How Brands Build Advocates By Anticipating Needs
Why are brands constantly pissing us off online? Despite the opportunities for engagement that digital technologies provide, most companies’ customer service-focus has been reactionary. Brands only reach out to their customers when there is already a problem, if at all. Hello Pepco, “Most Hated” company in America, I’m talking to you.
But what if brands used digital technologies to take a proactive approach to customer service and delighted us with unexpected gestures that demonstrate how much they cared about us?
This session will explore companies like Warby Parker, The Ace Hotel and others that anticipate customer needs. We’ll explore the technology and digital marketing tactics they use to proactively reach out and make customers’ lives easier. We’ll also explain why these gestures convert customers into advocates who share their experiences with their networks. Finally we’ll outline the metrics companies can use to measure advocacy.
Presenters
Duke leads Parature’s corporate strategy to include marketing, new products, acquisitions and partnerships. He co-founded Parature in 2001 with a vision to provide superior customer support software accessible via the Internet, and today, Parature’s Software-as-a-Service product suite supports millions of end users worldwide in diverse industries from national associations to higher education, gaming and interactive media, manufacturing, services and technology.
Duke has been widely recognized for his efforts in pioneering innovation. He has been named to Fast Company’s Fast 50, Washington Business Journal’s 40 under 40, Washington Techway’s Top Technology Executives, SmartCEO magazine’s Smart100, Washingtonian magazine’s Power 150 and Bisnow Media’s ‘Top 35 under 35 Entrepreneur’ in the Washington, DC region.
Duke provides thought leadership and serves as the chief evangelist for Parature. He is a frequent speaker at industry events and conferences throughout the country including Digital East, the Customer Management Summit, CRM Magazine, SearchCRM, the Ernst & Young Cloud Computing Summit, the Social CRM Expo and Executive Biz. His speaking engagements also include the Stanford Business School, Darden School of Business, George Washington University, Georgetown University and the MIT Enterprise Forum. Outside of Parature, Duke enjoys basketball, biking, skiing and collecting.
Duke holds a Bachelor of Science in Operations Research and Industrial Engineering from Cornell University.
Leigh George, Ph.D.
Leigh is a branding and digital marketing expert with nearly a decade of agency and corporate experience helping brands connect with the audiences they are trying to reach. She believes passionately that brand image is inextricable from customer experience—brands emerge from the multitude of interactions consumers have with companies.
As director, digital strategy at R2integrated, a leading digital marketing and technology company based in Baltimore, MD, Leigh helps clients from start-ups to Fortune 500 companies develop, implement and track strategic plans for digital marketing, social media, websites and community engagement and influencer outreach. Before joining R2i, Leigh was director of strategy at Rock Creek Strategic Marketing and Moiré Marketing Partners.
Leigh is a frequent speaker on branding and digital marketing. Recent presentations have included Now, New and Next in Digital Marketing and Harnessing The Power of Influence. She has a Ph.D. in branding history and theory from Binghamton University—one of only a handful of people in the country with that distinction.
Saturday, March 10
