Emotionally engaged customers - Your biggest risk
- Morris Pentel
- Mar 17, 2021
- 4 min read
This is part 4 of measuring customer emotions series of extracts
*Emotion-Scores (e-scores for short) are a CXFO.Org emotion measurement tool
In the last extract I talked about the customers who are not really fans and with whom you don't have a strong emotional connection. Today I want to talk about the customers who are engaged.
Engaged Customers are your largest commercial risk.
Ironically we want engaged customers but they are dangerous. The reason is simple, because they are emotionally engaged they are an emotional state of movement or excitement if you prefer. If things go wrong then there is always a larger impact. If you think about it in your personal life the more engaged you are with someone the faster the relationship moves through events. If things go wrong they go wrong bigger and faster because they mean more.
The bigger the emotional crash.....the larger the cost in cash
Engaged customers
We want to start as simply as we can and go back to Basic E-Scale from the principal of emotional engagement we defined in the rough guide.
A Zero state
1 - Happy or sad or don’t care - it has no impact..
2 - Very happy or sad – it might have an impact
3 - Happy or sad to the point where it impacts today
4 - Happy or sad to the point where it impacts more than today
5 - Happy or sad to the point where I am no longer in control of the now
It's a very general term set structure for several reasons that would make this an even longer article so for the moment please accept that these definitions come after a great deal of behavioural research and consultation and I will defend then right up until the time someone comes up with a better system which I will welcome.
Customers - 3 Do care
"You won’t believe what happened to me"
Characteristics
Theoretically your largest active group
Theoretically your largest group with highest probability of positive outcome from intervention – biggest bang per buck in short term activities
Easier to interact with - 3s are active therefore more open to change
More interactive and likely to offer their opinion, both offline and online.
Will take action without prompting but will be stimulated by events or contact
Behaviours
Might engage in ‘customer work or sabotage’ - good or bad.
Caution
They are firm in their opinion to the extent of it being reasonable because it is important
Engaged in a quieter way and less keen to make this visible
Not necessarily a larger group than 4 and 5 .
+ Will do customer work* around much larger peaks of engagement and around organisations social engagement
- will be strongly negative is they have made their decision about you. However if converted likely to become a +4
Risk
Competitors targeting, to identify dissatisfaction and try to win over.
Can slip down scale or churn if an offer doesn’t meet their expectation.
Engaged but not loyal
High impact on some statistical models leads to poor strategy often
Action
Active support for 3’s although initially they may not appear to need it.
Adjust you statistical model - – elicited views are not representative of whole base in any way. They are a good insight to process
Build ways to engage more
Identify risk areas in the customer journey, to avoid any decline. May need to move from passive to active during customer journeys Reduce unnecessary contact.
4 IT MATTERS
"I have a strong opinion that’s important to me"
Characteristics
This relationship with you is part of who they currently are and how they define themselves
Highly motivated
States present a level of ‘cognitive dissonance’.
Actively engaged in customer work or brand sabotage.
Willing to publicly express their feelings.
Extrovert personality traits or extreme experience impact
4s have a higher expectation of an emotional response from the organisation than 3s.
Behaviours
+ spend money and create brand momentum They will tolerate occasional lapses of service or poor CX because of the higher stakes in relationship
- 4s will expect a consistently poor CX and create additional cost in all contact situations
Your first step with a -4 will be to manage the mood at the start of each experience
Trust is a key element of these states.
Risks
This state has higher risks of change and higher impacts when the change occurs.
The 4 state is likely to be both unstable and higher inherent risks of volatile active states
Financial. Higher Risks and rewards
Brand.
Operational
An organisations ability to organise the resource to meet this higher stakes situation is reputational risk
States present a level of ‘cognitive dissonance’.
Summary
3's and 4's are the easiest to deal with if you have emotionally relevant strategies to deal with them.
They are the most valuable in terms of insight and social leadership in developing communities and creating substance from what you say to who you are and what you do.
These 2 groups are responsible for your social identity good and bad so that is the value of your brand and a range of other things. They are the key your ability to innovate and adapt.
Although normally less transactionally relevant than other groups they have the largest impact on your share value and ROI.
Next time I will talk about the last group......of love and hate and those who exist in state 5.
Till then thanks for all the feedback
M
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