A report this morning from Kitewheel got my attention this morning. They “examined the current breakthroughs and breakdowns in engagement with today’s connected consumer.” The results aren’t very encouraging to those of us who like to think we’re in touch with the expectations of our consumer base
They hired some folks to survey consumers and marketing decision makers with respect to consumer expectation around experience and brand execution. A few key findings:
- 76% of consumers use mobile devices to compare prices and read reviews while shopping, yet 51% of marketers are not currently managing mobile apps as a consumer touch point.
- 55% of consumers state frustrations in downloading an app that offers no functional difference from a business’ website.
- 68% of consumer respondents expect a response to tweets directed at a brand, and one in three expect a response within 24 hours. Yet 45% of marketers state it is unlikely that their company can respond to every one of these social media opportunities.
- 73% believe that loyalty programs should be a way for brands to show consumers how loyal they are to them as a customer; but 66% of marketers still see it the other way around.
In other words, we’re disconnected from those who access our brands via their phones. We look at loyalty programs as consumers putting their hands in the air to show they love us. They want them to be ways in which we show how much we love them. Doesn’t sound like the basis for a happy relationship.
Five areas of disconnect were discovered including: mobile, social media, real-time e-commerce, omni-channel capability and brand loyalty. Every one of those five has become far more important over the last decade and yet it seems as if many marketers are living in 1999. As the study says, the overall journey of today’s consumer is frequently a broken one, with significant misalignment between consumer expectations and brand execution. We need to think about how to fix that misalignment and do so quickly. You agree?
Consult Keith 