I purchased a coupon late last year – $45 for a $125 value from photo company X. Coupon expired before I could use it. I sighed and let it go. Until, I woke up one morning and saw that they were running the exact same deal.  I reached out to the company explaining my situation and asking for them to honor my expired Groupon.  I got an auto-reply with one custom sentence that said, “You can still use your Groupon for its cash value.” 

Besides the fact that I already knew that (and had stated such in my note), I was completely baffled. I didn’t see the harm in them honoring an expired coupon on a deal that they were running anyway.  If they weren’t running the same deal, I would understand and accept the loss with grace.  But, it was beyond me that they wanted me to purchase the same exact coupon again to get the same deal.

When I replied with, “I would rather lose my $45 than pay an additional $85 for this item.”  They replied with – Contact Groupon for a refund.  So, I did. Groupon had refunded it within 24 hours.

Who do you think I will use again?

If the objective of running Groupon deals is to gain new customers, why turn off even one by rejecting to honor a deal you are re-offering?  It’s not enough to say – these are our policies.  The world has become a smaller, more intimate place and we have to start implementing customer service policies that honor our marketing objectives.  It doesn’t matter if we bring the customers in only to bleed them out again.

Which bring us to a larger question – should marketing have input into our customer service policies?  If they do, should they be measured against the long-term retention of customers as well as the initial acquisition?  After all, a Groupon coupon that brings in a ton of customers is a marketing success. But, if marketing isn’t held accountable for the number of customers that are kept as well, then they have no motivation to close the loop of the customer experience and take care of the post-sale service level.  And, that post-sale experience, is what makes all the difference between one-time and all-time customer.

Last week, I had the pleasure of walking the Summer Food Show with a client.  This show is huge – three floors, thousands of vendors ranging from small mom & pop shops to large distributors of gourmet foods. Usually, I am on the other side of the equation of these shows – putting up booths, training sales people to deal with show traffic and generally putting a company’s best face forward. Do enough of these and you forget why you organize matters the way you do.

But, there were booths there to remind me. I won’t go over the obvious – stay attentive, smile, extend yourself to attendees. Instead, I want to focus on the little things because that is what separates you from the herd.

1. On a tradeshow floor, no conversation is private. Leave the company talk for dinner or an off-site lunch.  If you are trying to attract customers, you shouldn’t be sitting in your booth booming, “I want to know who’s looking at the books.”  Yes, this really happened. Needless to say, my client and I, who had tentatively walked into the booth, walked right out.

2. Don’t ignore an attendee because they don’t look like a good lead.  I will never forget an automotive test and measurement company that wouldn’t give the time of a day to a female attendee in of their booths. Turns out she was the head of testing for a major automotive manufacturer that was on their dream client list.   This happened again at the food show. After sampling some exquisite balsamic vinegar at one booth, I pulled my client back from further down the aisle. She loved the vinegar but not the three people who were chatting and ignoring her.  Still, she asked for her badge to be scanned. One of the exhibitors handed her a business card, a brochure and the polite brush-off of “Call us”.  Yes, their card ended up in the garbage can.

3. Be careful of paraphernalia in your booth.  An exhibitor sipping a seemingly innocuous Starbucks coffee may not seem like much.  Until you realize they are trying to sell “the best-imported coffee in the world”.

In the midst of a tradeshow, these little details often escape exhibitor notice. But, they matter. Take the one exhibitor who, while we casually passed by, invited us into his booth.  Then, he allowed us to sample his product extensively and talked about it with eloquence and passion. He is getting a definite call back and, most probably, a business deal.   Are you?

Which raises the question – what’s changed?

And my answer is – not much.

Look, we can all gush about how great social media is and the democratization of consumer purchases.  We can wax poetic about how it’s different this time and how we need to change the way we do things to accommodate this new wave of technology.

But, it’s not different. Not in the essentials anyway.

Now, I’ve been in marketing long enough that I remember faxing press releases.  So, maybe not pre-historic but I’ve got some time under my belt. And I can tell you that marketers have always told stories, shaped perspectives and engaged audiences. The way we do might be different but what we’re doing remains the same.

In the midst of all this storytelling, we have to ask ourselves a simple question: Are we delivering value?

And by value, I mean revenue.

You can have the most viral video in the word, a tweet that puts Shakespeare to shame and a Facebook page that sucks in likes faster than a vortex but, if you’re not delivering revenue, you’re not doing your job. The tools we use today are simplistic. Anyone can set-up a Facebook page, Twitter account or an email list of press contacts.  The question is – can that person then use tools to drive business?  Can they influence internal decisions to fit the company’s chosen narrative when the economy is falling apart?  Can they build a relationship with the sales department to maximize marketing dollars?

And that person, my friends, is not a story-teller or a communicator.  That person is a marketer.

Is anybody listening?

Obama is suffering from what I term as “a great tweet does not a product fix” syndrome. Cairo 1.0 was enticingly seductive. A young, charismatic president promised an Arab world desperate for change that, this time, things would be different.  They loved him, even related to him.  Whether they believed him or not was unclear but they were willing to give him a chance.

Since then, both Obama and the Arab world have grown up a little. Obama’s gotten a little more realistic and the Arab world’s taken charge of their own affairs with mixed results. So, tomorrow, he will face a very different audience than he did before. Not only have they realized that they may not need him but they trust him even less than before.

So, what can Obama say this time?

Like any company that has failed a constituent’s trust, the best path is to tell the truth with speed and clarity. Then, follow through.  Obama has to be willing to clearly outline what America’s position on issues are. You can’t espouse freedom and support repressive regimes.  You can’t promise to move forward on the Israeli-Palestinian and be unable to bring the parties to the table.

If Obama wants a do-over, he set realistic expectations. After that, he can go about exceeding them.

Well, sort of.  The honest truth is that on a feature-by-feature basis the iPhone does not outstrip many other phones. When you factor in cost, then the iPhone starts to look like a questionable purchasing decision. (Full disclosure: I am a repeat Apple customer and am on 3^rd iPhone.)

Several friends of mine are completely baffled by the iPhone fascination. (Yes, they are engineers and some of them are in the mobile business.)  To them, the equation is simple – same or better features, lower costs = easy decision.  Also, they always complain about how the iPhone “limits your choices” and doesn’t make everything customizable.

I call this engitalk or techno-speak because it’s a logic that doesn’t take into account the emotional part of the consumer experience. (And, yes, even if you are business to business company, purchasing decisions are still emotional. Ever heard the saying – Nobody ever got fired for buying IBM?)

So, why does the iPhone continue to be iconic?  Whenever I ask this question, the answer is always – its design! It’s so sleek, so smooth!  Everything is so intuitive. Well, yes, but that’s only part of the answer.

The more expansive answer is much more subtle and nuanced. The truth is Apple deeply understands what its customers VALUE, and puts the emphasis on that rather than what cool features they could offer.  Working with tech companies, I see engineers fall into this trap all the time. They just can’t understand why the new, shiny product they’ve created with its bazillion features isn’t selling.

The secret to the iPhone is:

1. They’ve limited the choices you can make.  This seems counter-intuitive. But, statistically, people are happier when they have more limited options. It’s less confusing and overwhelming. Apple understands that, not only do I not want to make the choice about what button should activate what program, but that I am not qualified to optimize my own experience. I just want to pick it up and have it work.
2. They handle the entire customer experience.  Last week, I broke my iPhone for the 3^rdtime. (Yes, I can be a bit of a clutz.)  Let’s say I had purchased another smartphone. What would have happened? A semi-qualified telecom agent would want me to renew my contract for the fifth time to get a discounted phone. Oh and it would take two days. With my iPhone, I scheduled an appointment with the Genius bar online, handed over my phone and was given a new phone in ten minutes. It took longer to restore it than replace it.
3. They control what’s on their phone.  In the age of open-source everything, this is a difficult call to make. You want to encourage innovation but, at the same time, open source doesn’t always produce the best results, at least not quickly.  So, yes, you can develop an app for the iPhone but you have to use their standards. This irritates developers to no end but, for me, I am thankful.  Part of the reason I pay a premium is because I want the better experience without having to worry about it.

In short, Apple is customer-driven not feature-driven.  They know that their customers value their experience and convenience over snazzy, new features. That’s what makes them #1 when, maybe just maybe, they shouldn’t be.

Sound familiar? It should.  Toyota recalled millions of cars and lost billions of dollars when several of its vehicles mysteriously accelerated, risking the drivers at the helm. An independent and official report released by NASA (National Aeronautics and Space Administration) and NHTSA (National Highway Traffic Safety Administration) eventually cleared the company of any electronic flaws.

During that time, Toyota’s PR team dealt with the crisis admirably, releasing information promptly, using their website and social media to keep the public and their customers updated about the recalls.  They deftly painted a better picture of Toyota by cleverly keeping positive information in the company’s press releases, advertising, YouTube channel and other social media outlets.  (Don’t believe me?  Compare Toyota’s and Motrin’s press releases during their respective recalls.)

But, the service agent’s comment brings to the forefront just how integrated Toyota’s marketing efforts are.  Your processes have to back up your own marketing efforts. If you sell service and your employees answer the phone with, “What do you want?” instead of “How can I help you?”, marketing can’t fix that.  Toyota has said from the beginning that their customer’s safety is top priority. They’ve developed videos about it. Now, their dealers (who are not even directly owned by Toyota) are ready to take the somewhat intrusive step of pulling mats out of cars to protect their customers.

In short, it all lines up.

So, the next time you advertise your business, make sure you’ve put thought into how you are going to deliver what you process. All the advertising and social media in the world can’t fix a broken process.

But, there was a common thread through it all – It’s the age of “your”.  Small businesses are finding profitable margins in customization. Whether it’s earphones by Custom Buds or “your corner of the Internet” brought to you by Viaclix, companies are focused on making your experience personal, even intimate.   A consumer’s value isn’t limited by what they are willing to purchase but on how willing they are to pay a premium for a custom experience.

And how willing they are to tell your friends about it. While most businesses are still trying to figure out how to get a customer to like their page, companies like GaggleAmp and Ripple Function are already a step beyond that. They want your customers’ friends to like your page too.

Which brings back the age-old question – what is a customer worth?  Are we that far away from a time where a customer’s social media presence becomes an intrinsic part of their value?  Will it one day determine the service a consumer gets at a hotel, airline or even a bank?

As a consumer’s market power and influence grows, so will efforts to keep every customer happy. And business will have to start asking themselves – how much is a tweet from that particular customer really worth?

Of course, tracking and quantifying that data is difficult at best and impossible for most small businesses.  So, where does the answer lie?

It’s the same as always – make every customer experience the best it can be. Treat others as you would like to be treated.  And, then, let the tweets roll.