Everyone wants to feel loved and remembered

Hey there 👋🏼

I am sure all of us are ecstatic about being able to view a historical moment this week that fo down in history as one of the most remarkable achievements of mankind.

Chandrayaan 3, the first spacecraft ever to land on Moon’s south pole, the permanently shadowed craters, thus giving the world an opportunity to actually what lies beyond that darkness.

Of course, this wasn’t a day’s or year’s work. It was well over two decades that scientists had been working tirelessly to make this dream a reality.

The reason I am talking so much about the Chadrayaan mission is because not only I am super thrilled to have seen this historical event happen in my lifetime, but also because it serves as a preface (well kinda) to this week’s newsletter.

This week’s topic is inspired by a request from Pavan Gudivada, who sent me this reply to my last newsletter:

What a wonderful topic to write about. After all,

Now, the answer to the question Pavan asked lies way beyond marketing and sales. It lies in the basic human sentiments and emotions: to be loved and remembered.

Only when people value you as a person (or brand) will you live on forever in their minds and hearts. And if their needs, wallets, and you are a good fit, then you can expect the kind of customer loyalty that we all dream of.

Well, the last sentence is pretty packed, so let me un-bundle it slowly.

We all want to be loved, needed, and wanted. We all want to be seen. Be it brands, people, or cats. Everyone wants attention.

How do you get that attention?

Well, there are plenty of ways for sure, but the path you choose will largely be a result of the end goal you have in mind.

In most cases, bold attempts and making a mark are one way to get attention. However, that attention is not only short it is majorly critiqued.

There’s another way of getting attention that goes on to live beyond time immemorial: genuine care and dedication.

And this is exactly what people building personal brands or brands around their products and services actually need to imbibe.

Show your audience that you actually care. Do it by engaging with them on social media posts. At the cost of sounding redundant, I’ll still say, serve up lots of value-driven content, help them level up, feel better, and add to their day.

Send thoughtful in-app notifications, send them emails that talk to them like a friend, and send them goodies or invites to sessions that will help them level up or stay ahead of the competition.

This works both for people who are already your customers, as well as your prospects.

Now, when it comes to sales, things become even more personal and real. A lot of power lies with the sales team and the after-sales support team to turn an experience into what we call “delight” in marketing.

Make your customers feel like they are the only ones out there you are here to serve. Of course, your customer knows that they are NOT the only ones in your client roster, but they DON’T need to feel that way.

Simple things like not jumping straight to business and asking them about their life/work/dog/cat/kids can make such a lot of difference that is beyond numbers on Excel sheets and attribution data.

If they are disgruntled, skip the small talk, and show them that your team has been having sleepless nights trying to solve the problem because that’s how much they mean to you.

These are just examples to help drive the point home. Show them you care. Your client is not an LLP, LLC, Pvt., or Public company. You are talking to a representative of that institution who is super worried that things are going wrong.

Ease that person’s pain, calm them down, and make them smile.

You want to live in that rep’s or decision maker’s brain as a happy memory (hippocampus).

There’s a lot to the topic of customer loyalty. It is a complex mixture of both brand and relationship equity, and value equity, too. However, in the essence of reading time and length of a newsletter, I would say, if you want to build brand loyalty, focus on marketing, and if you want to lead that brand loyalty to sales and customer loyalty (higher Life Time Value) focus on an easy sales process and after-sales support with a focus on relationship building.

Remember, a brand can only build customer loyalty, one customer at a time. It is never a mass-interaction process.

I hope you enjoyed this edition. Do write to me if you would like me to write about specific marketing topics. I love writing on such topics so go ahead and shoot me an email by replying to this one.

I wish you a wonderful weekend ahead!

Best,

Proma