media update’s Aisling McCarthy and Adam Wakefield attended the conference on Wednesday, 4 October and Thursday, 5 October at the Bryanston Country Club to find out how brands can and are adapting to this changing world.

1. Brands must deliver at every moment of truth

The third speaker on day one of the conference was Jade Fuhr Kirkel, marketing manager at The Sorbet Group. The focus of her presentation was managing the total guest experience (TGE) and the moments of truth – from a client’s first interaction with the brand, to their last.

Before even beginning the TGE journey, Kirkel said that it’s important to note, quoting from Jim Collin’s seminal book Good to Great, to have “the right people on the right seats on the right bus”.

“Go back into your organisation and think, ‘Do I have the right people?’ Without the right people, the total guest experience is a waste of time because they are not going to implement it according to how you want it done,” she said.

The TGE is every moment a person comes into contact with your business, no matter how remote it may be, with moments of truth making up the TGE.

“The biggest challenge of this moment of truth cycle is that every moment of truth is managed by a different person or a different department,” Kirkel says.

Every moment of truth can be broken up further into micro-moments of truth, such as a client going to a branch, which is the primary moment of truth, but then then being cold because the air-conditioning is not set correctly. That is a micro-moment of truth.

When potential customers are researching your business, that is a “zero moment of truth”. They are looking for a business that is offering the services they want.

“Do you come up on Google? Are you available? Is your website easy to navigate? This is all in the research phase,” Kirkel says.

She advised mapping out your brand’s TGE, where the moments of truth are, and making people in your organisation aware, responsible, and, most importantly, accountable for their moment of truth.

“Always make the guest at the heart of every TGE decision,” Kirkel suggested. Every TGE is a moment your brand can connect with the guest, and building relationships with customers is of the utmost importance.

2. Centennials – the new shopper generation

On the second day of the conference, Rachel Thompson, insight director at market research company GfK, delved into the next generation of shoppers, dubbed Centennials. Thompson classified Centennials, also known as GenZ’s, as people aged 20 years and younger.

According to research done by Goldman Sachs, 93% of parents said that their Centennial children did influence spending decisions and household purchases. Thompson said that in order to win over this group, both now and in future, it is necessary to understand them and to take them seriously.

Across the generations in South Africa, the main concern is safety and security. Thompson said that brands need to make shoppers feel secure if they want to reach them. Thompson also highlighted that Centennials are highly focused on themselves and personal gain. She said the major deciding factor for Centennials between products is what that brand can do for them.

Unlike the millennial generation, who are focused on how other people perceive them, Centennials are more focused on how they perceive themselves. This means that personalisation is vital to these shoppers, and making them feel included in the retail process, which is tailored to their needs, resulting in success.

“They like brands that allow them to help make the product 100% customisable to their needs. They want to help you to customise your brand.” Thompson said.

Being digital natives, 69% of Centennials said that they would be interested in visiting stores, which offered augmented reality (AR) and virtual reality (VR) experiences.

Thompson offered five tips to winning over Centennials.

  • Shift from offering new things to buy, to inspiring new things to do;
  • Shift from telling your story, to starting a conversation about theirs in which they can express themselves;
  • Shift from telling your story to allow them to tell it for you;
  • Shift from making it perfect before sharing, to making it better with their input; and
  • Shift to true disruptive innovation, whilst ensuring their security at all times.

3. Optimising CX for the goldfish attention span

Godfrey Parkin, CEO of marketing consultancy Britefire, kicked off the afternoon session on day two. He said that dealing with today’s digitally driven consumers can be tricky because the average attention span is less than four seconds.

“The 60-second TV advert is dead. We are living in the era of the six-second ad, and heading swiftly towards to the three-second ad.” Parkin said.

With the advent of the retail apocalypse, where in the United States alone, 800 retails stores have closed down in the last two years. Parkin said that people are finding digital shopping more emotionally satisfying than physical shopping.

“Personalised messaging and me-commerce is the intelligent growth hack,” said Parkin, explaining that customers have changed and are becoming more and more demanding.

He said that the use of AI is becoming more important in retail and, due to the falling prices of technology, brands who do not adapt their business models will be left behind.

“Any major retailer who is not investing in business models and CX research and development is going to die out. Never define your business in terms of its current enabling technology.” Said Parkin.

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For more information, visit www.marketingmixconferences.co.za

The plethora of platforms customers have to interact with brands creates challenges and opportunities for the brands themselves. Read more in our article, How omnichannel marketing creates brand consistency.