In 2015, Econsultancy conducted a survey asking 4,000 marketers what they thought were going to be the top digital trends heading towards 2020. 24% of respondents said they were steadily increasing focus on customer experience, and 23% said personalization played a large role in their upcoming marketing plans.
Trend forecasts have not shifted significantly over the past almost-two years, with Forbes citing that personalization will continue to upswing through 2017, and data-driven marketing will be leveraged to offer next-level customer experiences.
Obviously seeing this kind of enthusiasm for personalization and customer-centric marketing initiatives gets us all giddy, seeing as we’re in the business of offering better customer experiences through video personalization. But we do realize that it’s a large shift for many teams and that it’s bound to highlight some growing pains.
Case in point, Andrew Cocker, senior marketing director at Expedia, said he asks one main question when pursuing a seamless customer experience. Read on to find out how to solve the biggest challenge in marketing with personalization.
The Challenge: “How can we anticipate what the customer needs before they even have to ask?”
We really like where Mr. Cocker’s head is at. Customer frustration is frequently attributed to not being able to locate resources, answers, services and money-saving promotions. Basically, people don’t like doing business with brands who keep them in the dark. By figuring out what your customers are going to need before they actually need it, you’re eliminating the opportunity for dissatisfaction.
Every company should go on a “hole finding” mission where they try to locate all the gaps in their outward communication. Let’s say, as an easy example, you find out that most of your new customers have no idea how to set up your product. There are too many screws, not enough nails and don’t even get them started on the pictures-only instruction manual you provide.
People are jamming your call centers, getting ticked off at the long on-hold times and fruitlessly looking through your website for some sort of solution. They find nothing, their frustration grows and eventually they spread the word to potential leads that you provide a miserable customer experience and that someone else is offering the same product with a better emphasis on service.
What a nightmare! But one that, thankfully, is very easily avoidable.
The Solution: Video Personalization
We thoroughly believe that an optimal brand experience focuses on anticipating customer wants, needs and questions, and we believe that data and using your customers as a resource are your keys to unlocking wonderfully intuitive marketing solutions.
Peruse your brand’s social media feeds to take note of FAQs and repeat complaints. Similarly, if your brand has a call center, ask your customer assistance pros for a list of the most common questions they receive.
Defining common needs and providing clear communication is like the two-pronged “Step One” in offering an optimized and intuitive customer experience.
Mercer did an excellent job of clarifying a confusing topic when they turned to video personalization to better explain pensions. 90% of employers they work with ranked pensions as the most important benefit in managing retirement and workforce planning. Yet they observed employees were extremely hesitant to engage with their pensions because many simply didn’t understand how pensions worked.
Let’s look at this problem by the numbers to thoroughly illustrate how detrimental disengagement and confusion can be.
Mercer found that 3 out of 4 employee worries related to financial issues and 61% of employees had less concentration at work because of those worries. Unsurprisingly, that much (wo)man power lost to unnecessary stress had an effect on business’ bottom lines. But just how much? Mercer estimated a £2.16M annual loss per 1,000 employees — a loss that could be avoided just by getting people to engage with and feel empowered by their pension plans.
The challenge became finding a way to make pensions approachable and easily understandable, and that’s where Personalized Videocame in.
Mercer created an individual Personalized Video for every pension plan holder, and the video explained their uniquely individual plan. To be clear, it wasn’t an explanation their plan type with sample financial data plugged in. These were one-of-a-kind, 90 second videos created using pension holders’ data that worked to clearly and specifically explain how their plan worked and how they could better engage with it.
80% of viewers watched their video to the end, meaning they were engaged with the video and were absorbing the important information it had to share. It resulted in confident, empowered and educated pension plan holders.
Once Mercer found the gap in businesses’ financial communication, they were able to offer an outstanding personalized solution. Now, going forward, new employees who opt-in to a pension plan can receive this Personalized Video and build confidence right out of the gate. What’s more, Personalized Video generation can occur in real-time as new data is acquired so existing employees can receive an updated version of their video as they make changes to their plan.
Here at Idomoo, we make it easy for everyone, regardless of campaign scale, to refresh their videos, make changes to the scene logic and tweak creative elements, always delivering on the promise of cinematic quality video with native personalization.
Whether you’re looking to clearly explain complicated services like Mercer did, onboard new customers or offer a visually-driven, personalized answers to FAQs, video personalization can play a key role in ensuring your customers are following you every step of the way. Remove communication barriers and promote customer experiences built on empowerment, clarity and an understanding of and anticipation for key needs.
To find out more about Idomoo’s Next Generation Video Platform and how we can help you reach your customers and drive action, contact us below.
