When was the last time you received a marketing email asking for a tiny bit of your attention? Mostly likely, the answer is every other minute. In today's world we are constantly bombarded with marketing messages, they crave for our attention. Here is a screenshot of the marketing messages from my inbox taken today morning:
Most of these emails either try to sell something or want to get insights on how we as customers use their product.
What is common between all these messages?
Well you guessed it, they are all unread and they are all going to be trashed and/or unsubscribed! I am sure this is the story with a lot of other people out there too. These kinds of messages simply fail to grab any attention. If they can't grab customers attention they do not fulfil any purpose.
Why these kinds of messages fail to grab attention of customers?
Customers have a bunch of goals that they want to achieve. Unless the message is helping them achieve some of those goals in some way, it is going to be ignored. Even if companies offer incentives like money, reward points, gift vouchers etc there is just too much friction for customers to act. Trust me on this one, we have tried and failed.
So the question is, how can companies grab customers attention and build a long lasting and symbiotic relationship with their customers?
Say hello to "The iGig Model"
iGig stands for "I Give, I Get". Notice how Give comes before the Get: to get interesting insights from customers, first give what customers want! It's as simple as that.
Companies want to understand in detail how the customers use their products, what are the frustrations they face, what do they like about your product, what do they hate etc. For this to happen, customers have to start conversing with the company. But customers will not start conversing with a company just like that. Companies have to find a strong reason for customers to start the conversation.
Companies need to understand the Jobs that the customers are trying to get through. They need to genuinely help the customers get through those jobs. This delights the customers, it builds trust and a stronger bond between the company and the customers. At this stage, customers will be more open to starting a conversation with the company. And this will mark the beginning of a long, healthy, strong and symbiotic relationship.
The model in action
We wanted to get a insights on Monster Math usage from our customers. For a very long time we tried just like everyone else to send numerous emails, trying to start the conversation with our customers, but we only heard crickets. Customers would occasionally write to us when they were facing an issue with the app or wanted help with their subscription etc. We would diligently help them with the issue, but it felt very transactional. Once the problem was resolved, again we would hear mostly crickets.
Recently we started trying the iGig Model. We thought of what the customers goals were in context of our product. Some of the things that came to mind where:
- To eliminate the fear of Math.
- To develop the interest of Math.
- To keep the child creatively engaged in a fun way.
- and lots more.
Once we identified some of the goals, we ideated on what are the things we could do so that customers could achieve these goals. How can we help them in some or the other way? It is important to understand that our product comes later, its important to focus on only the customer goal and genuinely offer to help achieve those goals.
We ideated, experimented and started doing things that help customers achieve their goals. Once we tuned the emails to give our customers things that will help them achieve their goals, we saw significant improvement in all trackable matrix. Its still early days, but we were able to start conversations with our customers and get important insights.
This essentially is The iGig Model: Give Before Get!
