Innovations in Social Marketing Conference – Day 1

Having spent two days at the Innovations in Social Marketing Conference (with a half-day to go), I thought I would offer some of the main highlights and insights so far. There has been so much content that I will need to break this into at least a couple of posts. The theme of the conference is “It’s all about the customer,” and the organizers have brought in experts from the commercial marketing world to share how they maintain a customer-centric focus.

On Sunday afternoon after some introductory context, we heard from Robert Spector, who has written several books on customer service, offering lessons from Nordstrom, Starbucks and Amazon.com. His key points were:

• Create an inviting place in person, online and on the phone. (“Create a customer-centered experience” – all three of those brands do a great job of this.)
• Sell the relationship: service your clients through the services you offer. (“When you are dealing with other human beings, you are in the relationship business… Make them feel like ‘they understand me and what I want.'”)
• Hire nice, motivated people. (“Hire the smile, train the skill.”)
• Sustain those people through support, mentorship, recognition and praise. (“Never miss an opportunity to say ‘thank you.'”)
• Advocate teamwork through internal customer service.

His main point is that we need to not just offer a product, but to create an experience for the customer. We do this through all the touchpoints at which we reach people with our brand. For social marketers, this will generally start with a website, because we usually do not have actual personal contact with the audience. Use multiple channels, make it look and feel consistent in every medium.

On the same panel was Becky Ryan, who is director of marketing for Bel Brands USA (the company that makes Laughing Cow cheese). She focused on how they use research to get to know their target audience and thereby create a relationship with them. Bel has used Porter Novelli’s Healthstyles database to learn more about their core consumer — personified as “Diana,” an upscale mom who cares about her health and successfully manages her weight — a segment that comprises 4% of US households. Using the database, they learned more about her “passions,” manifested in four quarterly advertising themes: gardening, outdoor concerts, winter fun (mainly skiing), and holiday entertaining. They also found that TV was one of the worst media to use to reach her, and so focused on magazines, coupon inserts (because she considers herself a smart shopper), and the internet. The message revolved around the slogan “indulgence has a lighter side,” highlighting the great taste, low calorie count, and portion controlled wedges. It didn’t hurt that the product was also featured in the South Beach Diet book.

After these presentations, we were divided into groups to discuss what we could take from these ideas and apply to our own social marketing programs. While none of these concepts were really new — or at least shouldn’t be to people who have been doing marketing (social or otherwise) — it was good to be reminded of these core concepts and to struggle again with how to translate ideas designed for tangible products to our more challenging health and social issues. While I didn’t note who said what, some of the ideas/questions/key points that resonated with me included:

• How can we create a “third place” (ie, not home or work) where people will want to spend time?
• “The marketer knows the customer the best.” That’s our job. We have to know them inside and out so that we can be the advocate for the customer.
• “Market share is trust materialized.” How can we foster that trust?
• Relationships take time to develop, and we need to be patient to let that happen. Relationships can’t be bought, but must be earned.
• Personifying the target audience can be useful in understanding and applying data.
• “You need to be ready for your luck” and be flexible enough to change your strategy as opportunities present themselves.
• Could we in social marketing get away with only targeting 4% of the population? It would take demonstrating that addressing the tiny segment would make a big difference in the problem.
• Passions/emotion/lifestyle are all key to engaging people.
• How do we sell experiences and not just behavior change? When do we stop being “a health program” and start being part of people’s lives?

In the evening, our dinner speaker was Max Schorr, the twentysomething publisher and founding editor of GOOD Magazine. After a day of listening to and interacting with carefully polished professionals, Max was a breath of fresh air with his unbridled youthful enthusiasm for making a difference in the world. With his handmade Venn diagrams illustrating his desire to be at the intersection between idealism and pragmatism, and between power and humility (among several others I can’t remember right now), he reminded us of the reason we got into this profession in the first place (though, according to him, part of it just comes from the desire to get laid attract girls). I’ve been a subscriber to GOOD since I saw the first issue (the fourth just came out), and it’s worth subscribing to for its production values alone. It’s a gorgeous publication. Add to that the fact that 100% of your $20 subscription fee goes to one of 12 charities you can choose from, and you can’t go wrong.

Next post will talk about Day 2 of the conference.

Photo Credit: wiseacre photo