This latest study from Ad Age and Cheetah Digital makes a great case for building a strategy around “Relationship Marketing.” The only point I disagree with is the article points out that Relationship Marketing should be a part of your marketing strategy. I would counter that building relationships should be your only marketing strategy. The ROI is well established. Providing Personalized Engagement through Human Interaction, digital and one-to-one, is the ultimate objective to building any brand in this environment.

Here is the four-stage foundation the report suggest you consider:

They also mention that you can enrich company profiles using Zero-Party data. I have to mention that this is exactly what ShareDirect was developed for. Building a Personalized marketing strategy using First and Zero-Party data and marketing one-to-many as you would one-to-one.

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Are sellers and marketers correct to assume that keeping it simple is always the right approach? Sometimes perhaps that works but another Neuroscience research study from Corporate Visions and Decision Labs shows that the brain respond better with some complexity to make the presentation more memorable.

You need to manage your complexity effectively, particularly in a virtual setting. It’s what the research showed:

A key thing to remember is this not someone’s opinion but was a specific Neuroscience study as I have shown in my previous reports. You can scroll down to other similar studies from this same group. Also if you’re interested in depth on this topic you can click on the image and at the bottom is another place to click to see the full report. Let me know what you think. I’m including some of this in our presentations.

This report from Acquia is timely and has important detail regarding the role Personalization is playing and will play in marketing and sales success. I think, however, they miss the value of using a Human approach along with Personalization to build customer and prospect Trust and loyalty. I'll provide some highlights and my comments from the Acquia report:

So, although I think this eBook has some valid points and good numbers behind it, there appears to be several flaws in their approach and I believe leaving the Human element out of Personalization is a real missed opportunity. I would be interested in your thoughts. Feel free to reach out with your opinions.

The Demand Gen 2022 ABM Benchmark Survey is out and it contains significant new data on how ABM programs that better align sales and marketing through technology are making consistent headway in reaching and exceeding their goals.

Many are beginning the use of a platform that combines sales people with the dedicated personalized content like ShareDirect provides. Marketers are getting a firmer handle on Personalization strategies with Personalization at Scale being the big challenge, again which ShareDirect provides.

If you are thinking of adopting an ABM strategy or are in the beginning stages let us help you get there faster and with more impact. Let me hear from you if you have any thoughts or questions.

The 2022 Digital Consumer Trends Index is out and there is a lot in this report. Sponsored by Cheetah Digital and Econsultancy, the study provides "global consumer attitudes and trends in personalization, privacy messaging, advertising and brand loyalty." This is a very lengthy report so I will try to summarize it for you. You can click HERE if you want to see some of the data and research points in detail.

Brands who are providing a better online experience including personalized content, humanized approaches and customer obsession are making big gains in their markets. I invite you to take a brief look to see if any of this data is reflective of your approach.

This further validated how we developed ShareDirect as a human communication technology with Bi-Directional Personalization. Let me know if you want to take a look.

This may be the most intriguing and perhaps most effective message I have shared with you over the past couple of years. Our friends at B2B Decision Labs, a group I have referenced repeatedly, has reported on the science of the business apology. They take you right into the buyers brains to show how to properly rectify a mistake and the process that would lead to a very positive outcome.

People and businesses make mistakes every day that effect customers in a negative way. No one is immune. Some make many more mistakes than others and that’s another problem. The answers lie in what you are going to do about it. This report might provide you some guidance on how to work with your customer. Who knows, it may even work in your personal life as well.

It’s difficult to summarize for this communication but the order of the 5 segments of the apology matter. You can Click Here to see the full report.

I have a structured apology waiting for anyone who thinks this subject might be a mistake. Please take a look.

Below I have pulled out a section of an article from CMSWire, 5 Ways Transparent Personalization Can Win Over Customers written by Michelle Hawley. I have quoted is exactly because it piggy-backs nicely with my last communications on the importance of Zero Party Data.

However, it's important to know where to draw the line. While consumers are willing to trade some information for a stellar experience, 59% said they still aren't comfortable sharing location data - even for better service.

This applies to B2B and B2C equally. As I said before ShareDirect is the perfect driver to gain a willing access to customer preferences and needs. Let us hear from you.

This is the second part of my report on the Decision Labs great study on messaging and the scheduling of marketing communications. This one is a follow-up to the study I sent you last week on differentiating your solutions. This study which can be found here is on using content to motivate a prospect meeting.

Again, the researchers discovered some counterintuitive tendencies that should cause a re-thinking of how to schedule prospect contacts and what to send them. I’ll point out some general conclusions but I encourage to read through this 10 page report and you’ll find it’s worth it.

I ask that you take some time studying this to better understand the results they achieved with their study. And remember that ShareDirect is a multichannel technology using a variety of outbound capabilities and extensive content views for your market plus relatable and easy to access metrics.

I have a new research study from Decision Labs (one of my favorites) that is broken into two parts. Part 1 I’m sending you today on the Best approach for messaging. Part 2 will come in the next few days on the kind of content. Both studies show times have changed in the last couple of years and how attitudes about communication have turned 180 degrees around.

I’ll start with Part 1 and you can download the report here but I’ll offer a brief overview. The study had participants review four types of messages designed around different versions of the same story.

The results: “The Telling Details condition beat each of the other three messages individually and in aggregate, across every variable that was tested.” In fact “85% more participants preferred the Telling Details message.” So, on your next emails don’t be afraid to describe the features with the benefits to properly describe your solution.

I highly recommend you take a look at this short report. You’ll be impressed with the overwhelming percentage of buyers who prefer the more detailed message. I sat through the virtual meeting on this and was blown away by how counterintuitive it is for many of us out there but the numbers don’t lie.

This analysis from Braze is an easy-to-read and understand guide to purposeful Customer Retention strategy and execution. I've said for a long time retaining and growing a current customer is far more profitable than acquiring new ones. It's not to say that both efforts should be part of almost any marketing and sales strategy, but so often, it seems like acquisition is more funded and stressed than retention.

I'll report here on the first part of the report of 7 Key Retention Strategies That Work. All of these are important to help retain and grow current customers, B2B or B2C.

"Above all, retention requires Brand Humility. In other words, if you want customers to stick around, you have to learn how to communicate with them in ways that feel human. That means taking a closer look at your brand's messaging tone, frequency, content and communication delivery methods. And making sure your customer messaging and experiences are tailored -as much as possible- to the specific needs and habits of each customer."

The key for us and you is ShareDirect covers all 7 of the strategies listed above and is made to empower you to scale One-to-Many as you would One-to-One. Let us know if you would like to see how it could provide you a human and personalized approach to Customer Retention.

This is a very recent report from Brightspot, Content and Communications: 8 Ways to Stay Ahead of the Competition and I think it provides a very thought-provoking discussion of how to develop a successful consumer interaction. I’ll provide a quick overview but you might want to click here to see more detail on any or all of the 8 methods.

I admit that there is a lot here to consider. I invite you to scan the article to see if any one or two points stand out for you. I feel that this really explains how and why we developed ShareDirect. So much in this report sounds how we like to discuss our technology with our prospects and customers. Although BrightSpot may be doing it better or different way than we have so I’ve learned something here. Let us know what you think.

A new report from NetBase Quid demonstrates the increasing importance of social media and the rising of the "Visual Approach" in marketing. This had been gaining importance over the past few years as more and more opportunities in social media and other outlets made highly visual ads and particularly animation/video highly responsive and memorable. But, as with many things we’ll dealing with it was greatly accelerated through the Covid Pandemic.

TikTok, Facebook, Instagram and YouTube have been on the forefront to revolutionize the consumer experience. You can see the full report here.

The key point here is that market intelligence and consumer reaction are vital in building your brand today. Even how you handle a crisis is viewed as impactful in gaining trust from your audience.

We feel that building trust is the bedrock of our ShareDirect technology and having an excellent dashboard with very easy access and user interface allows you to make your case to the market through Social Media, Email, SMS and other outbound formats driving people to our unique Bi-Directional Engagement Sites. Let us hear from you.

I mentioned this about a month ago that we were receiving this recognition. It was a complete surprise since we didn’t know it existed and certainly didn’t pursue it.

I think it validates the tag line in our Heron Martech logo: Innovate-Enable-Engage. It is not an award for John, Marie, me or others in the organization. It shows how we built our company and our technology around Personalization and the Human element and placed our focus on our customers and their success.

I think the team at CIO Review were really impressed with the scalability of our solution and that led to the recommendation to appear on the front page.

Hopefully this doesn’t appear too self-centered but we feel it might result in others realizing the opportunity this technology might provide them. Let me know if you have questions or what you think.

We have been hearing over the past 2-3 years about the need to limit or control the amount of information brands can attain about each of us and our interests and preferences. Cheetah Digital has prepared an excellent guide on the topic including how to gain insight on customers and prospects that they will actually want you to have. Here are a few highlights from "The Zero-Party Data Playbook 2022."

So, what are the data types:

Obviously First and Zero-Party Data is well within the comfortable personalization categories and can enhance the relationship with customers and grow their business. You can see the entire report by clicking here.

The ShareDirect technology platform has the means to create First and Zaro Party data that stays within the comfortable parameters of the trusted customer relationship. Hope this helps you better understand this very important topic.

This report can be useful to almost anyone who is responsible for marketing and sales for a wide variety of brands. Customer Engagement is sometimes difficult to calculate since genuine engagement can be best demonstrated "when customers promote or defend your brand to peers."

The study recommends that you tap into every layer of the consumer's psyche:

• Emotion
• Rationale
• Ethics

I feel like much of this relates to how we built our company and our brand, ShareDirect. The core benefit to ShareDirect is helping you to achieve engagement with your customers One-to-Many as you would One-to-One.

Here is another excellent report from B2B Decision Labs and Corporate Visions on the use of Neuroscience to understand the buyer's brain. These studies utilized EEG, ECG, Eye Tracking and Skin Response to determine when and where to use the various selling techniques. There is way too much here to repeat in this email but I invite you to click here to see the report and scan what section might be import to you.

I'll try to sum up the key points below:

• Avoid hybrid presentations particularly for high level presentations.
• Go virtual for high level presentations
• Face-to-Face is best for presenting insights
• Don't disregard the phone
• Transcend modality with strong design. Invest in visuals.

I've reported on several of their cognitive studies and each one is an impressive game-changer. Let me know if I can answer any questions and if you find this useful or to see how we can incorporate these results in ShareDirect.

I have probably received at least 20-25 End-of-Year reports and studies and just as many Top Trends for 2022 surveys. Many are very industry specific or focused internally rather than customer centric. I decided this 2022 Global Customer Engagement Review might have something for everyone. It’s a long document but worth skimming through to find something specific and relevant for you.

After surveying 1500 marketing executives worldwide Braze and their research firm, Wakefield Research, have been able to report and assess the shifts in Customer Engagement over the past year and what to expect this year. This is a very short conclusion to the report.

	Brands Are More Confident Than Ever About Customer Engagement, and It’s Paying Off. As Brands’ Customer Engagement Efforts Mature, They Drive Better Engagement, Higher Retention, and More Revenue.
	In Order to Overcome New Privacy Challenges, Brands Should Move to the Exclusive Use of Zero- and First-Party Data.
	Data Management Is Now the Top Challenge For brands, Outranking All Other Concerns. While Many Brands Are Rising to Today’s Challenges, We See Major Opportunities When it Comes to Tech and Teams.

They cover financial services, health and wellness, media and entertainment, retail and ecommerce and other sectors for US, APAC and EMEA. Customer engagement is certainly becoming Top-of-Mind to the more successful companies and this study shows that. Let me know how we can help you enhance and focus on a Customer Engagement Strategy for you using ShareDirect.

This is a very thorough study released just a month ago on using Account Based Marketing to obtain market leadership. This report comes from ITSAM Group and the ABM Leadership Alliance. So, how can you use ABM as a critical strategy to drive business growth? This study provides insight into the current state of play with ABM and what’s working.

This is an important document and well-worth taking a look at. You can view the full report here.

The unique benefit to ShareDirect is we can provide a communications technology that allows you to market One-to-Many as you would One-to-One. So, we have the best of both strategies embedded in our platform. Let me hear from you.

This McKinsey study is a new benchmark indicating that “Personalization matters more than ever before.” The focus is on consumer expectations but we now know that this requirement is just as important in B2B applications. We understand that personalization and brand loyalty go hand and glove regardless of the level of business.

Here are some key take-aways but I encourage you to check out the entire article.

You can click here to see the full report that will only take about 10 minutes to review. We are available at ShareDirect to help you not just use our technology but we will provide guidance and best practices we have seen and experienced to be successful. Give us e a call.

Here is another great study from Corporate Visions on building successful customer relationships. You can see this study by clicking on my Engagement Site and you can also download the report. It is filled with great information that you can utilize for 2022.

The three stages they see are:

The last section is particularly interesting as behavioral and social scientists weigh in on dealing with organizational change, price increases, keeping and growing your customers and when things go wrong. I’m sure many of us can think of instances when we wish we could have a second chance to handle a problem with a customer.

Let us know what you think. We believe our ShareDirect technology can help to create and keep successful customer relationships.

There is a lot to digest in this survey from DemandGen. This will help those of you who have initiated ABM and you're working on advancing the program for 2022, and those who might be considering this opportunity to provide a more efficient and effective marketing strategy. Or if you haven't looked at this yet the report might be the fuel that ignites your interest in moving toward with an ABM program in your organization.

I'll point out a few highpoints and I promise there is much more. You can take a look by clicking here.

Let's discuss how ShareDirect could help you to utilize and expand this growing marketing strategy. We would love the hear from you.

What is the most important area of an ad or other marketing communication? What is the path of viewers' visual attention? These are questions that are gaining increasing emphasis in marketing as the science of Eye Tracking and Saliency Modeling has advanced in it's acceptance and the science behind it.

This article written by Tobias Komischke, PhD who works as Head of Innovation Lab at Infragistics is a good primer on the topic and worth the short time to check it out here.

• Eye Tracking assesses the eyes focus and the motion from one place to the other empirically derived from user behavior. It tells where users look in sequence.
• Saliency Modeling is more algorithmic determining the visual properties of screen areas including contrast, position, and size.

Which technique is best depends on the situation based on budget, time frame and how accurate the results must be. So both have their place. This topic is absolutely fascinating and I invite you to take a quick look. You'll want to re-read some of the paragraphs and pass it around to others in your organization. As you know we're here to answer any questions or thoughts.

You might be wondering when I'm going to get off this neuroscience/buyer's brain/cognitive study kick I've been on the past few of months. The fact is these excellent and unique studies from Decision Labs have been coming out with great frequency and regularity and I believe these could help any of us create a real difference in how we approach our various markets. We have tried to integrate some of this in our approach at ShareDirect.

So, what's the story this time? How can we be "the winner" more consistently in early-stage messaging?

This report will show you the importance of making your prospects "Think and Feel."

Click here to see this study.

This is another great study from Decision Labs on buying decisions from digital content. I realize it seems I'm really promoting this organization but their work recently has been truly excellent, unique and challenging to how we work in today's environment.

Dr. Carmen Simon, a Cognitive Scientist, has provided a new brain study measuring EEG and other physical functions from viewing content and participant's reactions.

The process of forming memories involves three phases:

• Encoding-Registering information through your senses
• Maintenance-Storing the information in your mind
• Retrieval-Accessing information as you need it

The key phase is storing which relies on "Working Memory." This is essential to "thinking, understanding, planning and making decisions."

There is so much more so I'll probably provide a couple of follow-up communications about this study. You can access the study here. Let me know if I can provide any additional thoughts for you in what this research means to digital marketing.

This is a big-time study and very important for the current environment we all find ourselves in. Decision Labs along with Corporate Visions created this Neuroscience study to test video as a selling tool in emails. There are four parts to the report and I'll send you a communications about each one separately over the next couple of weeks but include a link to the entire study each time.

You might remember over the last year that I have sent you several "Simple Videos", as I have called them. I have a couple of new ones that will come out in the near future. But the important thing to consider is that a personal video reflects personalization and a human approach better than most other options. And it can communicate an idea with higher recall and agreement.

I hope you check this out and, as always, I look forward to your comments and thoughts. We are certainly recommending this approach as we work with our clients and prospects.

I've been following and reporting for some time webinars and other communications from Decision Labs and Corporate Visions. Most of their research and recommended applications are a full cut above many other marketing research presentations.

Dr. Carmen Simon is a Cognitive Neuroscientist and Chief Science Officer with Corporate Visions. She runs studies of how buyers' brains react to certain messages and the manner they are delivered using neuroscience equipment measuring GSR, EEG, Eye Tracking and ECG.

I'll report on some other key aspects of this recent study in following emails over the next few weeks. This one is a summation of one part of the recent extensive study. It's entitled Data-Insight-Question, A Three Step Tactic to Increase Persuasive Impact. There is a precise choreography to gain an advantage in a presentation or dialogue.

It breaks down to three Guidelines that can make you communications more real and appealing to prospects and customers:

I'll have much more on this study in the near future but this might be enough to absorb right now. You can click here to see this synopsis of this one point from the bigger study.

I have recognized several times reports from Decision Labs and Corporate Visions. This is a new definitive report on avoiding parity in messaging based on behavioral research.

It breaks down to three Guidelines that can make you communications more real and appealing to prospects and customers:

The key point here is that the strategy can be on target but the story still has to resonate with the audience. Personalization and Humanized messaging is a key part of this. Let me know what you think and we'll work on describing features better for ShareDirect.

• Trust is a competitive edge. Trust is the second most important brand attribute, Trust has a strong positive correlation with loyalty, engagement and advocacy.
• Trust is Primal. What fuels such a belief? The consistency and quality of our interactions with people. When we interact with a brand in person, it's easier to establish that belief.
• Trust Is Omnichannel. Everything your brand does must be oriented around cultivating trust. Quality and consistency of content and customer engagement matters.

• 75% of customers prefer to interact with a real person.
• Customers engage with Humans not companies.
• To make your company sound more Human you must first be a Human.
• Always try to add a face.

Learn From The Leaders

How do Customer Experience Leading firms create such positive, memorable impressions on the people they serve? It doesn’t happen by accident. They all embrace some basic tenets when shaping their customer experience – principles that can very likely be applied to your own organization:

They aim for more than customer satisfaction.

Satisfied customers defect all the time. And customers who are merely satisfied are far less likely to drive business growth through referrals, repeat purchases and reduced price sensitivity. Maximizing the return on customer experience investments requires shaping interactions that cultivate loyalty, not just satisfaction.

They nail the basics, and then deliver pleasant surprises.

To achieve excellence, the Leaders execute on the basics exceptionally well, minimizing common customer frustrations and annoyances. They then focus on “nice to have” elements and other pleasant surprises, all of which help to create memorable peaks in the experience that strengthen customer engagement.

They understand that great experiences are intentional and emotional.

The Leading companies leave nothing to chance. They understand the universe of touchpoints that comprise their customer experience and they manage each of them very intentionally – choreographing the interaction so it not only addresses customers’ rational expectations, but also stirs their emotions in a positive way.

They shape customer impressions through cognitive science.

The Leading companies manage both the reality and the perception of their customer experience. They understand how the human mind interprets experiences and forms memories, and they use that knowledge of cognitive science to create more positive and loyalty-enhancing customer impressions.

They recognize the link between the customer and employee experience.

Happy, engaged employees help create happy, loyal customers (who, in turn, help create more happy, engaged employees!). The value of this virtuous cycle cannot be overstated, and it’s why the most successful companies address both the customer and the employee sides of this equation.