Have you recently sat in a meeting trying to redefine your customer experience? It’s a crucial challenge facing the majority of our clients, especially those taking advantage of cloud capabilities to create new subscription-based business models. These companies have embraced digital platforms to open up new segments and drive cost-effective demand gen. Their marketing and business leaders are in the midst of rationalizing a sea of multi-touch, multi-dimensional opportunities to engage with their customers. Here’s a snapshot of the changes we see our clients making in their marketing organizations as they move to subscription models.
Evolving marketing investment strategy
Digital tools create cost efficiencies to enter new markets and acquire new customer segments. If you’re also introducing new business models, such as a subscription version of your product or offering, your investment strategy must evolve. To create a dynamic customer experience and deliver the business value of a premium-priced subscription, you’ll need a clear engagement plan. This plan should connect product marketing, digital marketing, inside sales, direct sales, and your channel. Most of our clients have invested in a marketing automation solution to drive more cost-effective demand gen. Now, they’ve turned the dial on how to engage with these tools in a meaningful way and ensure that they have a revenue performance blueprint that is connected, practical, and can deliver not only on the initial acquisition, but also the renewal lifecycle.
Redesigning a customer journey that doesn’t end with the buy button
If you’ve recently added a subscription offering within your business model, you’re likely evaluating where your marketing and sales activities end and where your customer service begins. What metric are you driving? What marketing tactics do you own? Where do your accountabilities lie? We’ve embraced the fact that the customer journey is not linear. It’s fueled by self-directed customers who want to consume content when and where they choose. As a result, our clients are rethinking the customer experience and coupling digital engagement plans with the ‘always on’ customer relationships inherent to subscription models.
Rationalizing digital and physical touchpoints
Without a doubt, there is tremendous opportunity through digital and online platforms. However, to build a modern customer experience, our clients are realizing they must get back to the basics and understand their target customer and their buying profile. They are asking where their customers want to engage and how they make purchase decisions. Will it be online, at an event, or in a physical location? These questions are valid, even if they are purchasing a subscription. Once you have this information, you can see how your customer’s perspective has evolved and how you can get back in their line of sight.
Wrapping it up
Moving a product or service to the cloud creates a variety of new challenges and endless opportunities. This is why we see leading companies evolving their investment strategy, redesigning the customer journey, and working to rationalize customer touch-points. Smart marketers recognize that they must adapt to survive in the digital age.
