Does Marketing Ever Hear Customer Service Horror Stories?

I have written extensively on customer service in my monthly column in the Winnipeg Free Press. I have cited examples of:

• poor product design and odd customer communications I received from the company;
• horrible customer communications and apathetic staff;
• confusing links between the web and in store product selection;
• a wide range of industries; and,
• and still have so many more if needed.

I never mention the name of the company because I don’t want to embarrass them. I make an exception if it is a big international company that deserves the hit.

And when I write about fantastic experiences, I always mention the company name so readers will know who does good work.

As I was pondering a few recent lousy customer experiences, I considered the flow of information and sharing of information within a mid to larger company. I am a marketing purist and believe that it is marketing (real marketing, the 4P’s, and not just comms or digital) that should lead a customer centric strategy in every organization. However, recent personal experiences lead me to believe that:

• marketing does not hear the horror stories
• marketing doesn’t care about the horror stories
• marketing doesn’t know how to lead the solutioning to fix the horror stories
• marketing is not capable of assisting in any way, let alone lead the solutioning
• marketing does not have the internal credibility to lead the customer centric charge

Well, there is enough in those five bullets for a series of articles (note to self).

Let’s focus on the first one for today – marketing does not hear the horror stories.

Why does marketing need to hear about these? Because someone who has responsibility for product, comms, and strategy needs to lead the customer focus of the company. Marketing should be the best area to take hold of the situation and find the solution. Marketing is the keeper of all customer knowledge, or at least they should be, and this reinforces my point.

There is no other department that has such a wide ranging responsibility and the tools necessary to know the customer the best. Marketing leads the customer research, support for sales (and in return obtains key customer insights), and external communications. And, most importantly, marketing must share this across the company.

Flaws in my solution include, but are not limited to, the following:

• marketing not seen as the best department for this;
• marketing not capable of leading the customer centric charge;
• marketing not holding all the customer insights as collected from all touch points; and,
• marketing does not want to – NMDS (not my department syndrome).

Marketing does not have a direct investment like the sales team or the call center. Marketing can be the objective guide on the customer centric journey. Marketing should be the most knowledgeable about everything customer so that they can condense and share the important points to guide the focused customer first mindset in all other departments.

And knowing the horror stories should trigger marketing into action to find out if the situation was a one-off or a symptom of something broader or deeper. Coordinating the internal cross-departmental response team (departmental participation only as necessary) is the leadership role for marketing.

Take control or be controlled, that is the question for marketers.

Proactive wins.

To your success!

ChatGPT – Marketing Nirvana or Lazy Marketing?

The hottest topic on LinkedIn and on various marketing sites is the ChatGPT situation. I specifically use the word “situation” because this tool is being both lauded and vilified in equal amounts.

But I am not going to jump on that bandwagon. My focus today is the way that marketers use tools.

Far too often we (marketers) fall into the “latest and greatest” or “pure shiny object” trap. Remember Pokémon Go??? Remember the death of TV and radio?

The entire world is digital so being a digital marketing specialist is not so impressive anymore. While people need to know how to use a tool in a practical sense, there is far too much left incomplete on the input side of these tools.

Specifically, with ChatGPT, all of the marketing output I have seen is pretty generic. This is GIGO – garbage in, garbage out. If you read any blogs by the best ad creatives today one of the biggest laments is the creation of lousy briefs.

So, there are lousy briefs given to the new kid on the block. And if the new shiny kid is choosing from a sea of sameness in the digital realm, why are people expecting something new and brilliant to occur?

From those concerned with the quality of the output, the posts I have read indicate the output is just too generic to be effective marketing material. If every marketer put in the same brief, wouldn’t every ad or article come out the same?

And why would you want a generic marketing strategy? Which, btw, seems to be the output one gets from generic inputs.

Bill Bernbach often said that the focus of good advertising should be the study of “simple, timeless, human truths.” How can ChatGPT see what humans are actually doing when they interact with your product or service? Well, it can’t. Only humans can watch and study humans.

Granted, the study of human behaviour may enhance the brief for ChatGPT, but if you can see and hear and feel and sense the world around you why do you want to give to a machine learning tool?

We should be looking for more human interaction and understanding, not defaulting to generic ideas. Be intentional with people and your interactions with them.

Have you read the comments from Nick Cave about the use of ChatGPT to write songs in his style? Is response was “this song sucks.” Here is the link to the Guardian article https://www.theguardian.com/music/2023/jan/17/this-song-sucks-nick-cave-responds-to-chatgpt-song-written-in-style-of-nick-cave

I loved his comment where he called ChatGPT an exercise in “replication as travesty.”

Here’s the funny part – I had no idea who Nick Cave is! So, I checked out his bio and his work. I applaud his response and views.

The other areas of interest for me were the other uses of the tool. I have seen people talk about poetry, stories, students writing papers, and recipes, among other topics. Cool, but Google searches also turn up unique recipes that are also good and I get to see who posts the recipes. As for poetry and stories, the classics are the foundation and replication in a generic way will never be better than the original. As an instructor at university, I am really worried that students will use the tool to get the work done by AI rather than their own IQ. And yes, there are ways to structure assessments so ChatGPT usage can be uncovered or rendered useless…at this time.

The final straw for me is that this seems like marketers looking for an effortless way to do the demanding work. Look, I am all for efficiency, but not at the cost of effectiveness.

Effective marketing is challenging work.

Proper diagnosis of your situation – internal and external factors and capabilities.

Clear strategy – where are you going to play to win and what will it take for this to become real? What is the coherent action required to resolve a problem or take advantage of an opportunity?

Effective tactics…and tracking – only when you have done the first two steps can you develop your tactics. And remember that advertising is only a small part of the 4P’s of marketing.

Marketers, for the sake of your career, why spend time trying to game the system when you could put that same effort into improving your customer insights?

Do the reps!!! Study people and think about differentiation. Please don’t default to this new shiny object.

And as always – if you have a unique perspective please share. My luddite brain might be missing something spectacular.

I leave you with the wise words and views of Scott Adams.

Miracle on 34th Street – a marketing story

My favourite Christmas movie is Miracle on 34^th Street. The original with Edmund Gwenn, Maureen O’Hara and Natalie Wood, amongst others.

I am not including the cartoon classics of Charlie Brown and Rudolph in this assessment.

Why do I like this movie?

The wonderful story and the acting of Gwenn that makes Kris Kringle come to life. I also enjoy the approach to delivering the Santa Claus mail to the courtroom to validate Kris Kringle in his trial.

What a terrific story!

And yet there is so much more that relates to marketing.

Let’s go through the 4P’s:

• Product – Santa Claus was the product for the Macy’s parade and also in the store. Macy’s became the product when they developed the comparison list of all main products to show if Macy’s had it or if a competitor like Gimbels carried the item.
• Place – the Macy’s store was a centerpiece of the movie and the various offices, lunch room, and Santa Claus location were essential to the story.
• Price – I wasn’t around in the 40’s so I don’t know how accurate the pricing is. But the story referred to costs and profit resulting from sales of products.
• Promotion – From the advertising of the Thanksgiving parade to the advertising of Santa Claus in Macy’s, the messaging was very important. And two main competitors with a healthy respect for each other.

Now, these are the literal descriptions. And I believe there is much more.

• Product – the essence of the story is the determination of the existence of Santa Claus.
• Place – from the store to the apartments where key characters lived to the final scene in the house that young Susan saw as her dream home where a cane that matches Kris Kringle’s was found inside the house. How did it get there???
• Price – the comparison document of products also had prices that were from the other stores. Wow, ability to compare prices and stores well before the worldwide web…
• Promotion – how many stores today would recommend sending a customer to another store because you don’t carry the item? Heck, many staff from different stores just point you to an aisle, or two, instead of taking you there and ensuring that you can actually find the product!

The bottom line is that this is a most enjoyable movie and the build up to the courtroom scene never gets old. No wonder Edmund Gwenn won an academy award for best supporting actor and the movie also won for best writing – screenplay and best writing – original story.

Watch the movie and see if you can find gems that you can apply in your business. What is something magical, different, or unique that can set you apart from your competitors?

I know you can find something if you just look hard enough and if you truly believe. Yes, truly believe in yourself just like Kris Kringle. That’s when the magic happens for your customers and your staff.

Onward!