VIDEO: Focus On The Customer As A Person (Alexander Genov) (5)
VIDEO: Focus On The Customer As A Person (Alexander Genov)
This is a summary of the presentation Alexander Genov had during the first EcomWorld Online Conference.
>> You can download the slides in full resolution here <<
Alexander Genov is leading Customer Research for the Zappos Family of Companies and in this presentation, he shares how a “Customer Centric Culture” can create brand loyalty and increase the sales and revenue for any eCommerce brand, big or small.
Alexander emphasizes one thing several times in his presentations: Customers are people, not just numbers!
By understanding your customers, their needs, values, family situation, status and buying intent you can serve them better, offer the products they want to buy and make them loyal to your brand.
STEP1: It all starts with the creation of a company CULTURE that makes your customers HEROES.
In order to achieve this, they have defined 10 core values over at Zappos that every employee should keep in mind.
STEP2: CURIOSITY comes next. They basically seek complete understanding of their customers as people.
If that means visiting some of their customers in person, they will do just that!
STEP3: STRUCTURE! Zappos says not to SILOS, they put focus on self organization and employ a circle based structure that's built around customer needs.
There are no titles, there’s a place for natural leadership, and a more entrepreneurial spirit.
This helps them to understand customers better, since the team is in direct contact with them and that’s something a standard silo structure couldn’t provide.
STEP4: STRATEGY! Once you have all the information about your customers and you understand who they are as human beings, it’s time to form a strategy that actually works with this information.
Main takeaway from this step: DON’T TREAT ALL CUSTOMERS THE SAME!
An active family has different priorities and shopping habits from a single guy, for example.
hey respond to different sales tactics, they buy different goods, they prioritize different things.
For example, based on a research Zappos have conducted, active families care about discounts MUCH less than a single guy.
And what do you do with this info? You can structure your ad campaigns in a different way, based on who you target.
Your eCom store can work with multiple layouts to match the needs of a specific customer, you can offer different products to particular customer groups…
To put it simply, you can customize the shopping experience to match the persona of your customers, based on what you know about them as humans. This way, your business will soar!
Now let me paste all the slides from Alexander’s presentation, all the important information is in there. You can also download the PDF that has higher resolution images for easy reading.
This is a VERY good presentation!
I've had more than a couple of conversations recently with people that are wanting to start a business online - either in ecom or becoming service providers. And the biggest piece of advice I always have is to put customers first.
It isn't JUST about providing good customer service. It's about setting up the entire business around the customer - and promoting it with the customer's needs and wants in mind.
This is also super-relevant to affiliate marketers. All too often we only focus on ripping and running (pop and push), and optimizing based on stats alone. And this is fine in the beginning.
But sooner or later, innovation is necessary, and you just can't innovate without knowing your audience (even if it's a broad audience like in pop/push).
No matter what it is we promote online, audience research is crucial. Research and test to find out what words and phrases can trigger desired actions from our audience, and we have a business.
Amy
Originally Posted by vortex
I've seen MANY speeches where the presenters emphasized how important it is to keep customers in mind all the time, especially these days where price comparison portals make it so easy to compare prices from various sellers.
The businesses have to provide something extra in order to win the customers and many are already doing this.
But still, the guys at Zappos are taking this to a whole new level. Not sure if you have checked all the slides, but let me repost again one that shows how much they actually listed to their customers and try to make them happy:
Not sure how often they do something like this, but it's just amazing, isn't it?
Impressive indeed! Not to mention heart-warming!
A lot of people forget the fact that everyone and everything is fundamentally just energy. E=mc^2
And in the world of energy, you get what you put out.
A little compassion and care goes a LONG way.
Not to mention that in this day and age, word travels at the speed of light.
It used to be that big brands and corporations had all the power. But with the internet and the smartphone, the tides have turned. In extreme cases, a single bad review that goes viral can have the power to destroy a small business, or affect stock prices for a large corporation.
Which means that customer service is no longer just an option.
Amy
Sent from my iPhone using STM Forums
I've just posted the actual video replay of the presentation, you can see it at the very beginning of the opening post.
These videos have been provided by the iStack Conferences team as a special bonus to our members.
We will be posting MANY more in the coming days and weeks
Enjoy!
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