Author: sybil

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Engagement Marketing Training & Development

Internal Marketing’s Ultimate Question

I had the privilege again this summer of serving as an Executive Visitor at the Iacocca Institute’s Global Village for Future Leaders of Business & Industry at Lehigh University.  And my topic was (drum roll … ): internal marketing – the importance of taking care of employees so they can take care of customers. Specifically:

  • Why organizations need to be employee-focused and customer-focused
  • What managers need to do to gain employee commitment to organizational goals
  • How managers can strengthen employee-customer relationships.

It’s a delight to share internal marketing with such an energetic & enthusiastic group.  Regardless of where the Global Village interns were from (including Sweden, Austria, Singapore, Canada, South Africa, Puerto Rico, Israel, Korea, Mexico, Russia, Hong Kong, and the U.S., to name a few of their home countries), they quickly grasped the concept of internal marketing.  In each session, someone asked the ultimate question: “If internal marketing is so basic, why don’t more companies do it?”

A simple question with no easy answer

The best explanation I could come up with, given our limited time together, was to remind them that internal marketing is really an issue of leadership & values … evident in organizations who truly care about both their customers AND the employees who take care of them.

Yes, unfortunately, there are companies out there who only give “lip service” to valuing their employees (as mentioned in numerous posts throughout my blog).  And there are managers who feel they don’t need internal marketing – the ones who presume “I wouldn’t be where I am today if I wasn’t doing something right!”  (Hmm, I wonder what their staff and customer turnover is like?)

What I learned the hard way

So I shared what I learned a long time ago in my business.  The companies who need me the most are not the ones who hire me because they’re clueless when it comes to internal marketing.  While the challenge they present might entice some consultants, I no longer waste the time & energy to sell them on the concept when they just don’t get it.

I’d rather focus my time on helping my clients – those who recognize internal marketing’s value and are committed to doing something about it, as well as those already doing internal marketing who want to do it even better.  In other words, I don’t have to sell them on internal marketing because they already get it.  It’s why I love working with them.

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Engagement Marketing

Got History? Part 3

To wrap up this series of posts, here are some ways you can plan & leverage your organization’s anniversary celebration, according to Phyllis Barr, founder of New York-based Corporate Culture Marketing by Barr Consulting Services.

Why Celebrate?

Start with why you should consider celebrating.  Phyllis suggests the following as sample objectives :

  • To enhance corporate or product identity
  • Rejuvenate an aging brand
  • Educate staff and stakeholders (including customers, investors, local community and/or the public-at-large)
  • Reinforce the corporate culture
  • Enhance donor awareness & fund raising efforts (for nonprofits).

How Should You Celebrate?

Consider how long you intend to celebrate:

  • on the day of the anniversary itself?
  • a week- or month-long commemoration?
  • throughout the year?

Then consider how you’ll celebrate; for example:

  • Special events – such as hosting an open house, customer and/or staff appreciation activities, etc.
  • Exhibit highlighting your organization’s history & memorabilia – can be off-line and/or on-line; for example, set up a traveling exhibit at schools, malls, trade shows, etc. (whatever is appropriate for your organization)
  • History documented in a special book, newsletter, and/or DVD
  • Special promotions and/or giveaways
  • Sponsorships – another great idea for nonprofits: link up with a local business that’s been in business for the same length of time to develop a joint celebration.

Phyllis laments that too many corporate histories tend to be “cut & dried” & put together in dull fashion, but they need not be that way.  You can be creative as your imagination & budget allow.

Also, you don’t have to do it alone – include oral history interviews with staff and customers.  (What a great way to recognize the folks who’ve been with you the longest!)  You can also solicit old photos and artifacts related to your organization.

Whatever you do to celebrate your organization’s history, make it meaningful and make it fun!

Categories
Engagement Marketing

Got History? Part 2

My last post introduced the concept of corporate & nonprofit anniversaries as a marketing tool.  Here are some actual examples of how organizations have celebrated their anniversaries, shared by “Corporate Memory Marketing” expert Phyllis Barr.

  • To celebrate its 150th anniversary, a popular magazine co-sponsored a special exhibit with one of its long-time advertisers.  The exhibit opened in the city where the magazine was headquartered (also one of the advertiser’s locations) and then toured the country.  The magazine also compiled a brief history handout for distribution.
  • A specialty toy company organized its archives and included oral history interviews with its executives and key staff.  They also shared historical notes on their phone system’s on-hold message.
  • In honor of its 285th anniversary, a church created its own museum with special exhibits tied-in with the history of the surrounding community; created a special lecture series; sponsored a historic pageant as part of its celebration; conducted historical walking tours; and published a book of its history (dating back to the American Revolution!).  Not only did these efforts result in increased awareness & media attention for the church, but its historic research was also used in the church’s building restoration.

Besides garnering great press and public exposure, all these organizations used their anniversaries to recognize staff contributions to their longevity & success … a great way to stimulate and reinforce employee pride.

Stay tuned for my next post which will feature tips from Phyllis on how to leverage your corporate or nonprofit anniversary celebration.

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Engagement Marketing

Got History to Celebrate? They’re Not Just for Holidays!

Happy July 4th!

How does this holiday tie-in with internal marketing?  Glad you asked!

Independence Day is a festive holiday honoring a historic anniversary. But this type of anniversary need not be limited to a national celebration.

Phyllis Barr, founder of Corporate Culture Marketing by Barr Consulting Services in New York [ladyhistory@earthlink.net], specializes in “corporate memory marketing.” She helps organizations document their corporate history and leverage anniversary celebrations as a marketing tool – good for public/community relations, brand reinforcement, nonprofit fund raising, employee/stakeholder relations, etc.

So a company’s heritage can be used for internal as well as external marketing purposes.  According to Phyllis, this history “makes up the corporate culture and affects how an organization and its brands are viewed.”

Corporate history needs to be shared – through staff training materials, orientation, on the intranet, etc. – to “make employees better and more knowledgeable” and reinforce pride in their affiliation with their employer.  In her work as a writer, researcher, historian, and marketer, Phyllis has found that sharing a company’s history adds to employee loyalty. And a company able to highlight its reputation through its history also has a great recruiting tool.

In my next post I’ll share some examples of how organizations have marked their anniversaries in meaningful ways.  In the meantime, enjoy this holiday weekend!

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Marketing

Customer Value Challenge

In my recent post about companies that go after new customers at the possible expense of existing customers, mc (aka Michelangelo Celli of the Cornucopia Group) responded with a comment about maximizing customer value.

It’s a critical concept for any organization, and one that I’ll admit is not always easy to measure.  While some companies have been able to determine their customers’ lifetime value, my guess is more companies are wrestling with how to measure it than actually measuring it.

Considering all the variables involved, quantifying customer value may not be easy (depending on your industry), but don’t let that stop you.  There are some good sources of help out there.

One of them is Driving Customer Equity by Roland Rust, Val Zeithaml & Katherine Lemon.  This book explores the critical “drivers” of customer equity & their metrics: value equity, brand equity, and retention equity.

And in the current issue of Fast Company, Don Peppers & Martha Rogers offer a general formula for their new concept (and book) Return on Customer.

Like I said, measuring customer lifetime value may not be easy, but it is necessary.

Categories
Customer service Marketing

Customer Discrimination is Risky Business

A recent posting on Adrants featured a bank promotion that’s getting some bad press in the blogosphere.  It’s one of those promotions that offers a great premium to (attract) new customers, while offering ‘bupkis’ to existing customers.  A great lesson in How to Alienate Current Customers 101.

It’s a business development dilemma for most companies — how to recruit new customers and not alienate current customers in the process.   The challenge is current customers are likely to notice ads from companies they deal with, and when they see a promotion for new customers, they’re likely to ask the company “So what have you done for me lately?”

Delivering customer value on an ongoing basis is key.  The smart companies are driven to continually ask: “How do our loyal customers know we value their relationship?” and they focus on delivering that value.

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Engagement Marketing

Internal Marketing’s Voice – What Are You Saying? (Continued)

As a follow up to my last post, I wanted to address the question: how do you project a positive voice to the customer?

Before I get into the answer, let’s start with why it’s important to have a positive voice. Whether you’re communicating through a company blog, corporate newsletter, or face-to-face time with employees, customers can tell the tone of your company’s “voice.”

Customers (like employees) have this incredible, innate sense to cut through the customer-focus BS/rhetoric* to know whether or not you genuinely care about them. *Please note: it’s only BS/rhetoric if it’s lip-service and not a true part of your organization’s culture.  And therein lies the secret.

A company that values both its customers AND the employees who serve them creates a transparent culture. How employees are treated translates into the way customers are treated … and this sends a strong message about your organization.

So projecting a positive voice stems from internal marketing and comes from within – from leaders who are truly customer- and employee-focused.

What message is your organization sending?

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Customer service Engagement Marketing

Internal Marketing’s Voice – What Are You Saying?

An essential element of internal marketing involves connecting employees with customers – finding ways to reach out to your customers and proactively listen to them. Employees need to hear the “voice of the customer” to gain insight into customer needs and how they can be better served.

In addition, employees also need to provide the “voice to the customer” … a term I found recently in an interview with my friend & diva marketer Toby Bloomberg.  Toby talks about companies who use multi-author blogs to give customers “a broader look at the voices inside the company.”

What a great reminder that the voice of the employees in an organization is also important! The stronger the rapport between employees and customers, the stronger the relationship between the customers and the organization/brand.

Assuming that the voice to the customer is a positive one. (To be continued … )

Categories
Engagement Marketing

Happy Employees & Organizational Success

My last posting looked at the relationship between happy employees and happy customers.  Taking this one step further, do happy employees ensure organizational success?

My answer: it depends.  It depends on a lot of things – such as the utility and value of your firm’s product/service offering, market demand, and competition (to name a few).

If your organization provides a product or service that doesn’t meet market needs and/or has little real or perceived value, or if your competitors are doing a way better job, you won’t be in business long no matter how happy your employees are.  And you won’t have satisfied customers either.

The answer also depends on your business model.  The marketplace can change rapidly, putting pressure even on those firms with happy employees & customers.  Conversely, some companies with a toxic workplace or culture do well in spite of themselves (sad, but true).

Let’s get real … sometimes bad things happen to good organizations. and sometimes good things happen to bad organizations.  But which type of organization would you rather work for?

Categories
Customer service Engagement Marketing

Happy Employees, Happy Customers

“Happiness in the workplace is a strategic advantage.”

So says Hal Rosenbluth in his book, The Customer Comes Second (2nd edition).  He explains: “Service comes from the heart, and people who feel cared for will care more. Unhappiness results in error, turnover, and other evils.”

I agree with him 1000% … it’s what internal marketing is all about.

Beyond the inherent logic linking employee and customer satisfaction, there’s a lot of research that supports a positive, mutually reinforcing relationship between employees and customers.  (Check out The Service Profit Chain in addition to Rosenbluth’s book.)

But do happy employees = happy customers? (It’s a question I’m often asked in my internal marketing seminars.)

It’s an oversimplification to be sure … but you can’t have one without the other.  Remember, if your employees don’t feel valued, neither will your customers!