If there is a company out there that fully understands how to build community and generate excitement among their fans, it has to be Starbucks. A couple weeks ago I received an email from them announcing that one of their seasonal signature favorites was about to be launched again. Let’s see, Fall is on the way. Have you figured out what it is yet?
Just the other day I took Cassie to Sephora. I wanted to get her a little thank you gift and I knew how excited she was about the new store that had opened up here in Salt Lake. It was a great experience and the store was amazing. The decor was beautiful. They had hundreds and hundreds of make up, fragrance and other products. Not only that, but they had sampling opportunities galore.
Have you been to Sephora before? What did you think about the place?
I have always been a huge fan of Starbucks. I love their marketing, their service and their delicious coffee. As of late, I’ve been more and more tempted to start becoming a regular at my local coffee shop, Beans and Brews. The scary thing is that Starbucks doesn’t seem to care.
My wonderful wife, Cassie, gave me the coolest mug ever for Valentine’s day (she understands and accepts my coffee habit). It was a double-walled, faux-wood sporting, 16 oz mug of delight. The faux-wood paneling took me back to the days when I rode around in my grandpa’s car. Good times.
It was the coolest coffee mug I’ve ever owned and I could not wait to use it. Happy Valentine’s to me! Wait. Not so fast.
The mug’s lid leaked and I had to return it. It was kind of a let down.
But here’s where things really turned bad. When I returned the mug, the woman working behind the counter just didn’t care. Yeah, she returned the mug, but there was nothing in her voice or efforts that showed she cared about me as a customer. This might sound nit picky, but there are things I have come to expect when I walk into a Starbucks – friendly, caring service is one of those things.
Every business faces this dilemma from time to time. The problems come when your competitor consistently delivers on a great experience and you don’t. When this happens, customers can leave.
The other lesson to be learned is that when a business sets certain standards for itself, it must consistently deliver on them. Starbucks has done a wonderful job of building expectations. The companies challenge is that it must deliver on them.
The other day I received a great email from one of my favorite companies, Starbucks.
What are they doing that is so cool and innovative? A year or so ago, Starbucks launched an incredibly powerful service on their website called “my starbuck’s idea”. Just think of how bold of move this was. They understood just how passionate their customers are and they were willingly to hand over “control” of the company’s future to their customers.
Over the last year, they’ve been listening and making a lot of changes and improvements based on the feedback they received. They took this whole thing another step further – the Starbuck’s team posted the ideas online and allowed their customers to vote and comment on each other’s ideas. The ones that garnered a lot of feedback and responses were the ones the company took seriously and implemented. Talk about a great use of the “social web.”
But they didn’t stop there. Once they launched ideas, they talked about them (on their blog) and gave credit to the customers who gave them the idea. This is an amazing marketing tool, both for the innovations that came out of the process and the way they have made their loyal customers feel that much more involved in the Starbuck’s culture. This is another great example of a company that has figured out how to build community and manage customer relationships in an incredibly powerful and meaningful way.
At the heart of this issue is an interesting debate. I have heard and read a number of comments about why listening to customers does not work. Seth Godin talks about his all the time in his books. Allow me to paraphrase him for a second, ‘It is futile to listen to customers because they invariably won’t tell you anything new. They might offer you a critique or two about your business, but it will rarely lead to innovation. This is because consumers are inherently irrational and they do not know what they want.’ I am a big fan of Godin’s and though I understand what he is getting at when he talks about consumers this way, I think he actually misses on this one. It’s actually pretty arrogant to think that we, as marketeers, are the only ones who are innovative. Customers who are passionate about a brand will innovate. They will innovate and help you build a better business out of the love they have for your company. Just look at what Starbucks has done with their business model.
The Blog of Jason W. Sokol 