Traditional customer loyalty programs aren’t performing nearly as well as they used to. How can we forge loyalty with the next generation of customers?

Punch cards, reward points and other incentives have helped companies forge customer loyalty in the past. But these methods have lost a lot of ground! Customers are using technology to help them shop with hundreds, if not thousands of competitors. The advantages of saving up points or checking emails for short-lived discounts don’t seem as sexy to today’s consumers.

A new trend in customer loyalty is really taking off, especially with the next generation of consumers. Smart companies like Amazon have discovered a demand for pay-to-play loyalty programs. (In case you haven’t noticed, Amazon Prime has gotten HUGE!)

This is great news for everyone involved. Customers now know what to expect for their loyalty, and the companies who offer these programs see an immediate return on their investment. From a business owner’s perspective, this sure beats waiting forever and a day to see if those customers actually ever return!

But it’s not just big brands that are using similar strategies to create rock-solid relationships with customers. And if you’re still using a traditional model for your loyalty program, we’ve seen a lot of evidence that shows it may not be generating the loyal following your brand deserves. There may be a better way! Would your customers make an up-front financial commitment with the promise of continuing value?

Adam and Jeannie share some new ways companies are gaining an impressive following by innovating around the needs of today’s customers. How do they make it work? How did they know it was time for a change? Listen in and find out!

• Customers That Stick® post, Customer Loyalty: Winning Hearts and Minds
• 360Connext® post,  3 Themes for Driving Loyalty
• Infographic: The Science of Customer Loyalty
• Episode 097: The Best Customer Loyalty Metrics
• Episode 058: Jill Griffin, The Loyalty Maker
• Episode 057: Customer Loyalty Trumps Industry Disruption

Sponsor message:

Want to bring game-changing customer service training to your team? CTS Service Solutions offers a half-day in-person workshop designed to motivate and educate your customer-facing team members. Using energy, excitement, and interaction, our workshop helps frontline teams embrace a customer-centric outlook, then — using the principles from our book Be Your Customer’s Hero — gives them the skills and confidence they need to handle any service interaction. Don’t leave your frontline team hanging… Give them the training they deserve. Learn more at customerheroworkshop.com.

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Today’s guest shares his secrets for tying creative principles into brand experiences.

Creativity is the driver behind groundbreaking ideas and memorable brand experiences. And solving unforeseen customer service problems requires a level of finesse nobody can get from a script or rule book. In many ways, these things require the work of an artist.

However, those creating brand experiences often work in a typical corporate environment, where artistic thinking is easily stifled and forgotten. A true artist, as our guest Ron Tite explains, does not worry about ROI, competition or sales quotas.

Sound scary? Maybe, but companies like AirBNB have found success in truly creative solutions to real-life problems, and their competitors never saw it coming!

So how can you stay ahead of the next AirBNB in your industry? How can you BE the next AirBNB? Fear not. You can still find your inner artist!

Join us as we discuss how to create an environment that’s conducive to creative thinking. Ron shares tips for channeling your inner artist to deliver groundbreaking innovation, truly valuable content, and game-changing customer service solutions.

Trained at Toronto’s legendary Second City, Ron was named one of the “Top 10 Creative Canadians” by Marketing Magazine. He’s been an award winning advertising writer and Creative Director for some of the world’s most respected brands including Air France, Evian, Fidelity, Hershey, Johnson & Johnson, Kraft, Intel, Microsoft, Volvo, and many others. He is founder and CEO of content marketing agency The Tite Group, Executive Producer & Host of the Canadian Comedy Award-winning show Monkey Toast, and is a featured marketing expert on the new Mark Burnett-produced business reality show, Dream Funded. He has written for a number of other television series, penned a children’s book, and wrote, performed, and produced the play, The Canadian Baby Bonus. In demand as a speaker on innovation, branding, content marketing, and his own take on modern business, “The Expression Economy”, Ron has spoken to leading organizations all over the world. His upcoming book, Everyone’s An Artist (Or At Least They Should Be), will be published by HarperCollins in 2016.

Connect with Ron

• Twitter
• Linkedin
• Facebook
• Instagram

• Simon Sinek’s TED talk, Start with Why
• Adam Grant’s TED talk, The Surprising Habits of Original Thinkers
• Customers That Stick® post, To WOW Customers, Listen and Care
• 360Connext® post, 5 Silent Issues that Destroy Customer-Focused Innovation
• Episode 101: How the Innovation Process Fails Us
• Episode 106: J V Crum, Social Consciousness in Business

Sponsor message:

Do you know how to deliver the superior customer experience you visualize? We can help your team become a force for positive change, starting with a customer-centric mission. The Customer Experience Investigators™ at 360Connext specialize in helping companies across industries and around the globe develop and internalize unique and scalable customer-focused missions. To compete with the other 89% of companies staying afloat by providing better experiences, you need a compass for making astounding changes in the customer experience while breaking down the silos that are holding you back. We offer evaluations, workshops, and roadmaps to keep your wheels firmly planted on the road to a customer-centric future.

Join us on our mission To Create Fewer Ruined Days for Customers™ today. Visit us at 360Connext.com.

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What makes a great mobile app stand out from the majority that

Companies are quickly bridging the cross-channel gaps to deliver

Both having extensive backgrounds in customer-focused practices,

After all, only 16% of mobile apps get used more than

And why do most of them fail?

Many companies create apps simply because someone in a high

So do your customers need an app? Before you jump in

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Do you know how to deliver the superior customer experience you

Join us on our mission to Create Fewer Ruined Days for

Take care of yourself and take

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You have 5 seconds to win the customer in a retail setting. How

Marketing your brand in a retail setting today is more

Brand packaging, as our guest Terri Goldstein explains, used to

Smart package design is much more than just making the product

Package designers like Terri use a visual vocabulary based on

So how can you create packaging that speaks to your

Terri shares some standout examples of highly successful package

Terri Goldstein is the CEO and founder of The Goldstein Group.

Connect with Terri

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Want to bring

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You need rules and processes to keep things running smoothly. But do the resulting analog customer experiences give rise to serious pain points in your customer journey?

Artificial intelligence, customer service scripts and chat bots can be life-savers for your customer service team. It’s great when we find new ways to streamline and automate our processes, and even better when we find the solutions that are “just right.”

So what happens when we put those analog experiences on auto-pilot? What is actually happening?

Beware of the feeling that you’ve found the solution to all your problems!

Scripted responses tend to become the experience when employees are not empowered to use their judgement. And when we rely on technology that literally has no sense of judgement, we create experiences that make no sense to the customer in the moment.

Analog experiences often inadvertently ignore real service issues. And meanwhile, support tickets are being closed, and the “right” boxes are being checked off. Everything looks great from your perspective when customers are left feeling ignored or misunderstood.

Pay attention to what happens around those processes, or your analog experiences will eventually miss the mark and turn a customer who just needs a little help into a former customer.

Sponsor message:

Want to bring game-changing customer service training to your team? CTS Service Solutions offers a half-day in-person workshop designed to motivate and educate your customer-facing team members. Using energy, excitement, and interaction, our workshop helps frontline teams embrace a customer-centric outlook, then — using the principles from our book Be Your Customer’s Hero — gives them the skills and confidence they need to handle any service interaction. Don’t leave your frontline team hanging… Give them the training they deserve. Learn more at customerheroworkshop.com.

Take care of yourself and take care of your customers.

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Today’s guest discusses how he helps big hospitality brands improve the guest experience and forge better connections with their customers, resulting in explosive growth.

Mike Ganino shares how he helped companies like Potbelly and Protein Bar grow from small companies with only a handful of locations to beloved household names.

Wouldn’t you like to do this for your brand? It all comes back to culture and leadership.

Mike explains how he helps companies overcome the organizational challenges that have an impact on the customer experience. News flash: it’s not just training, or the tools and resources.

People in leadership roles need to understand the impact they have on the customer experience, and then understand the impact they want to have. And though many leaders already know this, they struggle to decide where and how to get started. That’s where Mike steps in!

Need to improve the service experience and grow your brand? Mike outlines the process that helps his clients transform their experiences and keep them consistently remarkable as they scale. Listen in!

Mike Ganino is a hospitality industry expert, global keynote speaker, and author of the upcoming Culture Kitchen: Recipes for Building a Great Brand. He is the former Chief Operating Officer at one of the hottest fast casual 2.0 brands (Protein Bar). Mike is a leading expert on building a brand that everyone wants to be part of by creating a captivating culture. He has worked with a number of category-leading brands like ChowNow, Uber, US Foods, Pressed Juicery, Protein Bar, Yum! Brands, Potbelly Sandwich Shop, and Lettuce Entertain You Enterprises.

Connect with Mike

Sponsor message:

Do you know how to deliver the superior customer experience you visualize? We can help your team become a force for positive change, starting with a customer-centric mission. The Customer Experience Investigators™ at 360Connext specialize in helping companies across industries and around the globe develop and internalize unique and scalable customer-focused missions. To compete with the other 89% of companies staying afloat by providing better experiences, you need a compass for making astounding changes in the customer experience while breaking down the silos that are holding you back. We offer evaluations, workshops, and roadmaps to keep your wheels firmly planted on the road to a customer-centric future.

Join us on our mission To Create Fewer Ruined Days for Customers™ today. Visit us at 360Connext.com.

Take care of yourself and take care of your customers.

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Adam and Jeannie discuss how the most innovative leaders in the fashion industry are responding to ever-increasing pressure to innovate quickly.

Today, fashion demands can change as fast as your Pinterest boards. Keeping up with these demands poses many challenges for retailers.

Burberry and Tom Ford are now promising the hottest new runway fashions will be available immediately, not six to eight months from now, which is the norm. How can retailers keep up without killing their margins with overstock and clearance sales?

Innovative retailers like Zara have proven traditional methods of inventory management and gathering feedback may be obsolete. They leverage the scarcity principle and real-time communication to streamline their inventories while staying on the cutting edge of fashion and building customer anticipation. What will this mean for larger retailers and discount outlets that carry a huge selection or high-end retailers that thrive on exclusivity?

Will customers demand rapid innovation in your industry? Adam and Jeannie have some tips to get you ready!

Sponsor message:

Do you know how to deliver the superior customer experience you visualize? We can help your team become a force for positive change, starting with a customer-centric mission. The Customer Experience Investigators™ at 360Connext specialize in helping companies across industries and around the globe develop and internalize unique and scalable customer-focused missions. To compete with the other 89% of companies staying afloat by providing better experiences, you need a compass for making astounding changes in the customer experience while breaking down the silos that are holding you back. We offer evaluations, workshops, and roadmaps to keep your wheels firmly planted on the road to a customer-centric future.

Join us on our mission to Create Fewer Ruined Days for Customers™ today. Visit us at 360Connext.com.

Take care of yourself and take care of your customers.

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Today’s guests discuss their new book, Blue Goldfish, and how companies can bridge the gap between people and technology in a world where human-to-human interaction is disappearing from the customer experience.

 According to Gartner, 80% of B2B transactions will occur without human-to-human interaction by the year 2020. That’s a pretty big game-changer!

While technology is creating some amazing opportunities to personalize the B2B experience, many companies are lagging behind in their efforts to leverage this technology to create a frictionless experience. And customers don’t care what’s going on behind the scenes to make the process impersonal and clunky. 

Companies like Amazon have managed to use technology to make it easy to do business with no human interaction whatsoever. How can we bridge the gap like they do?

Stan and Evan’s new book, Blue Goldfish, was written by crowdsourcing hundreds of great examples to help you understand how the best companies are staying on top of customer relationships while creating easy, innovative and memorable experiences. Our guests share a few of their favorite examples and explain the secrets behind their success.

Listen in to hear what’s next for digital customer experience, some exciting news about Stan and Evan’s upcoming books, and tips for making your digital experience frictionless.

Stan Phelps is the founder of 9 INCH, a consultancy that helps brands win the hearts of employees and customers. He has more than 20 years of global marketing experience with IMG, adidas, the PGA, and Synergy. An IBM Futurist, TEDx speaker, and contributor to Forbes, he has written four books: Purple Goldfish, Green Goldfish, Golden Goldfish, and Blue Goldfish. Stan lives in the Containment Area for Relocated Yankees in Cary, NC with his wife Jennifer and two boys, Thomas and James.

Connect with Stan

Evan Carroll is an author, speaker, and experience architect at Evan Carroll & Associates. His career spans roles in user experience, marketing, and product management for leading agencies and technology companies such as IBM, Capstrat, and Channel Advisor. He’s the author of two technology books: Your Digital Afterlife and Blue Goldfish. A North Carolina native, Evan has a BS and MS from UNC Chapel Hill and lives in Raleigh.

Connect with Evan

Sponsor message:

Want to bring game-changing customer service training to your team? CTS Service Solutions offers a half-day in-person workshop designed to motivate and educate your customer-facing team members. Using energy, excitement, and interaction, our workshop helps frontline teams embrace a customer-centric outlook, then — using the principles from our book Be Your Customer’s Hero — gives them the skills and confidence they need to handle any service interaction. Don’t leave your frontline team hanging… Give them the training they deserve. Learn more at customerheroworkshop.com.

Take care of yourself and take care of your customers.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Adam and Jeannie discuss cutting-edge new levels of customization and how they are making life better while changing how many companies do business.

We’ve talked a lot about the importance of personalization for customers. Typically, that applies mostly to how we communicate. Innovative ways of collecting and managing customer data have helped a great deal.

So what happens when highly-specialized customer data can be applied to advances in 3D printing and the Internet of Things? The word “customization” is about to take on a whole new meaning.

Adam and Jeannie  discuss new ways physical products can now be highly specialized to suit the  individual customer. For instance, ear buds can now be custom made to fit the  unique curves of someone’s ears, and customers are saying it’s well worth the extra few dollars and wait time.

With these new capabilities, there are many exciting opportunities on the horizon. But they certainly won’t come without new challenges! How can this level of customization be delivered on a larger scale? And what happens to large and small manufacturers when we have cheaper 3D printing capabilities at home?

We’re right on the edge of a huge change in the way we perceive and execute customization. What could this mean for your own business? Listen in!

Sponsor message:

Want to bring game-changing customer service training to your team? CTS Service Solutions offers a half-day in-person workshop designed to motivate and educate your customer-facing team members. Using energy, excitement, and interaction, our workshop helps frontline teams embrace a customer-centric outlook, then — using the principles from our book Be Your Customer’s Hero — gives them the skills and confidence they need to handle any service interaction. Don’t leave your frontline team hanging… Give them the training they deserve. Learn more at customerheroworkshop.com.

Take care of yourself and take care of your customers.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Today’s guest shares the principles of social consciousness in business, and how he made millions providing intrinsic value.

Are you in business to solve real problems for people, or are you in business to put money in your pocket? This is a question today’s guest J V Crum would really like to ask yourself. At the core of building a great company today, J V explains, you must approach business from a consciousness perspective.

J V gives us some highlights from his book and introduces the concept of Second-Stage Capitalism, where it’s just as much about the success of everyone involved- including the customer- as it is for the success of the business or business owner.

Take it from a self-made millionaire: The days of making a sustainable fortune by marketing another useless gadget are over. To succeed in today’s business world, you need to provide intrinsic value. You need to understand how your product or service and the experience around it brings your customers and society as a whole to a better state.

J V also explains the importance of strong customer experience principles in building and maintaining any business today. By combining social consciousness and excellent customer experience, J V has built a solid reputation and a strong foundation for doing good business. (Did we mention he made millions??)  Listen in and learn his secrets!

J V Crum III, JD, MBA, became a self-made entrepreneur millionaire in his twenties. He is a best-selling author, keynote speaker, certified business coach, licensed attorney, serial entrepreneur, Huffington Post Columnist on conscious business, and is host of the #1 Ranked “Conscious Millionaire Podcast”, which is broadcast M-F. He is the Founder and CEO of Conscious Millionaire Institute LLC, a global entrepreneur business coaching, training, and wealth-product business.

Connect with J V

Sponsor message:

Do you know how to deliver the superior customer experience you visualize? We can help your team become a force for positive change, starting with a customer-centric mission. The Customer Experience Investigators™ at 360Connext specialize in helping companies across industries and around the globe develop and internalize unique and scalable customer-focused missions. To compete with the other 89% of companies staying afloat by providing better experiences, you need a compass for making astounding changes in the customer experience while breaking down the silos that are holding you back. We offer evaluations, workshops, and roadmaps to keep your wheels firmly planted on the road to a customer-centric future.

Join us on our mission to Create Fewer Ruined Days for Customers™ today. Visit us at 360Connext.com.

Take care of yourself and take care of your customers.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices