Why is Customer Engagement a Key Marketing Lever?

Why is Customer Engagement a Key Marketing Lever?

October 8, 2021

Why is Customer Engagement a Key Marketing Lever?

October 8, 2021

Customer engagement has become an important theme in the marketing world. But what exactly is customer engagement? What levers can you use to create customer engagement? Your revenue and image will definitely benefit from a customer engagement strategy.

Customer Engagement, a Vector of Customer Satisfaction and Strong Business Lever

Customer knowledge and customer satisfaction are the two main objectives of marketing. If you read our blog regularly, then you know how important it is to get to know your customers and take customer satisfaction seriously.

What is Customer Engagement?

Customer engagement is a strategy that consists of getting customers involved in company interactions, making them proactive in the creation and deployment of a brand’s image.
An engaged customer is a customer who is actively involved in defining a company’s marketing strategy: they give ideas, via surveys or other, and talk to others about your brand.Customer engagement is closely linked to customer satisfaction. For a customer to be engaged with a brand, they have to be satisfied. True brand ambassadors are first and foremost satisfied customers.

But customer engagement is far more than satisfaction. Satisfaction is passive, whereas engagement implies active customer involvement.

Word-of-mouth is without a doubt the easiest and oldest form of customer engagement. The development of new information technologies, and in particular social media, has enabled word-of-mouth to reach further than ever before.

The Benefits of Customer Engagement

• Engaged customers are, by very definition, the most loyal. Customer engagement builds loyalty and retention.
• Customer engagement promotes word-of-mouth, particularly on the internet. Engaged customers are influencers and help acquire new customers.
• Customer engagement also enhances your brand image.
• Creating customer engagement allows to delegate part of your work to your most loyal customers. Engaged customers promote your brand for free.
• Engaged customers can provide ideas on how to improve your company’s way of working and your product or service range.
• A customer engagement strategy creates a strong emotional bond between you and your customers.

How to Engage Your Customers

Engage Your Customers via Satisfaction Surveys

To develop a customer engagement marketing strategy, you first need to do everything you can to satisfy your customers. To cultivate a customer-centric philosophy.

Sending your customers surveys is the first effective step in your engagement strategy. A customer taking part in a customer survey is a first sign of their engagement. Encourage customer interaction with satisfaction surveys.

Identify Your Brand Promoters

You then need to identify your brand ambassadors. To keep them talking about your brand, you need to pamper them, address them personally by email or phone, send them special deals, loyalty programmes, invitations to events, etc.

Those who respond very positively to your satisfaction surveys could be great candidates for your ambassador programme. They will be delighted to be invited.

Create Engagement with Quizzes and Competitions

Another way to encourage customer engagement is competitions or quizzes. Competitions are classic marketing tools. They enable you to collect lots of email addresses and maybe go viral, particularly on social media.

Highlight Your Customers in Your External Communication

You could, for example, insert an interview with a loyal customer in your newsletter. Or highlight customer comments on your website. Setting up open discussion forums is also another way to showcase your customers’ involvement.

All these actions aimed at your loyal customers and promoters should be incorporated into a coherent customer engagement policy, to be adopted by your marketing department, community managers, customer relations, CSM, etc. In other words, you need to optimise your internal communication within your company.