The Consumer Wars
A clash of tech-fueled convenience, attention-grabbing media, relentless distraction, and a dramatic shift in consumer thinking about almost everything means many in CX have lost sight of their consumer’s motivations. It’s not that we stopped trying; we stopped understanding. That’s why we struggle to match consumers’ needs as they disrupt brands to find those that satisfy them.
Branding and CX exist to motivate and maintain buyer behaviours by creating expectations and experiences and delivering the outcomes they want. They either save the consumer time and attention (convenience) or grab their attention (experiences). Saving attention by creating less friction and more speed turns out great for winning customers on a mission to ‘find a product’ but who care little about having a brand relationship - and for them, that will be good enough. But while machines make convenience and speed possible, the power of emotional connections shouldn’t be underestimated. Platforms brands that save consumers’ time will gain attention, but attention-grabbing brands understand that digital disruption doesn’t mean a retreat into digital channels, never-ending optimization and e-commerce; it means more experience innovation and meeting consumer motivations - such as using bricks and mortar for experiences, creating branded communities, brand-driven experiential events where the consumer is part of the experience, helping the consumer achieve their purpose (a me-goal) or bringing people together (a social-goal) and seizing their purpose.
Whilst we’ve mistaken interactions for engagement, consumers haven’t. They’ve been telling us for over a decade that what we’ve been doing doesn’t meet their needs (see the global customer satisfaction surveys) and voting with their feet as brand polygamy grows.
Fueling customer purchase intent but not building relationships is becoming an existential threat for CX and e-commerce. Convenience is important but not the priority driver for consumers. They are much more complicated than that. Every consumer signal and trend points to consumers wanting to belong to something, including brands. They want convenience when they choose it - but feeling full doesn’t leave them nourished.
Look at the trends:
The growth of communities. In a world where new startups appear faster than the latest social media micro-trend, consumers constantly try new products and brands, sending customer loyalty into a tailspin. For the increasing number of consumers practising belief-driven engagement, standout brands already function more like communities than businesses, bringing people together in a movement of shared values and interests. An engaged, authentic branded community can’t be built overnight - but community is fast becoming the strongest competitive advantage a brand can attain.
There’s also a new YOLO mentality for experiences or experiencing, across all generations, a deflection against tomorrow’s uncertainties to enjoy today. The trend is that Consumers are permitting themselves to live a little more. Sparking joy can be a purchase motivator. In-store browsing is just for the experience, even if they don't need to buy anything. Others are buying themselves treats, taking advantage of BNPL.
There’s more: Slow Commerce experiments in Europe and the US are finding an audience of consumers wanting to slow life down. The emergence of groups (surprisingly led by Gen Z’ers) meeting together to create moments free of mobile, messaging and always-on. BeReal, tapping into the youth trend for authenticity. And the growth of in-store footfall whilst e-commerce penetration rates have fallen back to pre-pandemic levels - and remain below 25 per cent of all commerce volumes. (Online searches have grown, but online sales are down as consumers switch to the store for the experience of choosing, trying and buying).
In today’s consumer disruption doing things differently is how to stand out. When we choose not to and follow everyone else by applying the latest best practices and pre-baked solutions from vendors and influencers, we give away our power to be different. Consumers will soon be able to use personal digital assistants to automate ‘buying’ the products they’ve relegated into the background, freeing up there time to spend their time and money searching for different. When everything is mended but looks the same, no one stands out.
Understanding trends, and which ones can help you lead rather than follow, is a powerful way to improve engagement and brand perceptions and that’s what I bring to CX teams and brands with my NCXT workshops, based on Foresight methodologies. Contact me for an exploratory chat @ michaelcooper@pobox.com