{"id":73737,"date":"2023-01-31T13:38:03","date_gmt":"2023-01-31T12:38:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/visionarymarketing.com\/?p=73737"},"modified":"2023-01-31T16:34:15","modified_gmt":"2023-01-31T15:34:15","slug":"customer-communities","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/visionarymarketing.com\/en\/2023\/01\/31\/customer-communities\/","title":{"rendered":"Supercharge your marketing with customer communities"},"content":{"rendered":"

Customer communities aren’t for every brand. Yet, facilitating<\/a> communities with your customers could supercharge your marketing. This is, in essence, what Sanjay d’Humi\u00e8res<\/a> explained to us in this interview. Sanjay is the founder of RTCX<\/a> (Real-Time Community Experience), a consultancy supporting businesses with their community marketing. He reminded us, lest we forget, we should always work with our customers to drive a successful marketing strategy. In doing so, Sanjay rightly reminds us, like Jonah Berger (Contagious<\/a>), that social media makes up only a small portion of word of mouth.<\/em><\/p>\n

Supercharge Your Marketing With Customer Communities<\/h2>\n
\"Customer
\u201cBrands fear unhappy customers,” Sanjay d’Humi\u00e8res tells us, and they are wrong. I asked Midjourney to show me a crowd of smiling customers raising their hands, but it seems that for AI, customers are necessarily grumpy. Yet it is possible to bring a community of customers together and turn it into something positive.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

<\/p>\n

Brands Must Focus Their Attention on Their Loyal Consumers<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Like it or not, the process of creating a new marketing strategy necessarily involves customers, Sanjay reminds us. Often, we interview them, which is a very important part of the process of creating new offers and new services.<\/p>\n

\"Marketing
Marketing to customer communities means bringing together engaged consumers around a brand or product, Sanjay d’Humi\u00e8res explains. Sanjay is the founder of RTCX<\/a>, a “startup specialising in stakeholder listening dedicated to companies and communities”.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

“Brands shouldn’t make assumptions on behalf of their customers, they should value their\u00a0opinion, then make strategic decisions based on hard facts. That’s how a significant ROI for the brand is obtained,” explains Sanjay d’Humi\u00e8res.<\/p>\n

Involving consumers in the marketing process<\/h3>\n

\u201cConsumers must be involved in the whole marketing process,” says Sanjay.<\/p>\n

Seeking your customers’ opinions allows them to take ownership of the brand<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

It is crucial to establish contact between customers and the human beings behind the logos. This is how customers take ownership of the discussion. Often, they do express pride in having contributed to the creation of a product or service.<\/p>\n

\"Smiling
With a little time and effort – as we spent with Midjourney – you’ll manage to make your customers smile too. So work with your customer communities and thank them for their commitment to your brand!<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

“Involving customers in our marketing approach is the basis of our discipline, but a lot of brands are afraid of hearing what they have to say<\/strong>,” Sanjay points out.<\/p>\n

However, unhappy customers also have important opinions that must be taken into account.<\/p>\n

Customer feedback is often focusing on heated discussions on\u00a0social networks. They only represent 20% of the iceberg, though.<\/p>\n

Eighty per cent of customer reviews remain hidden. These people would like to give their opinion but do not know how to do it.<\/p>\n

Social media does not represent the entirety of word of mouth<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

“Many companies rely solely on semantic analysis of social interactions and forget that there are many people who don’t know how to use social networks,” Sanjay points out.<\/p>\n

Marketers thus form an idea from what a minority of customers have written or said.\u00a0It is crucial marketers did away with this approach.<\/p>\n

If you don’t communicate properly with your customers, they then vent their anger on social networks, sometimes for no valid reason.<\/p>\n