on insight into the needs of the individual. Technology truly changes the game for companies who need to appeal to and motivate mass audiences, enabling us — and increasingly requiring us — to deliver content that resonates at the individual level.” Does this mean that Kellogg’s has replaced with technology, traditional tools like focus groups, panel survey data, and store visits? Not at all, says Broveleit. Striking a balance between the promise of technology and personal, human experiences is no easy task, but companies like CBA and Kellogg’s are showing the way. “We’re not replacing the human element with technology, but in fact, better enabling it through technology,” says Broveleit. “To us, there isn’t a tradeoff between experience and technology. In fact, a very important enablement role for technology is to improve the consumer experience, the relevance of our brands in the lives of our consumers, and the intimacy of our relationship with them as individuals.”


“Being ‘world class’ in the digital and technology space is a goal, but we want to make sure that the great experience is an even better experience that customers value.” — Angus Sullivan, EGM Cards, Payments, Analytics and Strategy, Commonwealth Bank of Australia



II: EXPERIENCE CONTROL

Science fiction author William Gibson once famously said, “The future is already here — it’s just not very evenly distributed.” So it is with consumer-facing technology. New technological innovations emerge every day: Google Glass is in use by early adopters; Amazon is experimenting with drone deliveries; geo-tracking tech is now sophisticated enough to pinpoint us in the store aisle. But does that mean we must rush to adopt every new technological innovation? Probably not. Just as form follows function in architecture, so too must consumer technology implementations facilitate real relationships. To do so, consumer technology must place control of the brand experience where it belongs — in the hands of your customers.

When beginning their travel journey at the airport, the airline offers their customers a choice: interacting with a live counter agent, or interact with the automated kiosk. Need help with your boarding pass, or with finding your gate? A live agent is standing by to help you. Do you prefer to speed through by checking in online and scanning your boarding pass on your mobile phone at the gate? Southwest has you covered. You choose the experience; Southwest facilitates it.

For Southwest Airlines, using technology to build real relationships means enabling their customers to choose their preferred experience.

As more sophisticated tech solutions come online, Southwest envisions augmenting that technology with the personal touch to help deliver choice and convenience to their customers. “While technology can do a lot of things very well and quickly, we continue to place a premium on the human capabilities to help with more complex customer issues, or simply to smile and wish you a good flight,” says Clarkson. “So for us, the two elements will continue to exist together to help set Southwest apart.”

“Allowing customers who want a more tech-centric experience to have it actually improves customer service for everyone,” says Jonathan Clarkson, Director of Southwest’s Rapid Rewards frequent-flyer program. “It means agents can spend more time with customers who need it.”

“Technology should definitely be for the benefit of the customer,” emphasizes CBA’s Sullivan, whose approach is to help customers “save time, save money and make money.” The bank views technology as a way both to enable their customers’ shift to digital interfaces, and to enable those customers who want more control over their experience. For example, CBA has deployed self-service options for a variety of banking functions — from tasks as simple as changing a PIN to tasks as complex as applying for a credit card or a mortgage. Their breakthrough innovation, “Lock Block Limit,” allows CBA customers © 2014 Aimia Inc. All Rights Reserved.

to use the CommBank mobile app to control their credit card security and spending amounts. Using the app, customers can instantly lock, unlock, and set transaction limits on a variety of transaction types — international or domestic, online or in-store, and even on ATM cash advances — in real time. Returning from an overseas business trip? Protect yourself from fraud by locking out international payments. Is your card lost or stolen? Instantly turn off cash advances. The app delivers peace of mind, convenience, and experience control, all at the same time — what’s not to love? “These efforts do benefit the bank — through less fraud and fewer calls to the call center,” says Sullivan. “But it’s really about creating the right experience for the customer’s banking experience.” The secret to these successful implementations is that Southwest and CBA have integrated technology and the human touch thoughtfully, over time, to give their customers control over the experience. The alternative approach — sudden and dramatic implementation of, say, marketing automation software that inundates your customers with offers with no corresponding control over the frequency, channel, or relevancy of the offers received — may lower costs and boost short‑term ROI, but it can also leave your customers confused, frustrated, and disengaged. Says Neal Zamore, Vice President, Consumer Marketing and CRM for North America at Avis Budget Group, “It really has to be about putting into practice the old saying about getting a ‘360-degree view’ of the customer. Integrating technology and the human touch means that all customer touch points are integrated seamlessly in real time into all channels, so that the channels blend and a customer is dealing with one brand that knows them well and knows how to treat them right, regardless of the channel.”


ARE YOU EXPERIENCED?

CBA OFFERS CUSTOMERS REAL-TIME CONTROL To create their breakthrough mobile banking app, “Lock Block Limit,” Commonwealth Bank of Australia leveraged customer feedback to provide CBA customers with unprecedented control over their credit card security and spending amounts. Using the app, customers can instantly lock, unlock, and set transaction limits on a variety of transaction types — international or domestic, online or in-store, and even on ATM cash advances — in real time.

Features > Lock in-store international payments > Lock online international payments > Lock ATM cash advances > Set a limit per transaction > Option to set a timer when “unlocking” > Notifications (SMS/email) when transactions are declined

Benefits > Brand perception > Incremental new account growth > “Front of wallet” customer engagement

> Fraud diversion



III: CUSTOMER CENTRICITY

Aimia’s 2011 Millennial Loyalty Survey revealed that Generation Y consumers around the globe more readily adopt new technology, are more flexible about data privacy, and are more willing to share their personal information for rewards and recognition than are their older counterparts. On the other hand, Millennials expect more rewards faster, are more unforgiving about privacy breaches, and are quicker to abandon your brand after a service breakdown. The challenge for marketers is not that Millennials have different needs from brands than other consumer segments. The challenge is rather that technology deployments can often be blunt instruments — delivering the same offers, through the same channel, to customer segments with wildly differing expectations. The answer to this challenge is not simply more data or more technology. The answer lies in using these tools

“By putting technology choice and control in your customers’ hands, you can build relationship trust, demonstrate commitment, and practice reciprocity. In short, call it customer centricity: Uniting technology with humanity to build real relationships.”

to get closer to the customer. By focusing your marketing efforts on collecting, analyzing, and acting upon data most correlative and predictive of customer value, you can account for the wants and desires of every demographic group — Millennials, Baby Boomers, Digital Natives, even Luddites. By putting technology choice and control in your customers’ hands, you can build relationship trust, demonstrate commitment, and practice reciprocity. In short, call it customer centricity: Uniting technology with humanity to build real relationships. According to David LaMarca, Senior Director, Retail Innovation and Store Design, CVS/Caremark, customer centricity is essential: “Instead of the product being at the center, in the last five years or so we really started to focus on putting the customer at the center of our strategy. We cluster our stores to fit customers’ needs within those stores, such as with our trip segmentation report, which helps lay out the store based on customer needs.” To practice customer centricity, you must leverage data and technology to enhance and personalize the customer experience, rather than exploiting it solely for short-term gain. In practice, implementing customer-centric technology often means providing options. Millennials may love your mobile app; older consumers may not. Most customers may be comfortable navigating your online customer support; some high‑value customers may prefer speaking to a live human being. Your customers don’t look or behave alike — so don’t treat them as if they do. It’s even possible to deploy technology as ubiquitous as self‑service checkout lanes in a customer‑centric fashion. At CVS, the company doesn’t deploy self‑checkouts everywhere — but rather limit them to where customers appreciate the convenience. “We know they know they work great in


urban stores, where people have a very limited amount of time and want to check out quickly,” says LaMarca. “However, in residential or rural areas, people don’t want them. They want a traditional checkout.” Customer centricity also means turning off the marketing fire hose and only delivering the most relevant offers to your customers. Through Cardlytics’ card-linked marketing platform, for example, retailers and restaurants can reach consumers through online and mobile banking applications to target offers based on a customer’s actual purchase history — ensuring that the offers are both timely and relevant. “The most important thing is to increase usability and relevance for the consumer,” says Cardlytics’ Kasey Byrne. “The consumer is in charge — the days of just accepting what you hand them are over. So how do you provide something that’s valuable enough that the consumer wants to invite you in?” A customer-centric approach to marketing is critical to leverage data and technology for the maximum benefit of both businesses and consumers. By focusing your data efforts on developing predictive customer insight, you ensure both relevance and value in your messages. By ceding technology choice and control to your customers, you allow them to self-select into interacting with the tools and channels that delight them. With fickle and impatient Millennials, a one‑size‑fits‑all approach to technology may be doomed to fail. “For the majority of us, we haven’t grown up with the digital world,” says Commonwealth Bank’s Sullivan. “Kids have always had digital. They will be comfortable doing things with technology that will blow our minds. They will re-create the world around technology and in many ways, it’s both exciting and daunting. We’re only at the beginning of the era of change.”


“The customer is in charge and the days of just accepting what you hand them are over. So, how do you provide something that’s valuable enough that the consumer wants to invite you in?” — Kasey Byrne, Chief Marketing Officer, Cardlytics



IV: BLENDING HUMANITY

Nothing is stopping banks from shuttering all of their brick-andmortar branches and requiring their customers to do all of their banking online. The technology exists. Banks would arguably lower expenses by eliminating lease payments, utilities, and human tellers. So why don’t they? Banks maintain physical branches because their executives know that, no matter how sophisticated digital channels become, some banking interactions will always require the human touch. Your customers may enjoy the convenience of applying for a credit card online — but when it comes to choosing the right mortgage, for example, no digital platform will replace the trust and commitment demonstrated by interaction with a live human being.

“The Golden Rule for implementing marketing technology is, ‘Thou shalt not sacrifice customer relationships on the altar of efficiency.’ Whether you’re a bank, a retailer, or a travel provider, your customers expect to self‑select into the channel most appropriate to their needs at the time.”

For example, Commonwealth Bank of Australia still operates an enormous face-to-face branch network, and has no plans to force the migration of their customers online anytime soon. “Even when automation is possible, there is comfort for people to have human interactions with another person when the problem is complex, like taking out a loan or dealing with retirement tools,” says CBA’s Sullivan. The Golden Rule for implementing marketing technology is, “Thou shalt not sacrifice customer relationships on the altar of efficiency.” Whether you’re a bank, a retailer, a travel provider, or any other business besides a pure-play digital native, your customers expect to self-select into the channel most appropriate to their needs at the time. Sometimes customers need help navigating a complex decision tree, and require a little handholding by a live customer service rep. Other times they require speed and convenience, in which case an elegantly designed online interface is just the ticket. Just as banks like CBA realize that some banking interactions will always require the human touch, so too must you examine closely each stage of your customer journey to determine when automation improves the experience and when human interaction is required. Blending technology with humanity offers your customers the best of both worlds. Take grocery shopping, for example. For shoppers in fast-moving urban areas, online grocery delivery services offer speed, convenience, and the freeing of valuable time for other activities. For foodies and shoppers with families, however, no online interface will ever replicate or replace


the joy of perusing the grocer’s produce section to find the choicest fruits and vegetables. In store, shoppers enjoy the choice of the self-checkout lanes versus lanes with human cashiers. Some shoppers enjoy downloading vouchers and coupons to their mobile devices, while others prefer the serenity of a digital-free experience. The best grocers offer a seamless blend of technology and humanity that leaves the customer in control of the experience. Every business is different, every channel has different challenges and benefits, and every customer will experience a different journey. The key to success, says Avis Budget Group’s Zamore, is to recognize valuable customers regardless of which channel they choose. “Relying solely on any one channel is a mistake,” says Avis Budget Group’s Zamore. “Brands still have to get better at recognizing a given customer in another channel and context. Right now it’s more like they get to know someone in a conference room and have to re-introduce themselves when they’re in the hallway.” Data collection within an environment of permission and trust can help marketers gain insight into stated channel preferences, preferred touch points, and relationship value, all at the level of the individual customer. Through the collection and analysis of customer-centric data sets, you can find the optimal blend of technology and humanity for your business — ensuring that you can deliver a consistent customer experience across all channels — online, at the counter, and over the phone — that builds relationship value.

The Human Touch / 13

“Avis Budget Group doesn’t believe in connecting people with technology, we believe in connecting people through technology.” — Neal Zamore, Avis Budget Group Vice President, Consumer Marketing and CRM, North America



V: EMPLOYEE ENGAGEMENT

Earlier this year, a Montreal Gazette article by author Hani Kafoury, called “Creating Customer Loyalty One Employee at a Time,” detailed Ford Canada’s new Consumer Experience Movement — an initiative focused on building lasting relationships with consumers and creating enthusiastic advocates of Ford and Lincoln products and services. Kafoury believes that in today’s economy, delivering a great product or service is not enough — sustainable competitive advantage lies in creating a positive and memorable consumer experience. To create this experience, says Kafoury, you have to start by creating a positive experience for your employees.

employees will bend over backwards for the company and its customers. In such a culture, there is no ‘this is just my job; I am only going to do that.’ It’s more of a team effort with a focus on how to best serve the customer and go the extra mile.” When it comes to infusing your customer-facing technology with the human touch, employee engagement likewise becomes critical to success. In the airline industry, for example, technological evolution has historically meant replacing traditional human-powered customer interactions with automated ones: online bookings replaced telephone bookings, and kiosk check-ins replaced check-ins via the departures desk. To condition their customers to embrace these automated platforms, airlines have learned that they must first encourage their front-line employees to embrace them.

“We know, based on statistical research, that a highly engaged employee will lead to a highly engaged customer,” says Gemma Giovinazzo, national consumer experience manager for Ford Canada, For Southwest Airlines, for in the article. “Highly-engaged example, living up to their mantra “If It Matters to You, It Matters to Us” requires them to build a staff of engaged employees who feel ownership of the customer “When it experience. According to Clarkson, comes to infusing Southwest undertakes extensive your customer-facing research to help them understand technology with the human what combination of digital and touch, employee engagement human interaction best serves likewise becomes critical to their customers’ needs. The airline success. To condition their identifies customer pain points customers to embrace automated via daily feedback, which is then platforms, for example, airlines published and made accessible to have learned that they must front-line staff. In addition to formal research, Southwest Airlines also first encourage their frontconducts customer observation line employees to and “co‑creation” exercises with embrace them.” employees to help staff understand which tool — technology or human interaction — is most efficient in alleviating those pain points. As technology continues to evolve, Southwest envisions augmenting digital platforms with the personal touch to improve the customer experience.

reasons behind any change to our front line employees to help ensure they adopt and champion the changes,” says Clarkson. Commonwealth Bank of Australia, meanwhile, has undertaken a journey toward customer centricity that has instilled a sense of employee pride in and ownership of the customer experience. This focus has paid off: five years ago, Roy Morgan research data ranked CBA number four in customer satisfaction among Australian banks; by 2013, they ranked first. How did they do it? By empowering their employees to improve the banking experience. First, CBA established success metrics by gathering and analyzing customer data via their CRM platform, loyalty programs, and bank branches. Then, the bank established customer KPIs for all 50,000 employees. Next, the bank encouraged both sales and service departments to meet weekly to discuss ideas for improving the customer experience. Finally, CBA CEO Ian Narev would randomly drop into the sessions to participate in the conversations. When your CEO gets involved in ensuring a customer focus, you know that the company is serious. In fact, a recent article from the Australian Financial Review titled, “Banking on disruption: CBA’s new breed of tech execs,” reveals that Narev has helped instill CBA with three key cultural principles: customer centricity; internal resource competition to ensure that only the strongest ideas survive; and harnessing the power of technology to improve productivity. These principles have not only helped CBA retain its top spot in customer satisfaction, but have also delivered a steady rise in CBA’s stock price.

That’s the power of technology combined with the human touch. Says Narev in the Financial Review article, “the level of enthusiasm and “We also really explain the importance passion to maintain our position has been outstanding.” of customer experience and the



“IF IT MATTERS TO YOU, IT MATTERS TO US”

“We really explain the importance of customer experience and the reasons behind any change to our front line employees to help ensure they adopt and champion the change.” — Jonathan Clarkson, Director of Rapid Rewards, Southwest Airlines



CONCLUSION

We live in an age of unprecedented technological revolution — in social media, in mobile technology, in data analytics — and collectively, this digital technology has a profound impact on our consumer lives, our home and family life, and on society as a whole. As marketers, we wrestle with understanding how we can best leverage these new tools to help build strong, sustainable, and valuable customer relationships. Is digital technology a net good to consumers, or a net detriment? Is technology solving our business problems, or compounding them? Is technology bringing customers and brands together, or is it driving them apart?

“To build a future of real relationships, we must always strive to balance technology with the human touch. Achieving that balance requires us to seek and analyze data closest to the customer; use digital tools to build dialog, rather than broadcast one-way messages; and cede control of the experience to our customers.”

To confront this dilemma, in October of 2014, the Aimia Institute held a debate on the role of technology in human relationships. The event, called “Technology on Trial: Remaining Human in a Technology Driven World,” was held in the Crypt at St. Martin-in-the-Fields in Central London. To help drive this debate, we invited two guest speakers to help us articulate the arguments for and against the impact of technology on human relationships. To argue for the prosecution’s view that digital technology is a net detriment to society, we invited Andrew Keen, the British-American entrepreneur and author of “The Cult of the Amateur,” who has argued that social media is fueling a new digital narcissism that is driving us apart. And to argue for the defense, we invited Kathryn Parsons, the British entrepreneur and co‑founder of Decoded, a start-up that aims to demystify the “dark arts” of the web and encourage women to be code-literate so as not to be excluded from the skill set of the future digital economy. The debate, moderated by our co-author Martin Hayward, was both robust and provocative. We purposefully structured a topic filled with gray areas into a black-or-white proposition: Is technology a boon or a bane to consumers? Has technology enhanced customer relationships, or is it destroying them? The debate became a classic battle between competing visions of the future: One dystopian, one utopian. Andrew Keen argued that social media in particular has destroyed


both the curators and gatekeepers of society, leading us into a muddled mass of online conversation and opinion in which the lowest common denominator wins. Kathryn Parsons, meanwhile, argues that the key to a technological utopia is one in which ordinary people embrace technology — and whether that means ordinary people learning to code and creating their own future, or ordinary consumers demanding choice and control from marketers, that future will be one in which technology benefits everyone. The debate attendees, marketers all, perhaps unsurprisingly sided with Parsons in the debate. As marketers, we all tend to technology utopianism. We embrace data analytics, mobile technology, social media, and other digital tools precisely because we seek to create a world in which companies and their customers enjoy real relationships. Thanks to technology, we’re closer to that reality than ever before. Given any choice between two extremes, however, the truth is always somewhere in the middle. Keen provides a helpful reality check to remind us that technology must always be a means, rather than an end. To build a future of real relationships, we must always strive to balance technology with the human touch. Achieving that balance requires us to seek and analyze data closest to the customer; use digital tools to build dialog, rather than broadcast one-way messages; and cede control of the experience to our customers. Digital technology is a set of tools — and a tool is only as useful as the hand that wields it.


1 CUSTOMER COLLABORATION

2 EXPERIENCE CONTROL

3 CUSTOMER CENTRICITY

4 BLENDING HUMANITY

5 EMPLOYEE ENGAGEMENT



ABOUT THE AUTHORS

Cindy Faust, Vice President, Global Product Marketing In her role as VP, Global Product Marketing, Cindy provides leadership to drive the overall go-to-market strategy for Aimia’s technology products. Her role includes sales packaging, client services strategy, and the evaluation of revenue-generation programs for existing and new proprietary global products. In addition, Cindy focuses on customer advocacy programs as well as understanding and synthesizing

Martin Hayward, Senior Vice President, Global Digital Strategy and Futures Martin Hayward leads the development of Aimia’s global digital strategy. An acknowledged thought leader and author on the future of customer data, insight, loyalty, and marketing, Martin was previously Director of Strategy and Futures for dunnhumby, at the heart of the development of the innovative use of detailed customer data for marketing and


customer insights and market needs. Prior to her current role, Cindy was VP, Product Management for the Aimia US and VP, Loyalty Technology Services, delivering technical solutions for clients in the financial services, travel and hospitality, retail, CPG, telecom, automotive, pharma, and high tech industries. Prior to joining Aimia, Cindy held various IT leadership positions with Carlson Companies and GE Capital ITS. Cindy has earned various collegiate degrees including an MBA from the University of Minnesota’s Carlson School of Management.

communications. Martin’s previous positions include: Executive Chairman of The Henley Centre, WPP’s leading Strategic Marketing Consultancy; founding Managing Director of BBH Futures, the strategic consultancy arm of the Bartle Bogle Hegarty Advertising Group; and Head of the Marketing Services Department for Mercury Communications, during which time Mercury was voted Brand of the Year. He is also the author of the book “Any Colour You Like as Long as it’s Any Colour You Like,” which explores the future of customer data and insight.


TECHNOLOGY

REAL RELATIONSHIPS

HUMAN TOUCH

About Aimia Aimia Inc. (“Aimia”) is a global leader in loyalty management. Employing more than 4,300 people in 20 countries worldwide, Aimia offers clients, partners and members proven expertise in launching and managing coalition loyalty programs, delivering proprietary loyalty services, creating value through loyalty analytics and driving innovation in the emerging digital, mobile and social communications spaces. Aimia owns and operates Aeroplan, Canada’s premier coalition loyalty program, Nectar, the United Kingdom’s largest coalition loyalty program, Nectar Italia, Italy’slargest coalition program and Smart Button, a leading provider of SaaS loyalty solutions. In addition, Aimia owns stakes in Air Miles Middle East, Travel Club, Spain’s leading coalition loyalty program, Club Premier, Mexico’s leading coalition loyalty program, China Rewards, the first coalition loyalty program in China that enables members to earn and redeem a common currency, Think Big, the owner and operator of BIG — AirAsia and Tune Group’s loyalty program, Brazil’s Prismah Fidelidade and i2c, a joint venture with Sainsbury’s offering insight and data analytics services in the UK to retailers and suppliers. Aimia also holds a minority position in Cardlytics, a US-based private company operating in card-linked marketing. Aimia is listed on the Toronto Stock Exchange (TSX: AIM). For more information, visit us at www.aimia.com. © 2014 Aimia Inc. All Rights Reserved.

CUSTOMER CENTRIC DATA

REAL RELATIONSHIPS

INSIGHTS

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