Want To Be A Super Brand?
Be Super Nice To Your Customer

The red light green light game killed 255 players in Netflix’s Squid Games. Players in the first game didn’t know what they were getting into. They didn’t have a chance other than to play the first game. But before the second game could begin, the contestants had a chance to back out from playing any more games. Some took that chance to walk out, and some remained. Then something interesting happened.

The players who opted to stop playing saw that getting out of the game had changed nothing. They were back to their miserable lives. In contrast, the players who wanted to continue playing had a chance of getting out of their misery. But when the ‘I-want-to-stop’ players got a second chance to return, they did. 93% of players returned. They knew that death was certain if they didn’t win a certain game. Yet this was them making an informed decision.

When your audience is desperate, and you give them what they are desperate for, they come. They come not for the love of you; they come for the love of what you are offering. And if you provide it enough, you might get them to fall in love with you.

Customers love brands that love their customers.

There is nothing taboo in brand-customer love. It needs to be the right kind of love, though. Nothing crazy. Nothing weird. The wrong type of love will chase them away.

Let me give you an example.

The 90s Bollywood movies worshipped this plot. So, the male lead stalks and harasses the unsuspecting female lead. He then tells her that he loves her and cannot live without her. He also tells her that if she says no, he will jump off a tall building or cut his wrist or jump in front of a speeding bus and die. When the female lead tells him point-blank that she is not interested in him, he thinks she is playing hard to get. He tries harder. He begins to harass her in every unimaginable way until she decides to give in. She decides to give in not because he has persuaded her to give it a shot. She decides to give in because she doesn’t have a way out of all the harassment.

78% of millennials are willing to switch to a company that offers better loyalty programs. Only products may not be sufficient to maintain customer loyalty. Customer experience over products has a better chance of drawing customers. Amazon sells products. But what it sells over products is convenience. The convenience of having the product delivered to your doorstep. Hassle-free. That convenience is a reward in itself.

Some brands don’t know where to draw the line. Some brands see where the line is, but they don’t know how to stop themselves from crossing it. The line between what brands can do and cannot do is thinning. At the same time, that very line is broadening. A brand’s motive behind pursuing a customer defines whether a line is thin or broad.

The line is thin for a brand that wants to listen to its customer before it can make an attempt to be heard.

Customers love brands that love their customers. But you know what customers love even more? Customers love brands that try to understand what their customers love.

Brands spend millions of dollars on product research. But they don’t spend even a quarter of it researching what their customers love.

Privacy regulations are getting tighter than strings in an action movie. But editors get to remove the strings in post-production. Likewise, brands can remove the strings attached to privacy concerns. And today, customers are willing to let brands remove those strings. All they expect in return are transparency and better offerings. And, of course, a little something for their efforts.

That’s fair, though, right?

That’s the beauty of zero-party data. You don’t have to stalk your customers. You don’t have to worry about getting caught with your hand in the damned cookie jar. No guesswork from tons of behavioral analytics!

Zero-party data is milk from the cow’s teat. As pure as they come.

I know a friend who shops on an e-commerce website for protein supplements. It seems three out of five times he placed an order, he got vouchers for baby food and baby diapers. He is single and doesn’t have kids. He told me he has never browsed anything related to “baby” stuff on the app. He stopped placing orders on the app and switched to another e-commerce company. He tells me he is happier with the second company for his protein supplements needs. This is despite the fact that the second company does not offer as high discounts as the first one. The second company offers him scratch cards with gym wear discounts. Now that is a company that understands him better.

Brands have an obligation to understand customers. When they don’t know what customers want, customers feel obligated to look elsewhere.

Offering an app alone with random discounts to unrelated products is not enough. Offering the right kind of products and rewards around the customer’s lifestyle matters.

Zero-party data doesn’t cost zero. It costs a lot more, but a lot less than one can imagine.

To get closer to customers, brands must pay attention to what customers are closer to. You can do that as easily as ABC with super-apps.

Super-apps are not blind rage. They are a meaningful rage designed to engage customers at every stage.

Take a look at what one of our clients is doing. Siam Piwat, Thailand’s leading mall operator, is revolutionizing the shopping experience.

They were ahead of the curve in reinventing their retail business. They are now pivoting to new business models through strategic partnerships. Perx Loyalty and Engagement Platform (LMP) will help co-create the transformational ONESIAMP SuperApp.

The super-app will build communities around customer interests. This will create effective marketing campaigns, promotional activities, and loyalty programs.

Super-apps are super effective when it comes to delighting and exceeding customer expectations. It’s a way to give them what they want in the way they want so you can get what you want — better data. And as you already know, data is the new oil!

Take a look at Tencent’s WeChat. It started as an empathetic messaging service. Soon, it was the “app for everything.” You could chat, pay, book tickets, open up a store – it gave the consumer the power — to do, create, and empower. In 2018, it was the ‘world’s largest standalone app’ with 1 billion monthly active users (MAU).

Super-apps may not bring down customer acquisition cost (CAC) to zero, but they can lower CAC. With the ability to cross-sell and upsell, you can make out like a bandit in the long run.

Perx Loyalty and Engagement Platform is a brand that helps you harness zero-party data. It can help you strengthen your bond with your customers.

You can immerse users, exhilarate them, and amplify connections in the evolving universes. Give the right rewards to your customers with our integrated advanced gamification elements. Hyper-personalize rewards that match customers’ lifestyles with rewards and merchants management. In short, Perx enables you to transform customers into super fans!

It all boils down to offering rewards that matter to your customers. When you do that, you can drive customer actions that matter to your brand.