August 13, 2009

Vancity treats customers the right way

A few months ago I wrote a few blogs on my experience with the Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce (CIBC) when they advised me they were increasing the interest rate on my personal lines of credit. My indignation over their move was not about the money; it was over their apparent lack of concern for their high value customer group. I further commented that it might be that they didn’t even know who their high value customers were!

BE DiFFERENT companies exhibit these traits:
- they define the specific customer groups that have the highest economic potential; they avoid playing to mass markets
- they focus their scarce resources on the chosen customer groups
- they seek to learn as much as they can about them; they discover their secrets
- they treat the chosen customers different from others with an understanding that their loyalty is necessary to provide the financial objectives sought
- they create premium priced value-based Holistic Offers
- they make it matter to deepen the relationship they have with the customers they have chosen to serve

My experience with CIBC clearly indicated they didn’t belong in the BE DiFFERENT category along with many other banks who decided to hit all of their customers with interest rate increases while the bank rates decline.

An article in the Vancouver Sun newspaper recently indicated Vancity, one of the largest Credit Unions around, has decided to solve their financial challenge in ways other than increasing interest rates. They decided to honor the agreements with their members. Although they attempted to get members to agree to increase rate increases they backed down in the face of a bitter customer reaction. At the end of the day they recovered and did the right thing for their members.

Vancity may not have done everything right in this situation but you can’t deny the outcome was the right one. They took action. They responded to feedback with their member interests in mind. They admitted the matter could have been handled more effectively. They decided to explore other ways to get their financial house in order.

Customer Learning is not always an elegant process, and Vancity is a good example. You don’t always get it right the first time; the key is that BE DiFFERENT organizations tend to get it right the second time with customer interests in mind.

Good job Vancity!

A poscript to my CIBC adventure. I was advised they were leaving the interest rates on lines of credit at the higher levels for all customers until credit markets ‘settled down’. Not sure how that applies to me but at the end of the day I was not listened to, I am treated like the masses and clearly they are indifferent to our relationship. Oh well on to other things. Hmmmmm… i wonder if Vancity needs more members?

Cheers, Roy Osing

Remember to follow me on Twitter

Related Blogs
CIBC Part 1
CIBC Part 2

Posted 8.13.09 at 05:42 am by Roy Osing | Permalink | Comments (0)

August 11, 2009

Tim Hortons Learns with Twitter

Interesting article today in Canada’s National Post newspaper on Tim Hortons recent experience with Twitter. Seems that the company had planned to sponsor a Rhode Island USA ‘Marriage and Family Day’ event by supplying the coffee.
Normally this type of thing would be seen as a positive community action by the company but in this case since the event organizer was vehemently opposed to same-sex marriage, Tim was immediately in the internet dog house. I suppose people saw Tim taking sides in this highly emotionally charged issue.

Apparently thousands of angry Hortonites voiced their displeasure over the company’s sponsoring an event with such political overtones. The Tweets accused the company f homophobia and threatened to take their business elsewhere. The company reacted by announcing that the sponsorship had been cancelled as it was beyond company policy - a slap on the wrist for the local Tim’s shop.

BE DiFFERENT learning points:
- Twitter is an amazing tool to learn hat your customers think about your organization
- It is FAST and you get immediate feedback on any action your organization takes
- You must have a strategy that constantly monitors the Tweets you get
- Have someone tasked to search your organization on Twitter to see what your followers are saying
- Be prepared to take immediate action when things go wrong
- Recovery is critical and unless you do so FAST your business could be in trouble
- Make Twitter a priority in your organization - its all about Customer Leaning

The good news is Twitter gives you immediate feedback. The bad news is that unless you are aware of it and act quickly and decisively you could lose your loyal customers.

Cheers, Roy Osing

Remember to follow me on Twitter

Related Blogs
Twitter Value
Customer Learning Tool - Twitter
Institutionalize Customer Leaning in your Organization
Discover Customer Secrets

Posted 8.11.09 at 06:11 am by Roy Osing | Permalink | Comments (0)

August 6, 2009

BE DiFFERENT Marketing Practice #3: Discover Customer Secrets

BE DiFFERENT Marketing Practice #2 stipulates that organizations must institutionalize a continuous process of learning about their customers and that they adopt this capability as a core competency - to outsource is to BE SAME. So what type of customer information do we seek to learn? The bottom line is that most organizations try to determine what customers need and want; this does not go far enough to BE DiFFERENT!

The objective of Customer Learning is to discover Customer Secrets, the deepest, most intimate desires of WHO you intend to SERVE. Customer needs operate at the highest most superficial level (what telecom product needs does the target group have), whereas Customer Secrets operate at the lowest, detailed most intimate level (what recreational, travel and culinary delights does the person have?). You get the difference in approach.

Why is the secret level important? Well, other organizations will simply not possess the same information on a customer group and you therefore will be in the driver’s seat to apply the information in your Holistic Offer creation process and achieve an unmatched position in the market. Everyone else will be busy bundling things together based on narrowly defined customer needs, and you will blow by ‘em with relevant compelling Offers which deliver the intimate value expressed by your target customer group. Will it be easy to copy your Offer? Not likely - customer secrets are market power which few will possess.

Where do you get secrets? You need to build a trusting relationship with your customers and engage them in a conversation where they reveal this information to you because they believe you will use it to benefit them. I am not talking about violating privacy laws here; rather listening intently to what people chose to tell you and then using it to create value they are quite willing to pay for. That’s what marketing is all about, isn’t it?

Absolutely!

Cheers, Roy Osing

Remember to follow me on Twitter

Related Blogs:
Customerize your Marketing
Customerize Practice #1 Create Holistic Value Based Offers
Customerize Practice #2 Institutionalize Customer Learning

Posted 8.6.09 at 06:21 am by Roy Osing | Permalink | Comments (0)