“People will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will remember how you made them feel,” said Maya Angelou. What used to be one of my favourite quotes is something I believe is becoming more and more true and necessary in today’s highly evolving and cluttered world.
Some estimates have put us at being exposed to more than 4,000 pieces of content on a daily basis, from waking up and checking our phones all the way to sitting at dinner and listening to stories, and there is so much we can absorb and remember.
Moreover, in a world of parity, it becomes the latent capacity of a brand to control or influence the behaviour of the beholder by evoking a specific set of thoughts, feelings and emotions. Development has placed many products and services to be at par, pushing customers to go beyond the expected values of quality, functionality and speed of service that have become a given with an ever more demanding customer, and push to explore and discover new experiences.
The pandemic has accelerated an inevitable transformation, and these behavioural changes are here to stay, including high expectations (think accessibility and speed of delivery).
Yet we won’t be living forever behind our screens. People will keep seeking new experiences and the conversation is not about online and offline, but rather about an entire ecosystem that works in harmony that needs to deliver on customer needs.
Brands have to go beyond the idea of selling and look into a business of entertaining, a business where we acknowledge that people want to put in zero effort, and at the same time get the most from the brand.
The idea of simply drawing a line between physical retail and e-commerce presence will not suffice as we keep progressing to a world of everywhere commerce. Consumers need to be able to purchase a product whenever they want and wherever they want; even social media platforms are evolving to accommodate that need and push through the idea of social commerce.
The onus is on brands to define a unified experience and deliver it wherever the customer is, and not to wait for the customer to come to the brand.
The evolution of technology and the introduction of 5G (some telco operators have started talking about 6G) will further empower both sides of the equation: a customer ever more in control and brands capable of delivering new experiences, driven by data and managing the whole user journey.
Yet we need not to stop at simply the idea of implementing technology. From CRM, to AI, AR, VR all the way to facial recognition and voice-activated commands the solutions are abundant; but we need to employ tech advancements at the service of customer experience and look into emotional technology.
Tech used in experiences needs to have the capability to evoke a set of emotions and capitalise on relevancy in communication. Let us not forget that customers are ever more demanding and expect to be treated with that high level of importance. Personalisation in communication will help brands become more relevant and more appealing to potential users. Also, virtual experiences and relevant content will help connect with the audience and make them feel valued.
The target audience is dead, long live the customer. At a time where we are seeking to build that one-on-one rapport between brands and customers, it becomes inevitable that we no longer seek to look at a broad target, but rather use technology to build relevancy through targeted ecosystems and personalisation through individualisation. Every day we are reimagining the way we live, the way we shop and the way we interact. Similarly, brands need to relook into their business models to embrace experience across touchpoints and redefine both strategy and execution. Brands need to elevate from the product they sell to the experience they deliver that customers buy into, and take that experience to the customer.
