Brand Loyalty...

Wait'll next year...

I'm a Cubs fan. I'm not a diehard follower of every game. I don't get to watch much baseball. But of the two teams here in town, I've always favored the Cubbies. And we've chanted every year the same phrase: "Wait'll next year!" and remain loyal despite a non-World Series record older than I am.

Why?

I don't know. I don't think most Cub fans know. The team always chokes in the end. Their ballpark is ancient. They don't have a parking lot. And their mascot is a not-very-threatening baby bear.

Ask any brand loyalist and few can articulate why they prefer Colgate to Crest or Coke to Pepsi. In fact, most answers you get are more tied to emotion than reason: "My mom always bought Tide." "You know Ford stands for Fix Or Repair Daily." "I've eaten Wheaties since I was a kid." "Head & Shoulders works for me, why risk trying something new?"

So how do you fight brand loyalty. It's very, very hard.

One thing you don't want to do is directly bash the favored brand. That can force loyalists to dig in their heels. It's like saying something bad about America. I can do it. But let an outsider say a word and I'd be all over them.

There are two common approaches to help sway brand preference: Get to prospects before they form a brand allegiance and/or be as different from the favored brand as possible.

Brand allegiances can be strong. That's why banks offer children of depositors free savings accounts. And that's why I suggest my tool & equipment clients get their products into as many vo-tech schools as possible. Students who learn on a product tend to favor that brand.

And strong brand differentiation helps. Rather than being a horse of a different color, you need to be an entirely different animal. More like a camel. The novelty or uniqueness of your approach can't be subtle. It should be so different it draws prospects in to try it. For instance, Starbucks doesn't sell coffee -- they sell an experience.

I’m still a fan of my Cubs, and wait'll next year!

Branding's Dirty Little Secret...

know this is not the appropriate place to air my dirty laundry, but I can't hold it in any longer: Beth has been disloyal.

She probably didn't think I'd notice the signs. I probably ignored them hoping they would just go away.

But last night I couldn't ignore it any longer. This morning, I confronted her:

"I can't hold it in any more," I said. "Why? Why did you change from Tide to Era?"

"What brought this on?" Beth asked.

"Yesterday I helped you carry that Era container in, and I tossed the old one out. How long has this been going on?"

"I've been buying Era for a year, maybe two," she said without emotion. "If it's a big deal to you, I'll stop."

"I just want to understand," I replied. "What made you change your loyalties?"

"Era is half the price of Tide," Beth replied. "If it bothers you, I'll switch back. PJ gets dirtier in summer. Tide might work better."

"Now wait a minute! Half price? Really? I don't see why being brand loyal to Tide is such a big deal. It's only soap..."

Baby Boomers are infamously brand disloyal. It doesn't matter if they're B2C customers or B2B. And as they age, their allegiance to brand wavers even more. Their parents' generation became more loyal with age, but many Boomers become more discontent. The reasons vary. Some switch for what's new or trendy. Some switch for lower price. Some switch for higher quality. The key to keeping their loyalty is to follow their changing buying patterns and produce different products, services and "buying experiences" to meet their changing, fickle taste. Or I should say OUR changing, fickle taste.

What are you doing to keep your customers' loyalty? How has your product improved? How are you selling differently?

- Phil Sasso

Selling: Over-The-Top Soil...

Only in America do people pay good money to buy dirt. I'm not talking about sleazy tabloids dishing out big bucks for juicy celebrity gossip -- I'm talking about plain old dirt.

And I'm humbled to say, I am now one of those Americans.

As I sit here staring out my window at a 4 foot-tall pile of screened black dirt, I'm a little embarrassed. First, because I 'm writing a tip about dirt. And second, because it's really not all I expected. Seriously. I expected MORE, both in quantity and quality.

Somehow, I thought 10 cubic yards was physically a lot more. In fact, Beth and I both initially wondered if we were cheated and got less than we paid for.

I also thought screened dirt would be SCREENED. I guess I expected the dirt to be, uh, cleaner. I didn't think there'd be any twigs or roots. Apparently, what I was expecting was what's known in the dirt business as "pulverized topsoil". But being unschooled in the fine art of dirt, I was a very uneducated customer.

I think part of the problem is that the salesperson was just an order-taker. She really didn't explain how tall or wide the pile would be or how much area it would cover. She didn't educate me on the different kinds of dirt or try to upsell me to topsoil. She didn't even try to cross-sell me on mulch or anything.

Perhaps on the phone I sound more dirt-savvy than I really am.

Maybe this company usually deals with landscapers who know exactly what they want. But, the moment I told her I wanted a truckload of dirt delivered to my house she should have began explaining my options and probing to determine my depth of knowledge.

Don't get me wrong, she was friendly and thorough. She just wasn't very well trained. This company could increase sales significantly by training the telephone representative to take an extra minute or two to explain the fine points of dirt when taking orders from homeowners. I guess you could say I was undersold because I was uneducated.

What am I going to do with all that dirt? I'm sure that will come up in a future tip…

- Phil Sasso

COA: Email Marketing...

I'm moving this week.

There's no boxes to pack. No truck to rent. No utilities to cancel. I'm not changing homes or offices. I'm changing my email address. I know what you're thinking: yawn.

It may not sound like a big deal to you, but I've had the same email address since 1996. That's longer than I've been in my home OR my office.

And to be honest, it's a little more stressful than I expected. If I was moving, I'd notify the post office of a COA and they would forward my mail to me for about six months. They'd even put my new address in the NCOA file so all the direct mail marketing could update my file.

But, in most cases, you don't have that luxury when you change your email address. And I get a lot more emails than physical mail these days. I'm not even sure who everyone is that has my email address. Up until now, I've used the same email for business and personal communications. Now, I have a chance to reform my process and create four new addresses. You might consider doing the same: one for family & friends, one for personal business, one for work and one for junk mail. It will help me sort through the average 316 emails I get in a day.

What’s the marketing lesson for you? According to database marketing service provider Epsilon, 14% of customers will change their email address in the next 12 months. That means if you market to consumers about 1/6 of your email database will go dead over the next year. And unlike with the post office, no one will tell you where they've moved.

But there is a B2B marketing concept here too. What if when I cancel my email service provider they offered to forward me emails for 6 months for a $25 fee. How much could they make? And would this positive approach generate good will? You may think it would cause more customers to jump ship. I don't think so. Look at phone number portability. I think it has meant more business for many providers. Especially the smaller or newer providers.

So consider how you can keep your database up-to-date. And while you're thinking of it, change my email address to phil@shaboom.com in your contact management application!


- Phil Sasso