Wednesday 30 May 2012

Marketing Automation and Moments of Truth

If marketing has one goal, it’s to reach consumers at the moments that most influence their decisions

A quote taken from this McKinsey article.

But how often as marketers do we really understand when those moments of truth are?

DSC00302Of course as we buy our morning latte it would seem like almost the perfect opportunity to be offered a pastry with that in the local Costa or Starbucks. And it would seem that whatever you buying in WH Smith these days its always the right time to be offered a Cadbury's bar at a special price.( Although that would seem too random for my liking..and yet it seems to work)

And talking of chocolate, I came across this perfect photo opportunity in a Superdrug store recently where product placement was very much to the fore with a real moment of truth opportunity to cross sell

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Of course there are times when the customer is begging for you to make the sale - for example when I earlier this evening added the words 'Arne Jacobsen station desk clock ' into my Google search bar. No guessing what I was in the market for.


But sometimes it's not that obvious and you have to put the pieces together - as did Harry Caul in The Conversation ( An A to Z of eCRM - H is for Harry ).


Luckily these days much of this 'grunt' work is achieved with Marketing Automation platforms that can help score the right moment to approach a potential customer with the right message.


Seem a little old fashioned and sounds like old school marketing? I'm not so sure.


With so many marketing automation platforms these days incorporating Social as part of that lead process it makes it much more palatable to those of you who think Social is the answer, now what's the question?


Of course this only works if the programme has a real time element to it and doesn't work on traditional batch and blast mechanics.


But imagine a scenario where I read my emails in the morning with news of the new trainers I've been looking at online are available at my favourite Nike store. As I walk past the store, I receive a message on my location aware mobile  inviting me in to try them on for size - they have my size 9's in stock as they remember my last online order. And because they know how many miles I've run since then they think I deserve a new pair (using data to second guess that need)


I've got time so I go in and obviously check in - at which point I'm offered a free pair of socks to go with the trainers if I buy there and then.


Of course I buy, and receive a thank you message on my Nike App, encouraging me to take a photo of them on and share with my favourite community..Pinterest this week.


And so the journey continues.....not in my dreams but in real life


Anyway must quickly run down to WH Smith to buy some chocolate

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