Patrick Dixon the British futurist says “The future is about emotion.” To be able to influence people, we need a deep understanding of what drives them emotionally. Emotions are what our customers want them to be; respect, trust, concern, responsiveness, fun and love. It’s how we make
them feel.

We know that emotions have a significant impact on loyalty and we know it’s a major factor in the buying process and yet, most of the time we ignore it, concentrating on the physical aspects of our business. Look at your website now, where are the deliberate explanations of how you meet your customers emotions? These are more than likely your values.

Emotional reasoning, irrational logic and impatience are virtues. If one of the challenges of business today is attention, then perhaps a good place to start is tapping into people’s emotions. That starched, bland and mundane approach won’t work in the future. And this applies to our people too. They particularly will be seeking out work that is part of something that matters and is meaningful to them. Why? Because they can!

Colin Shaw and John Ivens in their book ‘Building Great Customer Experiences’ quote “Emotions are a major differentiator and are the most underestimated assets available to business today. They can be used to put colour back in a grey world.” I think what you mean guys is that emotions can harmonise and humanise the relationship we have with people and when our product doesn’t really make us different or matter anymore. It’s the only thing we have left, the people experience we deliver internally and externally, and that’s about people being motivated by emotions.

On an individual level, some days we feel we can move mountains, other
days it would be difficult to flip a tidily wink. The point, that’s okay. Emotion
is part of being human, its part of business and we all have those days.
The difference now? We are beginning to recognise it, allow for it and use it
to be more in touch!

Moving that static database where you ‘buy’ customers to a healthy, engaging, vibrant business community isn’t going to be easy, no one said it was. It’s also a long and windy road too. However, the only limitations to it are what you place on it, not your customers, nor, the community you already have. There is a clear step by step approach that I feel is appropriate using some leading edge thinkers for help and bit of my own brain power.

In simplistic terms, you need to understand that all community members are equal but they will have and want different roles. Participate and engage in different ways! In the past we would grade our customers based on A, B, C and D or whatever denomination that was. That’s a little outdated. Using a mix of Frank Reichheld’s model and Charlene Li and Josh Bernoff’s model in the book “Groundswell” can provide a great solution to getting to grips with the dynamics of your community.

Identifying the following groups is essential to planning your reputation and marketing campaign where you can engage with individuals, maximise the intelligence and intellect and ensure you communicate the right things at the right level.

I suggest these are the critical game players in your business community:
1. Pillar influencers - significant influencers, they are not afraid to challenge you, intellectual about the future and have the ability to refer potential customers.
2. Connectors – well connected either online or offline or both
3. Promoters – people who promote, without any incentive, what you do
4. Passives - people who buy from you on a regular basis but who can also become promoters with some encouragement
5. Collaborators who could also be co-creators

There are sub groups of people that are important but these are your main ones. These members will significantly shift your business towards the new competitive advantages of innovation, engagement and building relationships with the relevantpeople.

What’s non-negotiable is the fact that the groups are made up of people. People have replaced products, connections bind communities and, with that, comes the rocky movement from broadcasting at customers to being social with your community. It’s a hell of a challenge, but at the route is building the right relationships with the right people.

There is a lot of dispiriting going on. There must be something in the air. I’ve made a list:

1. My local Caffe Nero’s not offering free wifi.

2. Companies House making it nigh impossible for you to do business with them, as their website is an entanglement of mush thats completely unusable.

3. The Chelsea Building Society devaluing houses, so on paper you have less equity and they can charge you a higher interest rate. Nice way of promoting customer retention.

4. Biscuits that you used to get in your hotel room, but you don’t now. Cut stuff from behind the scenes, not on the stage!

5. People like lawyers, accountants and public sector workers thinking they have a right to be aloof. Get your parachute chaps, you’re heading for a big fall.

6. People still trying to ‘sell’ stuff. Features and benefits is just so yesterday.

7. People using social media to broadcast. In the past we just had companies doing it, now we have thousands of individuals.

8. People who just show up at work, dream all day about doing something else and never get round to it because they didn’t take time out to find their passion and purpose.

Just thought I’d dump that. Ah, feel much better now……..

Disrupting the status quo is every leaders prime role. It’s a stark contrast to the ‘command and control’ days of previous business models. Companies need to think about disrupting their relationships with their customers. Yes I did say that! We are far too complacent about them. We need to change the game with openness, transparency and moving from a culture of ‘managing the customer database’ to sowing the seeds of creating a ‘community’ around our brand. Something that will be at the heart of every business in the future.

Look at this model I created. It’s by no means perfected….months of R & D will do that but it shows a shift from an inert account management regime to a community model that will be full of life and vibrant.

Database → � � � � � � � � � � � � Relationship → � � � � � � � � Community

You can look at www.club.lego.com/en-US/default and www.harley-davidson.com for great examples. But it won’t be easy, it means unlearning stuff that’s ingrained in our minds. After decades of disappointing relationships, we now have the ability to gain impressive inroads into true partnerships with customers that really do change the dynamics for the better.

Truth is, we are struggling to get off first base. For many it will be a leap of faith, for others a simple transition. But it does require a deliberate plan to achieve it. And. ironically it starts with the database. More on that tomorrow…..

Business in the past was valued on it’s financial performance, it still is. Increasingly, it will also be based on influence, followers and fans. If we own something we try to protect it. In fact, we can become over protective. For years we have been conditioned to think that we own stuff at work; our team, our customers, our products. Tesco thinks it owns it’s suppliers!

This over exuberance can be detrimental, if not a tad delusional. We can spend lots of money defending something that we actually don’t own. The future, we know, will be based on the value of our relationships with our fellow humans. You can only part own a relationship. You will only part own a product as we collaborate more, you have never owned your people, especially in a war for talent. And customers just ain’t buying that ‘priviledge’ thing anymore.

You don’t own the buildings you work in, you probably don’t own that car you drive and your company probably only lease that computer and mobile you use. We need to shift our mentality from one of ownership to partnership. That way we can work positively on the things that really are meaningful and rationally focus our efforts.

People will often say that your brand is like Marmite, they either love it or hate it. Your retort should always be, as long as people don’t find us indifferent. These ARE times for ‘sticking your head above the parapet’ and ‘sticking out like a sore thumb’ as long as it’s for something exceptional of course.

Being in an indifferent position is fundamentally a difficult place to be. Customers don’t see you and therefore ignore you. It becomes inherently difficult to build any traction on the customer loyalty front. Many companies initiate the worst action with poor consequences by trying to buy customers through traditional marketing tactics. That only gets you bad profits which you can’t sustain over the long term.

Better have a smaller list of customers who love what you do, promote what you do and buy more of what you do again and again. Rather than the ‘yeah whatever’ group that aren’t listening. Those that hate you…..well that’s just life!!!