Customer touch points (also called touchpoints) serve the same purpose in global marketing. They reflect important encounters that occur throughout the customer’s journey. You get a complete picture of what a typical consumer experiences in global marketing with your firm when you organize them chronologically.
In this article, we’ll look at what consumer contact points are and how they affect marketing and customer service teams. After that, we’ll go through several touch point examples and tried-and-true methods for integrating them in your firm.
To monitor customer contact points, a customer journey map is employed. They’re organized in chronological sequence to depict how a typical client interacts with a business.
There are various factors to consider before making a purchase.
Related: What Is Lead Nurturing And What Are The Right Tactics?
1. Social Media And The Internet
Although social media may be used in any of the categories of this list, it is most typically used to acquire new customers in global marketing. It makes sense since social media is a low-cost way to reach a large portion of your target market. You may use it to promote products, build consumer connections, and boost your brand’s overall reputation.
2. Use Of The Internet As A Medium For Advertising
Have you ever seen banner advertisements at the top or sidebar of a website? These are the touchpoints that encourage people to return to your website. It’s a successful strategy for certain companies, such as Best Buy, to boost traffic to their websites.
3. Digital Marketing Content
Apart from commercials, digital marketing content is any material that your company publishes on the internet to promote its brand. Promotional videos, infographics, and fun blog pieces, such as this one, are examples of these resources.
4. Business Functions
You may have attended a conference this year where you advertise your company by standing at a booth if you work in marketing or sales. These events are an excellent way to introduce your brand to prospective customers who are unfamiliar with it.
5. A peer referral
It’s no secret that customers trust their friends more than your marketing. According to 83 percent of customers, friends and family are the most trusted referral sources. As a result, if a company wants to be trusted, it must prioritize word-of-mouth marketing.
6. Conversations With Company Representatives
Conversations with clients in person are the most direct way to communicate with them in global marketing. The impact of these in-store chats on a customer’s purchasing decision is immediate.
7. Catalogs Of Products
Catalogs, whether digital or printed, are an excellent method to display your work.
Related: What is message optimization?
8. E-business
For many businesses, ecommerce is the most effective way to acquire customers and complete deals in global marketing. A small firm in one location may supply items and services to a consumer on the other side of the globe since websites are accessible from anywhere in the world.
9. Product Assessments
In today’s digital age, product reviews are no longer a pre-purchase touchpoint in global marketing. Customers increasingly own smart gadgets that allow them to read product reviews while browsing in your shops. Additionally, some online retailers provide reviews on the listing page, enabling you to read what other customers have to say without having to leave the website. This contact point is shown in the graphic below.
Related: Lead Generation: Can It Be Useful For Your Products?
10. Points Of Sale
This is your consumers’ last point of interaction before they make a purchase. It’s critical to pay attention since this is where your salesman makes their case for why the customer needs your product. For many businesses, this is a crucial stage in the customer journey.
11. Thank-you letters
Following up with a thank you note is an effective way to build connections with clients. This might be an email or, if feasible, a handwritten message thanking consumers for their business. It’s an excellent way to show them you care and establish a long-term friendship.
12. Surveys Of Product Evaluation
Product feedback surveys are given out after a transaction to assess the customer’s experience with your product or service. If a customer posts a negative review, the company might reach out to them to learn more about the issue. They then pass this information on to the product development team, who use it to enhance the product for the next version.
13. Upselling And Cross-Selling Emails
A customer’s requirements do not disappear after a transaction. In actuality, as customers begin to use your product, they may have new needs.
This allows you to upsell or cross-sell more costly or premium goods in your business to consumers. As an example, consider the following.
Related: What is email marketing?
14. Procedures For Billing
Billing is a part of this checklist that is sometimes forgotten. This is because it happens after the client makes a purchase and has no influence on the customer’s choice to buy your goods. However, it is still a crucial stage in the customer journey since if not managed properly, a negative experience may rapidly lead to churn.
15. Subscription Renewals
Renewals are crucial to a subscription-based company’s revenue strategy. Clients must renew their memberships in order for your firm to continue to develop. As a consequence, it’s vital that you remove as much friction as possible in your renewal process. It’s intended to be challenging, after all.
16. Customer Support Channels
A customer support channel is any platform that service agents utilize to interact with customers. This may be done by chat, email, phone, social media, peer review sites, and other means. Businesses must invest in omni-channel help if they want to create a fantastic experience for their consumers.
17. Customer Satisfaction Program
Customer success initiatives include a lot of different contact points. When a customer success department sees a potential problem in global marketing, they contact consumers to let them know about it and provide a solution. This demonstrates a commitment to the customer’s goals, which leads to stronger rapport over time.
18. New Client Onboarding
Customer onboarding is a common point of contact for service teams in global marketing because many customers abandon products shortly after purchase. This is because they either do not understand how to use it or do not have the time to learn. Both of these factors contribute to churn, making successful onboarding programs critical for businesses.
19. Customers’ Loyalty Programs
Loyalty programs are another important contact point that service staff should be aware of. These activities assist you in strengthening your client connections and converting them into lifetime supporters in global marketing. People will be more inclined to write positive reviews about your company if you reward them with special advantages and discounts.
20. Self-Service Resources
Consumers in a hurry or with a brief question for your support staff may not want to spend 20 minutes on line for a professional; instead, you may give self-service tools such as troubleshooting processes that customers can do on their own. They won’t have to wait for replies from your customer service staff, and they’ll be able to resolve issues on their own time, making your product more convenient and user-friendly.
Including Customer Touchpoints In Your Business
By using customer touchpoints, you may greatly enhance the customer experience. Not all contact points, however, will be ideal for your company. You may not have an online catalog if you’re a SaaS firm, for example. If you operate a one-person business, your customer is unlikely to encounter a sales team.
To create a customized customer touchpoint map, follow the steps below.
1. Put Yourself In Your Customers’ Shoes.
First and foremost, put yourself in your consumers’ position and consider the steps they take before making a purchase decision. What’s the first place they’ll look? What variables do people take into account while making a purchase? What happens if people have problems with the product while using it?
Let’s take a look at a customer journey.
When a customer recognizes a problem, he or she starts looking for solutions.
After they’ve found a solution, they look for a specific product. They use Google to hunt for things, then go to merchant websites like Amazon to see what’s available.
They search the internet for product reviews.
After acquiring enough information, they purchase the prod.
They make use of the product, but they have issues with it. They look for books and tools to assist them in determining how to solve the problem on their own.
They seek help from a customer service representative.
Assign each of these client activities to a single touchpoint after that. Here’s an illustration of what it may look like:
Touchpoint one: A well-designed blog that covers topics that your customers are interested in.
Touchpoint two: A sequence of sponsored adverts on Google and Amazon product pages.
Touchpoint three: A collection of unsponsored product reviews on your website.
A customer portal is the fourth touchpoint, and it allows customers to check out and track their orders.
The fifth touchpoint is self-service alternatives such as knowledge bases and product how-tos.
Touchpoint six: A customer service portal or phone number that they can use to contact you.
2. Determine What Is Feasible Given Your Organization’s Size And Budget.
Now that you’ve got a good idea of what resources and information your customers will need along their journey, it’s time to figure out which ones will be the easiest to implement given your company’s size and budget.
3. Create Tasks For Touchpoints.
It’s one thing to choose the touch points; it’s quite another to turn them into actionable tasks. It’s time to put your plan into action now that you’ve determined what’s realistic.
4. Use Software Tools To Automate Touch Point Tasks.
Use marketing, sales, and service software in global marketing to ensure that touch point tasks are completed effectively and with minimal intervention.
Consider this scenario: You’ve decided to use social media marketing as your first point of contact, but you only have a three-person marketing team and aren’t sure where to start. You should consider using a social media management tool like HubSpot’s Social Inbox (included in Marketing Hub). If your staff is new to social media management, you may also have everyone undergo a social media certification course.
Customer Touchpoints May Be Used To Improve The Customer Journey.
Using customer contact points, you can participate in every stage of the customer journey in global marketing. There is no margin for error. You, on the other hand, offer accurate information at exactly the right moment. Touchpoints may help you boost client retention and growth, whether you’re a one-person firm or a major organization.
