Building Trust and Loyalty: Constructing a Brand Dialogue with your Consumers
This session actually lived up to the promotional description, as two clients and their agency counterparts talked about building digital strategies to better engage consumers. The panel was moderated by Kenneth Cassar, Chief Analyst and Senior Director, Industry Solutions, Nielsen/Netratings. Panelists included Mark Hillman, Chief Creative Officer, Resource Interactive, Chris Keith, Associate Marketing Director, Herbal Essence, Proctor & Gamble, Mark Renshaw, Senior VP, One-to-One Marketing Solutions, Arc Worldwide and Laurie Clithero, Interactive Brand Manager, Nestle Purina PetCare Company.
Though we got off to a weak start when Kenneth Cassar asked the question "Will the internet ever be as impactful as television"? Huh? The panelists responded intelligently with a unanimous "duh, yeah..." but without the sarcasm. Mark Renshaw from Arc Worldwide dutifully pointed out the fact that the internet is interactive and allows companies to create dialogues with their customers. Ten minutes into the session and I was very worried.
The next question from Kenneth brought the discussion to life; "What's your philosophy on consumer control of content"? Chris Keith, Associate Marketing Director, Herbal Essence, Proctor & Gamble, candidly admitted there wasn't as much consumer involvement with shampoo as there might be in other categories and this presented challenges with regard to brand engagement. He believes "We need to find ways to share control with the consumer, not keep control from them." To this end, he talked about the huge interest in celebrity hairstyles and how they're considering doing something that draws consumers into their site to somehow make better connections with their brands. Not yet well developed but it sounded like a good idea to me.
Mark Hillman, Chief Creative Officer, Resource Interactive, said "Consumers are going to take control, regardless of whether you want them to or not." Kenneth Cassar brought up the Diet Coke/Mentos viral videos as an example of this point. Coke did not approve of the explosive-spew videos at first, but soon realized the opportunity and they created a viral video contest that helped extend the interest in their brand. Mentos went on to create the Mentos Intern site (http://www.mentosintern.com/), which is a funny, interactive expression of their brand personality and a great example of encouraging consumer involvement, if not control of a brand.
The audience was invited to contribute, and someone asked Laurie Clithero, Interactive Brand Manager, Nestle Purina PetCare Company, how she used their web site to respond to the recent pet food poisoning scare. Laurie said each brand site dealt with the issue individually, and all available information was shared online so the very best information was found on their own web sites. That prompted Kenneth Cassar to raise another question to the panel about internal control of the content. He said corporate web sites used to be managed by the "PR lackey," which drew a lot of laughs and an immediate awareness that he hadn't thoughtfully considered his audience.
Another audience member asked how clients choose between creating content on their corporate site versus creating a micro-site and how they measure ROI. Mark Renshaw acknowledged many clients choose to go the micro-site approach in order to evade the corporate brand guidelines that restrict design and message. I thought this was very honest and brave, especially considering his client was sitting next to him. His client, Laurie Clithero then admitted she didn't have a good answer for measuring ROI, which launched several comments from the panel explaining (justifying) why we can't always hold the internet accountable for ROI. Interesting.
The panel wrapped up with a discussion of multi-channel planning and how companies decide how much to invest in the internet versus other marketing tools. Not surprisingly, the answers were vague, but the hour was mostly clear, informative and even entertaining. I can't wait for the future when we'll learn if the internet ever became as big as television.
