Brian Solis: How Experiences Matter to Your Bottom Line by sas

7/27/2019 Brian Solis: How Experiences Matter to Your Bottom Line by sas

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CONCLUSIONS PAPER

Brian Solis: How Experiences Matter to Your Bottom Line

Featuring:

Brian Solis, Principal Analyst, Altimeter Group

Insights from a keynote address at a recent Integrated Marketing Week conference, organized by DMA and Econsultancy, and sponsored by SAS



SAS Conclusions Paper

Table of Contents

Introduction 1

On Being Human 2The Experience Divide 2

The Culture of Connection 4

Introducing Generation C 4

Rethinking the Sales Funnel 5

The Four Moments of Truth 6

Developing an Engaged Relationship 7

Creating Passion, Not Just Consumerism 8

Closing Thoughts 9

About the Presenter 9

For More Information 10



1


Introduction

The one-year-old girl was entranced with the iPad ®. It lights up. Things move. It

responds. It’s completely intuitive to her.

Given a set o ashion magazines with brightly colored pictures, the inant

is beuddled.

She drags and swipes, pinches and reverse pinches, yet the magazine

does nothing.

It is clearly broken. Useless. So she sets it aside.

“For my one-year-old daughter, a magazine is an iPad that does not work,”

says dad in a YouTube video that has garnered more than 4 million views.

“It will remain so or her whole lie.”

Part o the inant’s brain has been coded to an entirely new way o interacting with

media, compared to her ather’s generation She will never know a world without touch-

screen computers, smartphones and the Internet She will never know a world without

Instagram, YouTube and Pinterest She will never know a world without mobile wave-to-

pay, scan-to-connect or swipe-to-navigate That world simply doesn’t exist or her

Whatever your thoughts on inants using iPads (there are plenty o opinions in the

comments to this viral video), one thing is clear: Your uture customers will be dierent

rom anything you’ve ever known in the past Today’s customers are already prooundly

dierent rom yesterday’s Get real about this evolution o the human dynamic – or get

overrun by those who do

What’s does this mean or the uture o business? At a recent Integrated Marketing

Week conerence, digital analyst and uturist Brian Solis shared insights rom his book

o the same name –WTF or short, which, by the way, is intended to mean exactly what

you think it means

“In all reality, the uture o business is something each and every one o you has to

answer or yoursel or the businesses you work with,” said Solis “I’m not going to talk

about social media and the importance o Facebook and how amazing Pinterest is

Those are all tools and technologies that we will gure out how to use I want to talk

about the idea o an integrated experience, and how important that is

“The other day I was asked to oer my prediction or the most important technology we

need to ollow in 2013 What is the biggest trend on the horizon that I thought we all

needed to pay attention to? My answer: Human beings All o this technology that we’ve

been gited is an opportunity or us to better learn about the people we are trying to

reach And to use that knowledge to connect with them in meaningul ways, to create

a customer experience that delivers on our brand promise”

“Today’s inants, millennials

and Generation Z are digital

frst; they have to learn how to

be analog. Generation X, baby

boomers and matures are

analog frst; we had to learn

how to be digital. The uture is

taking a digital-frst perspective

to build products and services

that begin with the connected

generation in mind – not

necessarily based on the

world as we know it.”

Brian Solis

Digital analyst and uturist



2


Solis’ answer brings ocus to the importance o social science over “shiny object

syndrome” Businesses may put too much emphasis on a shiny technology, without

ully understanding how that technology changes human behavior

On Being Human

In the Emmy Award-winning television show, Undercover Boss, senior

executives work undercover in their own companies as entry-level employees

– under an altered appearance and assumed name. The executive spends

one or two weeks working in various areas o the company’s operations, then

returns to his/her true identity. The executive then summons select employees

to corporate headquarters or a surprise debriefng – good or bad.

“There’s a magical moment in every episode where the executive who went through the

rigmarole o being an employee or a customer is given the git o empathy,” said Solis

“They say things like, ‘I orgot what is was like to be an employee’ ‘I orgot what it was

like to be a customer’”

Solis isn’t casting aspersions on executives, just acknowledging that their roles can be

quite oreign to the roles o employees and customers “A day in the lie o an executive

is about managing spreadsheets and dashboards, reporting to shareholders and board

members, and determining how to propel the company orward The language o

executive roles is oten not even a human language anymore It’s about targets, strategic

directions, corporate perormance and ROI – it’s not usually about inspiring people on a

human level”

That’s what makes the Undercover Boss show work There’s always this “aha” momentat the end But when we gain this empathy, what do we as marketers do with this git?

Not so much, so ar, Solis charges We have access to some o the most amazing

technologies ever to tell us more about human beings – what’s important to them and

how we can be more relevant – but we’re pouring all this knowledge into the same

programs, processes, methodologies and philosophies we have always used We’re

not doing very much new at all; that has to change Our mission should be to exact the

kind o change that makes integrated marketing not a matter o aligning communication

channels, but an embedded unction and mission o a better organization

The Experience Divide“Ater conducting a lot o research over the years, I have seen a common weakness in

customer-acing organizations,” said Solis “I call it the ‘experience divide’ It represents

the gap between your brand promise and the experiences people have with your brand

It’s the dierence between the image you’re trying to create with your marketing eorts

and the reality o what your customers eel and share I assure you, there is a gap

between what you say and what people eel and share That gap doesn’t have to exist”

We have access to some o

the most amazing technologiesever to tell us more about

human beings – what’s

important to them and how

we can be more relevant – but

we’re pouring all this knowledge

into the same programs,

processes, methodologies

and philosophies we have

always used.



3


Closing the gap starts with understanding the customer experience on a deeper level

With the technology we have available to us, we are no longer limited to measuring

straightorward metrics such as hits, click-throughs, likes, ollowers, sentiment and

share o voice We can start to create and measure shared experiences, and the value

and the impact that these experiences have

Marketers might protest, saying, “We already reach customers through multiple contact

channels We already have integrated marketing to deliver good experiences” Do you?

Really?

“When you start to truly pay attention to the people you’re trying to reach, you start

to become them,” Solis said “You gain the ‘aha’ empathy moment o an executive

in Undercover Boss You start to realize that all the talk about market segmentation,

customer proling or customer segmentation is too limiting, because it’s about

demographics, cybergraphics and behaviors When you become a marketing

anthropologist and start to investigate how you reach people, how they make decisions,how you infuence them and how they infuence others, you gain a second ‘aha’

moment: Traditional marketing is broken Or at least it has to undamentally change

as the world around us has changed”

By design, the way companies market and the channels we use to market are delivering

the opposite o an integrated experience, because those channels themselves are

not internally integrated The Web team crats the website The social media team

is responsible or the company’s presence on Facebook and Twitter The marketing

communications team generates the collateral, and so on Talk to people in those

teams, and you’ll get any number o answers about what the customer experience is

supposed to be, and oten you’ll nd little consensus and collaboration among those

teams That’s a problem when we dene integration at a higher level, when we’re trying

to achieve not just consistency across a series o technologies but a cohesive and

satisying experience with the company as a whole

“Technologies are not the answers; they’re just the enablers,” said Solis “It’s not just

about social, mobile and big data It’s about everything that is having an impact on us as

individuals That’s why I’m not just an analyst who studies disruptive technologies I’m

also an aspiring digital anthropologist, studying the impact o technologies on society

and culture”

We are all becoming that one-year-old girl with the iPad, to some degree We might

not be evolving in the Darwinist sense, but we are evolving in terms o how we getinormation, where we get it, and how we assimilate it to make decisions We are

gradually becoming that person we’re always stuck behind in the airport security line

– the one so pathologically connected that there is always one more device to sh out

and put in the tray We are more and more connected each day

“Technology and society evolve

aster than many can adapt.

Those that do fnd that it’s not

just about survival o the

fttest, it’s also about survival

o the ftting.”

Brian Solis




4


The Culture of Connection

The pope, the highest spiritual leader o the Roman Catholic Church, is

considered the successor to Saint Peter, to whom Jesus gave the keys o

heaven. In ancient times, popes helped spread Christianity and resolve

disputes o doctrine. In the modern day, popes are dedicated to interaith

Christian unity and dialogue, charitable works and the deense o human rights.

Given the prominence o the papacy in world history, the naming o a new

pope is a global watershed event. It has also been a watermark or our

changing culture.

When Benedict XVI became pope in April 2005, crowds at the Vatican watched

him with reverence, knowing they were part o history. Only eight years later,

when Pope Francis rose to the position, crowds at the Vatican photographed

him on their phones, knowing they were sharing a part o history.

“We see the world dierently now,” Solis said “You are now marketing to an audience

with an audience o audiences – connected by shared experiences They share

experiences as they happen When the experiences become the center o everything,

you can either be designing those experiences or reacting to them

“I would argue that most organizations are doing the latter – reacting to experiences

rather than creating them For example, when businesses got on Twitter and Facebook,

they rst used those channels to respond to customer complaints Then they had to

create a department or that, create new metrics, get new budgets and get technology

to acilitate and manage these interactions But why spend all o our time and money

just reacting to the experiences people are having, when we could defne the experiencewe want people to have through positive conditioning? What experience do you want

people to have and share, and then how do you design the rest o the integrated

strategies to bring that vision to lie?”

Introducing Generation C

I you’ve been around olks rom Generation X (born in the’70s and’80s),

Generation Y (“millennials” born rom the early ’80s to the early 2000s), or

Generation Z (the generation now being born), you’ve seen the scene – people

gathered together, ostensibly or un and riendship. But everybody is oblivious

o one other, glued to their smartphones instead. “Best party ever,” is probably what they’re texting.

No matter what we think o this scenario, we’re not going to change it We could laugh

about how these young people who appear to be bored and disengaged are probably

texting about the amazing time they’re having We could also acknowledge that

something is engaging them, and nd ways to become that something What can

we do to stay relevant to this obsessively connected generation – Generation C?

It’s easier than ever or

customers to share experiences.Pull out your phone, snap a

picture and bam – it’s in a text,

a tweet or posted to Facebook

or your blog. What experience

do you want people to have

and share, and then how do

you design the rest o the

integrated strategies to bring

that vision to lie?

It is or Generation C that

we need to design shared

experiences, but what we

do will beneft all our

customers, because the

more we learn about them,

the better or everybody.



5


“Generation C is not an age demographic, it’s about customers who live a connected,

digital liestyle,” said Solis “Generation C drives it all They are the ones texting, tweeting

and sharing their status updates on Facebook They are the ones inatuated with

posting seles on Instagram And they are wired dierently

“Why does this matter? It matters because the more they are connected, the more they

are inormed The more they are inormed, the more they are empowered The more

they are empowered, the more they are demanding As they become more demanding,

they expect more personalization, aster responses, the right kinds o inormation and

the right kinds o treatment So everything we’re talking about with technology solutions

– social, mobile and big data – none o it matters i you don’t care about creating

meaningul and shareable experiences or Generation C”

The rst step is a change o mindset – a more human and empathetic approach

Nobody likes to be marketed to or sold to, but people do like to be drawn into an

amazing story We all like to be immersed and carried away to a dierent and moreenticing place Marketers can deliver on that desire when we pay heed to what Solis

calls the human algorithm at the confuence o data science and digital anthropology

The rst point to remember is that Generation C is digital So when we make marketing

decisions rom an analog standpoint, we’re already missing an opportunity to align

with them For example, we want to make websites accessible rom mobile devices,

so we get technology that ports the company website down to a smaller screen

Chances are, the website wasn’t that compelling or useul in the rst place – ew

o them are – but now we’ve ported it to a device or which the interace isn’t even

compatible People do not use smartphones the same way they use desktop or laptop

computers, so why do we think it’s enough to publish the same content on vastly

dierent categories o devices?

Rethinking the Sales Funnel

Businesses today are structured around the proverbial sales unnel, where customers

are seen as progressing rom awareness to decision to action to loyalty In most

organizations, each stage o the sales unnel is handled by a dierent department,

each striving toward dierent metrics tracked by dierent reporting mechanisms –

and getting dierent results

“I call this traditional model a cluster unnel, because it underestimates the customer

and oversimplies the relationship,” said Solis “Instead o awareness, the rst stage

is usually an attempt to convince customers that we’re amazing and we deserve

their money Once the customer is hooked into the unnel, what usually ollows is

a transaction and then distance O course, later we’re re-enchanted, because we

want to cross-sell or up-sell So the customer goes into a governance process, oten

a customer relationship management system that is old and broken Few in the

organization have access to this system, and those who do have access don’t know

what to do with it Not that they could do much, because the system is oten very

limited in its unctionality and held together with duct tape”

How people connect,

communicate, share and

discover is changing. Armed

with new methods o gathering

inormation and interacting

with retailers, consumers are

becoming increasingly inormed,

empowered and demanding.

This is only the beginning o a

much larger movement, and it

is orcing businesses to adapt.

No matter how precise we get

with customer segmentation,

or how smart we get with

predictive algorithms, it won’t

matter, because without

understanding social science

– without aligning with a bigger

mission or vision that matters

to our customers – we are just

using new tools to conduct

business as usual. We are not

moving in any new direction.



6


In his new book, Solis introduces a dierent way o conceptualizing the sales unnel as

a customer journey The rst step is ormulation: awareness and consideration The next

step is pre-commerce, where the customer evaluates options In the third step – the

commerce step – we manage purchase, customer experience and loyalty The ourth

step, post-commerce, is where we have the opportunity to build a bond with that

customer that transcends the sale

“In the center o all this is shared experience,” Solis said “As people are going

through this decision-making and action process, they are either taking away shared

experiences to know what to do next, or they’re contributing shared experiences to

help other people know what to do next

Evaluation

Purchase

3

Commerce

1

Formulation

2

Pre-

Commerce

4

Post-

Commerce

Experience

Loyalty

Bond

Experience Is Everything

Awareness

Consideration

Figure 1: Dynamic customer journeys all overlap each other at dierent moments

o truth.

“This is where social science – digital ethnography – comes into play When you

start to map customer behaviors, you learn what questions customers keep asking

and what networks, channels, apps and communities are important to them This is

important because, unlike traditional word o mouth, what is posted on review sites,

blogs, YouTube videos and social media sites does not disappear It keeps building

and building, growing more infuential, until at some point these shared experiences are

organically louder and more discoverable than anything you can SEO your way around

And that’s a big deal”

The Four Moments of Truth

“I just joined the church o Vitamix blender owners,” Solis said “I love my Vitamix

blender Initially, I couldn’t gure out why the Vitamix blender was so expensive, but not

only did I learn about the value proposition o the blender and why it was so expensive, I

learned how to use it All on YouTube”

Shared experiences are at the

center o the customer journey.

That means it has never been

more important to be sure

that operations are aligned

with marketing so that all the

customer touch points are

delivering a brand experience

that’s consistent with the

intended brand promise.



7


Many people gravitate to YouTube to research purchase decisions Videos are easily

discoverable They have an immediacy that pulls us in There are promotional videos,

tutorial videos, reviews and more – much o it created by company outsiders – real

people like you and me When your customers have this kind o co-marketing power,

the uture o branding comes down to our moments o truth, Solis said:

• The Zero Moment o Truth, a term coined by Google, marks the point when you

become aware o something and search or more inormation, probably via Google

or YouTube Sure, there are other inormation sources – according to Google,

shoppers rely on more than 10 sources o inormation to make a purchase

decision – but Google and its YouTube subsidiary satisy 95 percent o initial

searches in that Zero Moment o Truth

“It’s called a moment o truth or a reason,” said Solis “This initial impression

can make or break the relationship However, most o what happens in the

Zero Moment o Truth is not dened by you When consumers search or your

company, what comes back on YouTube? What comes back on a review site,a blog search or on the thousands o orms that probably exist in your business

or market today? While you’re busy trying to create a positive image through

outbound push marketing, the market might be dening a very dierent Zero

Moment o Truth or you”

• TheFirst Moment o Truth, a term coined by the marketing giant Procter &

Gamble many years ago, is about social discovery It’s the three to seven seconds

when someone notices an item on a store shel Despite spending billions

on traditional advertising, P&G thinks this instant is one o its most important

marketing opportunities – so important that the company created a new position,

Director o First Moment o Truth, and an entire department to ocus attention on

in-store marketing• ThenextlogicalstepistheSecond Moment o Truth, consideration to purchase

Here is where product attributes (perhaps on the back o the package) come into

play or the consumer This is where they are engaged in act-nding

• TheUltimate Moment o Truth is about the experience, particularly what gets

shared People share when a purchase has delighted or disappointed them,

because sharing is cathartic either way, said Solis “But it’s human nature to

share the bad more than the good These shared experiences are critical to your

marketing eorts, because one person’s Ultimate Moment o Truth becomes the

next person’s Zero Moment o Truth And that is integrated marketing”

Developing an Engaged Relationship

Designing around these moments o truth tells you everything Positive conditioning

ocuses on getting people to share the good things more oten, so that they outshout

the negative things The negative things point to your experience divide I text analysis

o online chatter about your brand shows that the most requently used words are

negative – “slow,” “broke,” “ailed,” etc – that can outshout the most compelling

positive words your marketers sprinkle on your website, such as “service,” “community,”

“people,” “innovation” and “support”

Most consumers use both

YouTube and Google when

searching or relevant content.

You probably track Google

metrics, but what does your

YouTube presence say about

your company?



8


I customers see that experience gap, they will be having a reluctant relationship with

the company, a relationship o necessity rather than satisaction and loyalty Who

wants that?

The opposite o a reluctant relationship is an engaged one An engaged customer

perceives and shares an experience that is consistent with the brand promise An

engaged customer is your best ambassador Engaging customers pays o Research

published by the Technology Services Industry Association (TSIA) shows that 70 percent

o people are willing to pay up to 13 percent more or a product they believe will give

them a good experience “I was willing to pay a premium or my MacBook Pro because

I knew I would get a good experience and wouldn’t have to deal with issues,” said Solis

“You do the same thing But unless we can convince our companies that an experience

gap exists – that a part o the process is broken – we won’t get much buy-in or eorts

to x it”

Creating Passion, Not Just Consumerism

When you study the complete user experience, you want to know not only

what captures people’s attention but also what turns on their hearts. What

makes them passionate about your company in the way people are passionate

about Apple or Zappos? What makes them want to share their experiences in

a positive way?

When you approach marketing with those questions in mind, you might see

that the way you create content and share inormation isn’t actually optimized

or what you want people to eel, do and share.

Businesses use a host o customer metrics to try to gauge the success o marketing

eorts: return on investment (ROI), customer sentiment, customer lietime value (CLV),

recency/requency/monetary (RFM), share o wallet (SOW), past customer value

(PCV), etc

One popular metric is net promoter score – the ratio o customers who are promoters

or detractors, usually based on their responses to your surveys For example, “Would

you recommend this product or service?” While net promoter score seems like a useul

measure o consumer propensity, we should be less interested in what customers sel-

report they would do, and more on what they actually did

When you look at conversations across the social and mobile media, you can see

rsthand whether they are recommending you or not That should be your new net

promoter score, because whether you like it or not, the uture o your brand isn’t just

created, it’s co-created There’s what you say, and there’s what they say, and they can

get louder than your most clever and creative marketing

The opposite o a reluctant

relationship is an engaged one.

An engaged customer perceives

and shares an experience that

is consistent with the brand

promise. An engaged customer

is your best ambassador.

Companies should care about

return on experience (ROE)

and shared experience value

(SEV) as metrics – measures

o the value people ascribe totheir experiences, what they

are sharing, and how well those

experiences align with what you

want them to have and share.

“Funny, with all the technology

and inormation to learn about

our customers, we still don’t

seem to get it. There’s B2B,

B2C ... it really is about H2H …

as Brian pointed out ... human

to human.”

Comment on the SAS Customer

Analytics blog



9


Closing Thoughts

The uture o business has always been about creating value – or shareholders and

stakeholders in the enterprise What’s changing is how value is dened, derived

and demonstrated in the context o today’s new generation o consumerism While

technology advances are making customer centricity imperative or the enterprise,

success will not be dened in terms o technology, but in terms o shared experiences

and the outcomes they generate

In our digital world, success will be less about managing multichannel marketing

campaigns and more about designing experiences independent o channel so they

are shared in the right context – because they are worthy o sharing Success will

increasingly be driven not just by how well you shape your customers’ impressions,

but also how well you can infuence their expressions

Marketers have an opportunity to reinvent the way companies relate to customers – touse technology to restore the human element that technology once removed We have

the chance to ocus on meaningul emotional connections instead o just conversions

and transactions It’s essential, because shared experiences are the emerging currency

in a connected economy

“There are no case studies or this, because the whole point is that you will do

something groundbreaking, exceptional and unique to the culture o your company –

something that will dierentiate your company’s customer experience,” said Solis “This

is not about ollowing other companies, it’s about setting the bar or others to ollow”

About the Presenter

Brian Solis

Principal Analyst, Altimeter Group

Brian is a Principal Analyst at Altimeter Group, a research rm ocused on disruptive

technology A digital analyst, sociologist and uturist, Solis has studied and infuenced

the eects o emerging technology on business, marketing and culture Solis is also

globally recognized as one o the most prominent thought leaders and published

authors in new media

His new book, What’s the Future o Business?, explores the landscape o connected

consumerism and how business and customer relationships unold and fourish in our

distinct moments o truth His previous book, The End o Business as Usual , explores

the emergence o Generation C, a new generation o customers and employees and

how businesses must adapt to reach them Beore that, Solis released Engage!, which

is regarded as the industry reerence guide or businesses to market, sell and provide

services in the social Web

“There are no case studies or

this, because the whole point

is that you will do something

groundbreaking, exceptional

and unique to the culture o

your company – something that

will dierentiate your company’s

customer experience. This

is not about ollowing other

companies, it’s about setting

the bar or others to ollow.”

Brian Solis


Key Takeaways

Integrated marketing is more

than being consistent across

technologies It is about creating

a cohesive and satisying customer

experience across the relationship

The uture o your brand isn’t just

created, it’s co-created

Success will increasingly be driven

not just by how well you shape

your customers’ impressions, but

also how well you can infuence

their expressions



10


For More Information

For more about Brian Solis’ book, What’s the Future of Business?:

wtfbusiness.com

Download related SAS white papers:

Vail Resorts Creates Epic Experiences with Customer Intelligence:

go.sas.com/s6a8f4

Leveraging Analytics to Improve the Customer Experience:

go.sas.com/4btpr6

Argyle Conversations: Building a Marketing Analytics Culture:

go.sas.com/4wu42n

For more about SAS® Customer Intelligence solutions:

sas.com/software/customer-intelligence

To read more thought leader views on marketing, visit the SAS Customer

Intelligence Knowledge Exchange: sas.com/knowledge-exchange/customer-

intelligence

To get resh perspectives rom marketing practitioners, read the SAS Customer

Analytics blog: blogs.sas.com/content/customeranalytics

Twitter: @SAS_CI

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11




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Brian Solis: How Experiences Matter to Your Bottom Line by sas