How To Make Customers Love Your Brand

Consider this, if you almost know everything about a certain thing, for instance marketing, the nitty-gritty of marketing, facts & figures related to marketing, in a nutshell almost all the details of it, what would it mean ?

Well it means you are taking a lot of interest in marketing, you spend most of your time, money, other resources in reading, experimenting, exploring marketing, right ? 

And it is more likely that you will keep doing it as long as there is marketing right ?

Let’s consider another example, if someone knows a lot about Apple Inc brand, its various flagships like iphone, ipad, ipod etc all the details about it, most of its features, how it can help you do certain tasks effectively, why iphone is better than Samsung galaxy S4 etc.

What does it mean? Well it means that, that particular individual is having great interest in Apple Inc products, he spends a lot of his time, money etc in order to satisfy his/her thirst of interest by using  Apple Inc products, by experiencing them, by utilizing them etc.

So in a nutshell when more a person knows a lot about something, like how it works, what purpose it serves, what benefits it deliver etc then that means he/she is really interested in that “something” and that’s why you won’t find Samsung lover (who knows in greater detail about Samsung products or product) talking about Apple iPhone and vice-versa.

And for that very reason the Samsung lover is more likely to advocate, more likely to buy, more likely to remain loyal to Samsung, right ?! Of course!!!

One Thing!

So what’s the point ?!

The point is, “attention to details, having deeper knowledge, information, understanding etc about something” means one thing.

That, that person is highly interested in that thing.

Construal Level Theory

Now such high level and low level of interest has been explained by various theories with quite substantial facts in their support. But the more sound and most valid one is the “Construal Level Theory” now before getting into what it says about high level of interest.

Don't worry we getting there, the main topic of the article "How to make customers love your brand"! Just bear with me few more minutes, you won't regret it! trust me!

K!, let me give you a brief summary of this theory from Wikipedia which defined it as “The general idea is that the more distant an object is from an individual, the more abstract (general understanding, seeing the big picture only, having low interest) it will be thought of, while the closer the object is the more concretely (deeper understanding, attention to details, having high interest)it will be thought of”.

It talks about remoteness/proximity in terms of four things that are as follow:

1.      Time

2.      Space

3.      Social distance (interpersonal distances, such as distance between two different groups or two dissimilar people or in our case distance between a brand, product/service and target market)

4.      hypothetical distances (imagining that an event is likely or unlikely or (in our case) a product/service that is real, how closer it is to reality and how big is that reality, for instance how abound and widely spread a product/service or brand is, for example Coca-Cola Vs Amrat Cola (a local drink from Pakistan)  etc.
 

Time

Now for instance a product/service that would only be available by year 2020 (Time) the potential customer is likely to have high construal level (lower interest, having just general understanding) of that product service but what if the product/service is going to be made available in 2015 (Time) or in next couple of months, then the potential customer will have low construal level (higher interest, having more understanding). 

And as we all know people generally give a lot of value to the most immediate events, outcomes and overlook things in remote future, therefore delivering right product/service in right time is essential for achieving customer’s interest. 

Not to mention that according to a study 74% customers consider late, untimely response to be one of  the major cause of their dissatisfaction ⁽¹⁾. 

Space

Likewise if a product/service is available in Japan while the potential customer is Siberia, it is more likely that, that individual will have high construal level and vice-versa.

Social Distance

Similarly for social distance, if a brand, product/service is related, socially to a particular culture, region, people, social class, certain society segment, then this product/service will get low construal level (higher interest, having deeper understanding) from that specific society segment, specific culture or region and vice-versa. 

And perhaps that’s why most brands go for “social epidemic”⁽²⁾ that results in higher customers interest in the brand (product/service). 

Social epidemic is:

Step 1.       Picking up people from a social segment, group with rare social gifts like Cristiano Ronaldo from sport loving segment, more specifically youth who love soccer and where Cristiano has a rare social gift of millions of fans around the globe.

Step 2.      Associating your brand with these people (people having rare social gifts)

Step 3.      Using their influence to influence the masses for the benefit of your brand. That is to increase customers’ interest, to improve brand awareness so on and so forth.

Hypothetical Distance

And the same goes for hypothetical distance.

 

Okay got it, what’s the point?

Good question, the point is if a product/service has low construal level (higher interest, having deeper understanding) in terms all the above four factors then that mean that, that particular brand, product/service is getting high level of interest from its target market.

And as we know, we all want our businesses to grow, to prosper therefore we need to utilize this approach to get our target market interest, involvement in our brand, in our offerings.

Okay how can I do that ?!

  

Research

Research your target market in terms of construal level, like what is their construal level in terms of time, in terms of space, in terms of social distance so on and so forth.

Once you identify the construal level in terms of these four factors, then you need to identify high construal level and mediocre low construal level in these four factors. 

And next step is to find means, methods to reduce that high construal level or to improve mediocre construal level by bringing it to low construal level (higher interest, having deeper understanding).

This whole approach will result in a highly interested customer, a customer that is more likely to buy your product/service, more likely to advocate about your brand, more likely to stay loyal so on and so forth.

That's it, its your turn to add something ;)

You may also like to read How to Develop Emotional Aspect of your Product

You may also like to read Six Must Skills for a Marketing Manager

You may also like to read Customer Dealing: Balancing the Two Sides of the Same Coin

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References:

1.      http://www.accenture.com/SiteCollectionDocuments/PDF/Accenture-Global-Consumer-Pulse-Research-Study-2013-Key-Findings.pdf
2.      Gladwell, M. (2000) The Tipping Point. Little, Brown and Co, New York, NY.