Every marketer understands their target market, but how intimately you understand them varies. Getting involved with customer support teaches you a lot about your target market, and lets you intimately understand their needs, wants and motivations.

You'll learn not only what they want to use your product or service for, but why they want to use it. You'll learn the language they use to describe it and how they see it. There is no better way to hold a mirror up to your company than to talk to your customers about their experiences with your product.

Take Carol, for example. Carol is a customer of ours that I've helped on a few occasions with technical support. And she's taught me a lot about our market - while some of it isn't news, it's confirmation that our approach is correct. For example, here's a few things I know because of my support interactions with her:

• She needs support. Free technical support and the ability to talk to us during our support Q&A webinars is a big reason that she loves us.
• She loves to learn. She's constantly exploring and learning more about functions in the system she could use, and she really appreciates our business advice (not just tech advice). This has influenced our blog's direction and our technical documentation's direction to include a little background, too.
• She doesn't know what a CMS (Content Management System) is. She just works on her website. This isn't a surprise and we don't use that acronym ourselves, but it's a good example of how you can glean knowledge of how customers talk and understand your product.

These traits are common to a large chunk of our market, and there are many more. We've got several customers that we have interacted with over time, and they've become archetypes of our target market.

So after all your effort doing support and customer service, let's say you've gained a deeper understanding of your product and your target market. Now we can put that to work in our marketing messages.

Creating a More Authentic Message.

After my experience with customer support, I've definitely gained a great deal of understanding about our product and our customers, and I would expect that most marketers would find the same thing. Doing support at GoodBarry, I can say that I have:

• Better understanding about which features our customers use the most
• Greater appreciation of the areas of the system are easiest to use and which are harder.
• Knowledge of the strengths of our products, according to the customer
• Better understanding of what motivates and excites customers

Now your product or support may be different to GoodBarry's, but I would bet that similar benefits would be gained anywhere.

To put it simply: I can see the product in it's true form, as it really is - not in an academic light. This then feeds directly into our marketing messages, making them far more authentic for our audience.

So how can you create a more authentic message?  By applying those lessons you've learned from your time with your customers. By using that authentic experience and true understanding you gain from dealing with customers after they've purchased, you can create marketing messages that:

• Set the right expectations - just as my laptop technician did.
• Communicate the most attractive benefits of the product - as Carol has shown us
• Better motivate your prospects to buy - by using the language the customer uses and the benefits they find most attractive in real-life usage.

And most importantly, these marketing messages are true and authentic - so they don't disappoint.

Word of Mouth Marketing That Sticks and Stays.

The best thing about authentic messages: customers repeat them. If they don't agree with your message they'll make up their own, which may or may not be favorable to you. But if they do agree with you, they'll just repeat your message. It's easier that way!

Real marketing messages that aren't mere puffery and positioning but true representations of the benefits of your product spread smoothly and are accepted easily. Authentic marketing messages are a big part in successful word of mouth marketing.

Some Caveats and a Final Word

Maybe you're involved in customer service every day, and if so that's great. My primary role is as a marketer, but I'm also involved in support and training at GoodBarry. And I'm confident that this has helped improve our product and hone our messages.

Of course, not everyone can do support or customer service. Technical support in some organizations requires some serious knowledge that marketers might not have. But what you can do is sit next to them, listen to their customer calls or read their support tickets. Maybe you can pull the support team into your next marketing meeting and see what they think of your ideas.

Traditionally, marketers have worked with sales and legal departments, but the customer service team is too often ignored. These guys are at the forefront of dealing with your happiest and unhappiest customers, they know your product inside out and can tell you in five minutes the best and worst things about your service.

My key point is that as marketers, you should engage and understand the customer service side of your business. Talk to them, sit next to them, try doing their job for a day or two.

Trust me, it's worth it.

Marketers, Lawyers, Politicians. These three groups are often accused of misleading people by spinning tales and moonshine. Marketers in particular are known for their ability to spin tales about anything. We're known for the ability to excite and amaze, grab people's attention and keep it for a while. That's our job as storytellers.

So what happens when the story you're telling isn't entirely true? The lights fade and some people buy and then they learn after a while that you sold them on a story that wasn't entirely real. At best these people will be mildly disappointed. At worst they'll be downright angry. In either case, they will not listen to you again.

Marketers now face the toughest, most cynical audience ever - and it's largely our own fault. The above scenario has happened too much and too often, as we've exaggerated the benefits and hidden the flaws of our products in an effort to sell ever more.  As banner click through rates continue to decline and most ads being largely ignored, we are becoming more and more desperate to cut through the noise and make an impact.

The Authentic Marketing Message

If there is any lesson from the advent of Web 2.0 and the rise of "New Marketing", it's that consumers are people; they like to be engaged and they like to be told the truth. In regaining the trust of consumers it's time to sit back and be a little more honest. To cut through the noise and make an impact, we need to create more authentic marketing messages.

So what's the best path to do this? How can we create a more effective marketing messages and product promises that resonate with the consumer that the customer willingly spreads?

I'm suggesting a novel approach that we use at GoodBarry: get you and your marketing team to help out with customer service and support.

Get Involved with Customer Support.

Whatever that is for your company, get on the front line and get involved. Do some tech support, some phone support, some front desk customer service. Hear the real voices of your real customers telling you their real thoughts.

There are two reasons you should do this.

Get "Real World" Product Knowledge.

Most marketers do understand their product and what it does. Unfortunately, this isn't really the complete picture. Real product understanding comes from knowing more than the specifications, size, color and so forth. You need to know how the product is used in the real world and what the stumbling blocks are in the wild.

Which parts break most often? I remember a laptop I had once had a broken keyboard. When I called the support line and started to explain what I needed, the technician said "Ah, no problems. You need your keyboard replaced, we'll send someone out. The keyboards are easy to replace, it'll only take them a moment."

Apparently, people's keyboards on this laptop were always falling apart! The support technician knew this and knew how to take action. I'm sure he passed this on to the manufacturing department, but the point is - he knew the stumbling blocks for his product and he knew that the modular design meant it wasn't going to be hard to replace. This was a big plus, since I couldn't afford to not have my laptop for long.

By getting your hands dirty with customer support, you get to see your products in the wild, being used or consumed by real people. You'll see what they complain about, what they really love and what they hate. You'll begin to see your product through your customers eyes and understand its flaws, limitations and qualities.

That’s it for this time – next post we’ll follow up with the second reason that marketers should get involved with customer service!

Every business owner wants to increase conversions. Whether it's trying to get browsers in your street level clothing store to buy, or website visitors to add a product to their cart, we're all playing a game of converting browsers into buyers.

Naturally there are some browsers in your shop that are really quite serious and almost ready to buy. And there are also various degrees of browsers. I'm going to bunch all the browsing customers and call them Window Shoppers - ranging from completely uncommitted passers by to browsers in your shop tugging at a new sweater.

Recently I was in a store that I had no intention of buying anything from. As I walked through the store casting my eyes around, I started wondering:

How could this store's owner turn ME into a buyer?

Which leads me to a second thought. If I'm in your store I'm 1000 times more valuable than someone in the street, even if I have no intention of buying today. Why? Because you have my attention. It's your shop, your staff and your message. You should have a pretty good chance of converting me. Maybe not today, but one day. Buying decisions are often cumulative things.

But before we get too deep into this, let's try and get inside the head of a window shopper.

The Window Shopping Syndrome

While this would apply to both online and offline stores, I'm going to focus on ecommerce, or online stores. In this context, a window shopper is someone browsing your ecommerce store.

Window shoppers, the lovable little creatures that we are, share some similarities in the way they think. I've identified two things that are true of online window shoppers (By Brett's hand-waving theory of common sense and reasoning).

1. They're actually looking for a product they want that you have, but they're not ready to buy yet. This is sometimes called pre-shopping - finding out information and prices etc before the purchase.
2. They're interested in some information that you have, or just like to look at the latest widget thingy-ma-bob. They're a fan. In any case, they're not buying anything in particular, but you probably sell products or have information that they're generally interested in.

Thankfully when your shop is online your visitors are usually fairly targeted already. You're not so likely to get people wandering onto your website who are just waiting for their tardy friend.

So if that's what they're, how can we keep them happy? How can we convert these browsers into buyers - even though they're not really thinking of buying?

I think there's two things to accept up front:

• They probably won't buy today.
• They might buy in the future, but you can't be sure.

With that in mind, we've got to come up with ways so that they remember us when they DO want to buy.

3 Tactics to Increase Conversions: Recruit the Window Shoppers

Use Email Newsletters to Snag Future Customers

Have you got an email newsletter? Throughout your site, think about how you can prominently display your newsletter. Explicitly ask your website users to subscribe to your newsletter.

Use wording to incentivize the sign up - remember, you have to answer their inevitable question "why should I sign up? Phrases like "Sign up to receive updates on our products" are okay, but not as good as "sign up and receive discounts inside our monthly newsletter". Make sure you follow up on these promises though!

Give the Fans Even More Great Content

Search engines love content; so do fans. If you have reviews and comments on the latest iPod, it will be of interest to iPod fans. Write honest reviews of your products. Take photos and post them. Make videos showing you using the product or service if possible, and put them on YouTube. These things make your site a hub of information for people, and make you their top-of-mind store to buy their favorite widget from.

Build a Community

People like to hang out. They like to discuss and post their thoughts. Give your visitors a reason to stay! You can use Forums - why not link your forums to your products, so that people can discuss particular products? Or you could simply enable comments on your online store so that people can tell others what they think.

The 4Cs

Most of these ideas are easily derived out of the 4Cs framework - it's all about Content, Credibility, Conversion and Customer. Remember to keep what your customers are looking for right at the top of your list of priorities, and you'll be heading in the right direction.

Rappers Need Street Cred. So you need... Net Cred?

What's street cred? The urban dictionary of slang gives us this definition:

Street Cred
Short for street credibility (n) -
repsect(sic) from urban communities. usually something essential for making it big in the rap world.

Now if I may offer a definition of Net Cred:

Net Cred
Short for internet credibility (n) -
Respect from the online community, with tacit acknowledgement that the information or propositions you present online are real and somewhat trustworthy. Usually something essential for making it big online.

Unfortunately, Net Cred isn't really measurable - it's more a feeling people will get when they land on your website.

Think about this: when you're surfing the web, you're often looking for something. It might be a gift for your sister, some information for a project, or news on your favorite singer.

Sometimes you'll find something suitable, but then ask yourself: "Can I trust this website?"

That's when the website's Net Cred comes into play; the more apparent the site's Net Cred is the more likely you will buy the product, use the information or believe the news.

Zooming in on Online Businesses for a moment - for every business, there are some basic building blocks of Net Cred that can be (and should be) used pretty easily. If you are a business owner, here are some things you can add or do to your website to lend a basic level of Net Cred in the eyes of your visitors.

• Your physical office address. Real companies have real postal addresses - so tell people about it!
• A phone number. Your customers might not call it, but at least they know they can, if they want to.
• Watch your spelling and grammar. It's simple, but important. If someone has too many spelling mistakes and poor grammar it's too easy to be dismissed as amateur.
• Think about presentation. Your website should look good. It doesn't need to be a work of art, but spend some time, effort or money to ensure your site is well laid out and easy on the eyes. Either use a professionally designed template (as our online business builder does) or get a designer to put something together.
• Make sure your site displays nicely on all browsers. Too many sites only work on Microsoft's Internet Explorer (IE), and not Firefox or Safari. Websites need to work across IE, Firefox and Safari for mac users - if your site doesn't display correctly to your potential customer, they will not buy from you.
• Add an About Us page. About us pages are commonly read by people trying to work out if they should trust a company. Make sure you have one! It should tell the prospect 5 important things about your company: who you are, where you are, what you do, why you do it and how you do it.

That's 6 things - and there's loads more, no doubt.

The point is simple: credibility is a huge question when your customers land on your website. You've got to make sure you are communicating your credibility effectively - or you'll lose them lickity split.

Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's legendary detective was often tasked with solving baffling mysteries. Armed with nothing but his wits and some sketchy clues Sherlock Holmes would face up to the challenge. He needed patience, cunning and an open mind. Lateral thinking was a must. What a hero.

Sherlock, however, does not belong in any discussion around web design or online businesses -  and so the Anti-Sherlock rule comes about. The Anti Sherlock rule simply requires that you accept two things as true:

1. Websites are NOT mysteries. Your Online Business and Online Shop should be easily understood by the visitor. You know who your audience is, and you can pretty much guess what they'd be looking for on your site. So give it to them without fuss - serve their most common needs as quickly as possible.

2. Your customers are NOT Sherlock Holmes. While I'm sure a bunch of them would leave Sherlock in their Mensa sweatshirt wearing dust, they're too busy to apply that intellect to work out your website. Don't make them jump through hoops.

This may seem obvious. But why, dear god WHY, do so many businesses have mysterious web sites and expect you to work out what to do next?

If it's a game, I don't want to play.

Recently I was honored to be asked by Luke Hayes to participate in an advanced reading of his upcoming book "Website breakthrough 10 Easy Steps". Luke is an extremely successful internet marketer and has been in the game for a long time. I respect his mission (and drive) to help business owners succeed online. I found his book to be an easy read. He cleverly breaks down all the concepts so that those new to the game can grasp them quickly. More importantly it covered everything a business owner needs to know to start-up and begin to run a successful online business. 

You may have read about my 4C's of online success (Content->Credibility->Conversion->Customer). In his book, Luke sets the foundations for a perfect lead-in to the critical 4th C (the Customer) where Business Catalyst plays such a vital role. Our approach to see the customer (rather than content) as the centre of an online business enables business owners to understand their customers so they can increase their profits. After all it's cheaper to market to existing customers rather than pursue new ones.

Make sure you read Luke's book when it's published, as to get to the 4th C, you need to have covered the first three.