Pitney Bowes SVP Marketing Answers 4 Questions for Marketing Innovators

We recently launched a new feature of our widely read blog Ernan’s Insights on Marketing Best Practices.

It is called: 4 Questions for Marketing Innovators The goal is to provide a quick read filled with meaningful insights from marketing thought leaders.
Each column will feature one innovator who will address 4 questions;

1. What is one marketing topic that is most important to you as an innovator?
2. Why is this so important?
3. How will the customer experience be improved by this?
4. How will this improve the effectiveness of marketing?

Please send your feedback and ideas for people you would us to interview to ernan@erdm.com

Bill Borrelle is the SVP and leader of Integrated Marketing Communications at Pitney Bowes, a global technology company offering products and services that enable commerce. From data-driven marketing services to shipping and mailing products, the company is a leading provider of location data and provides the data that enables billions of social media check-ins every day. A Board Member of the DMA, Bill’s roots are in direct and data-driven marketing, leading client relationships at Wunderman and Digitas. Before joining Pitney Bowes, Borrelle was Chief Executive Officer of mcgarrybowen New York.

1. What is one marketing topic that is most important to you as an innovator?
Location data. Unlocking the potential of using location data in marketing to engage with consumers with greater relevance and impact.

2. Why is this so important?
Since the beginning of time for Marketers, it is "context” that makes our messages relevant and actionable. I believe that “Context is King”, and have believed that since we began to use the term "Contextual Marketing". Contextual Marketing is a form of targeted messaging where the content of the message is directly relevant to the channel; perhaps the topic of a print publication, or relevant to the editorial content adjacent to the ad on a website, or relevant to a social media conversation, or even relevant to your customer’s online behavior. It’s fundamental.

So now, with 2/3 of Americans with smart phones and 74% of consumers who have smart phones saying 'YES’ to location-based services, we have a new form of contextual marketing that uses the real-time location of your customer to deliver a relevant, impactful message. So imagine intercepting your customer, through your company’s app, at the moment that they are near to your location with a real-time offer? Or perhaps, in the financial services category, knowing that your customer is in a real estate office, suggesting a home loan offer opportunity? It is mind-boggling if you let go and imagine all the new opportunities that we have as marketers with location data.

3. How will the customer experience be improved by this?
There are two scenarios where location data improves the customer experience. In a 'pull’ scenario, the customer is reaching out to you, through your app, to get information.

Where is the nearest branch? Can you direct me there? What retailers near where I am right now will let me use my rewards points to redeem? What movie theatres near me are playing a particular movie I want to see? We all know these examples well, because we live them, and it has become second nature. More and more, through the apps of banks, airlines, retailers, communications companies, opportunities to simplify life or save time or improve an experience are all being introduced using location data as the foundation of that improved experience.

For Marketers, it is the "push” scenario where there is untapped potential to improve a customer experience. Location data and automated real-time push messaging is often not built into existing CRM systems, so we are seeing our clients who use Pitney Bowes location data beginning to be very creative in not only the data that they use but also how they apply this data to deliver an unexpected, spontaneous message of relevance that engages and drives behavior. When we give our customers, with full transparency, the option to choose to share their location information in exchange for better service or a price advantage, the majority will say "YES".

4. How will this improve the effectiveness of marketing?
One notable advance that location data uniquely provides is driving action in the physical world using digital technology. There is no other method to immediately intercept a customer in real time, via a 1:1 customer tailored message, to drive an immediate physical in-store purchase. It's a great example of this new phenomenon, sometimes referred to as “phygical” marketing, where you use digital technology and data to drive a purchase in a physical environment, such as a retail store or a restaurant. Note, of those who are loyal to many apps on many mobile devices i.e. the “truly mobile engaged consumer”, the vast majority have their phones engaged while they shop, or eat out, or travel. We have a captive audience, and the only hurdle is our ability to meaningfully drive the right high-value message. In a nutshell, location data delivers relevance, and relevance drives revenue and results and relationships.

When used for research purposes, location data can help you better understand your target by analyzing the patterns of their movement on the planet. For example, do they commute to work every day? Do they travel internationally? Do they frequent a competitor's retail store more than yours? This is another great way to make your marketing programs more effective.

Remember that there’s location and then there’s location intelligence. It’s not sufficient to know the geographic coordinates of your customer on a map, you need to know what's around them. And that is where the layers of location data come in for Marketers to create impact in ways never before possible. This is a great opportunity for data-driven marketers.

What is your favorite activity outside of work?
I like to run. Power up the pop music, and escape on the West Side Highway in New York City overlooking the Hudson River. Nothing like it.

4 Tips for Earning Consumer Preference Data

The Challenge: Marketers everywhere are fighting an uphill battle: trying to deliver more personalized communications but lacking the accurate data to do so. Without that information marketers are still stuck sending ‘Spray and Pray’ blasts of email.

According to Toronto-based anti-spam filtering and web security services provider, Perimetic, “roughly 130 billion spam emails are sent, worldwide, per day, accounting for roughly 70% of global emailing activity.”

The goal of consumer-provided preference data is to deliver personally relevant offers, communications, and experiences. However instead of making consumers comfortable with sharing personal information, the ‘Spray and Pray’ practices of marketers have caused consumers not to trust them. This certainly applies to providing them with personal information.

Based on Voice of Customer research conducted by our firm, we have learned that there are 4 ways that brands can earn consumer preference data. These findings were consistent across B2B and B2C research.

4 Key Takeaways for Marketers:

1. Demonstrate to Consumers That You’ll Safeguard Their Information and Use it in a Responsible Way.
Successfully doing so requires that you follow two important steps:

•  One, promise consumers that you’ll safeguard their personal preferences by assuring them at each stage of the sign-up process and in all subsequent messages.

•  Two, follow through on that promise.

Violating these steps can do serious harm to brands. Conversely, demonstrating that you’re trustworthy will only help to strengthen the consumer-brand relationship.

2. Assure Consumers That “Responsible” Means That You’ll Never Rent or Sell Their Information to Third Parties.
This assurance cannot be subtle: it must be undeniable.

Email Marketing Services Provider, MailChimp, offers a great example of this. The message on their website support page is plain and unmistakable: “MailChimp does not provide, sell, share, or rent lists. Ever.”

It’s that kind of conciseness that puts consumers’ minds at ease. Do it.

3. Honor Consumer Expectations That Preference Data Will Be Used to Drive Increasingly Targeted Offers.
Aligning your brand with this expectation requires that you demonstrate your commitment to honor expectations from the outset of a relationship.

Boston Store’s Fashion and Sales News email sign-up form requests customers to provide the store with 10 essential preference criteria, thereby assuring customers that they’ll only receive relevant offers.

We applaud Boston Store for using detailed preference criteria to deliver a more personal experience.

4. Clearly Demonstrate to the Consumer That You’re Working to Provide an Improved Experience With Their Preference Information.
If value is not obvious, consumers will assume that you’ve betrayed their trust.

This expectation of relevance applies to both online and offline experiences and communications. Be sure that you’re demonstrating the value to the consumer consistently and over time. There’s a lot of bad history you need to overcome.

We urge you to test these 4 Tips. Per the experience of our clients, your customers will reward you with increased loyalty and sales.

Burberry: 3 Powerful Ways To Engage Consumers Online

The Challenge: According to a study conducted by Martini Media, luxury brands have been gradually dropping TV from their multichannel marketing mix in favor of digital media. But will the move pay off in the end? Digital darling Burberry seems to think so, quickly taking the throne of luxury online marketing by creating entirely new levels of customer engagement.

While luxury marketers have traditionally trailed mass marketers in digital marketing spend, digital media has skyrocketed among luxury agencies over the past year. Context and targeting are quickly becoming the most important criteria for luxury brands, and luxury marketers are finding a need to achieve reach through the use of niche, passion-based sites.

Digital media is perceived to be more effective than offline marketing in driving favorability, as well as online and brick-and-mortar traffic. It appeals to affluent audiences on the go, who often have more money than time. And because luxury brands must deal with an extremely niche audience that is more privacy-sensitive and difficult to reach, these customers expect an engagement experience that mass marketers aren’t capable of delivering.

With its highly successful push into digital media earlier this year, Burberry has become luxury online marketing's champion. Creative officer Christopher Bailey claims it’s become “as much a media-content company as a design company.” As proof, the company has launched its recent AW(Autumn/Winter) 2012 collection across 10 different social platforms, tailoring the presentations to best leverage the advantages of each site.

Key Takeaways from Burberry

1. Use co-creation to drive brand awareness and engagement through
user-generated content.
Taking a cue from Threadless, Burberry’s Art of the Trench photo-sharing site allows consumers and fashion photographers to document how they wear the brand’s iconic trenchcoat. This unique use of user-generated content and customer engagement has generated a massive amount of brand awareness for the company.

2. Make your consumers feel exclusive by showing them exclusive content.
In its recent “Tweetwalk” event, Burberry partnered with Twitter to post backstage pictures of every look before models were sent out onto the runway, which meant that Burberry followers were seeing looks before most members of the fashion show audience.

3. Design your content to help guide your customers down the purchase path.
In a fresh twist on direct sales, Burberry live-streamed its London Fashion Week catwalk to 25 main stores as a “living catalog,” allowing existing customers to place immediate orders on upcoming collections before the looks became available to the public. Burberry also made it possible for consumers to directly purchase items by clicking through any of the image or video galleries on their social media posts.