Building trust with customers is an absolute imperative for marketers to better engage and earn brand loyalty.
A new report from EY and Forbes Insights, Building Trusted Relationships Through Analytics and Experience, says that less than 33% of CMOs and marketing executives fully understand the point in the customer experience where trust is eroded, and only half are able to address negative experiences at the customer touch point.
What’s more, marketers need to leverage real-time data and analytics to be predictive.
Here are some key takeaways from the eye-opening report:
91% of CMOs feel that building trusted customer relationships is a significant focus of their departments’ strategic and competitive vision
87% of CMOs say their strategic vision includes the customer experience, and they recognize that they need to embrace the latest data and analytics technologies in order to build credibility and long-term relationships with customers.
Less than a third (30%) say with full confidence that their department or company has a full grasp of where in the customer life cycle the trust is breaking down
Yet 38% of respondents strongly agree that they are leveraging analytics to understand where trust is being eroded in the experience life cycle.
Over the next two years, 81% of CMOs say that data and analytics will be an important tool with which to build and measure trust
Nearly three-quarters (73%) of marketers say they use analytics to check if the brand promise is being kept throughout the customer’s interaction with the company
Most executives (51%) believe that there is a significant opportunity in the use of analytics for customer insight and in expanding the use of external data sources
Just 37% say they have the capability to use analytics to tailor communications and outreach to the customer
67% of survey respondents agreed or strongly agreed that the customer experience requires collaboration outside of marketing. By having a better grasp of data and analytics, marketers may be able to take more control of the customer experience.
“Companies understand that building relationships and trust are the ultimate goal,” said Woody Driggs, EY’s Global Advisory Leader, Customer Practice. “Consumers have become more sophisticated. Their expectations are higher, they want a personalized experience and they want two-way communication. Companies need to leverage real-time data and analytics to enable them to be forward-looking and predictive, to know what the customer wants even before they do.”
Bruce Rogers, Chief Insights Officer at Forbes Media, believes that marketers and executives across the board continue to recognize the significance of data and analytics to inspire confidence with customers and to personalize the relationship.
“More importantly, executives know there is room for improvement in their use of analytics,” Rogers said. “They need to remember that the data they acquire via the customer is a privilege, and use that approach to build trust.”