Customer engagement
Customer engagement is a marketing and strategic management concept. Practitioners view it as interactions, "engagements", between a firm and its customers, while academic researchers define it as a psychological state that “occurs by virtue of interactive customer experiences with a focal agent/object”, where focal agent/object can be any type of organization and/or its offerings such as branded products or services. As such, customer engagement is seen as a customer’s motivationally driven, volitional cognitive, emotional, and behavioral investments into interactions with such a focal agent/object. Marketing scholars see customer engagement as a key construct in understanding customer journeys and the most recent phase in marketing theory and management, following customer buying behavior process models, customer satisfaction and loyalty, service quality, relationship marketing, customer relationship management, and customer centricity/ focus.
Definition
In March 2006, the Advertising Research Foundation announced the first definition of customer engagement as "turning on a prospect to a brand idea enhanced by the surrounding context." However, the ARF definition was criticized by some for being too broad. The ARF, World Federation of Advertisers, Various definitions have translated different aspects of customer engagement. Forrester Consulting's research in 2008, has defined customer engagement as "creating deep connections with customers that drive purchase decisions, interaction, and participation, over time". Studies by the Economist Intelligence Unit result in defining customer engagement as, "an intimate long-term relationship with the customer". Both of these concepts prescribe that customer engagement is attributed to a rich association formed with customers. With aspects of relationship marketing and service-dominant perspectives, customer engagement can be loosely defined as "consumers' proactive contributions in co-creating their personalized experiences and perceived value with organizations through active, explicit, and ongoing dialogue and interactions". The book, Best Digital Marketing Campaigns In The World, defines customer engagement as, "mutually beneficial relationships with a constantly growing community of online consumers". The various definitions of customer engagement are diversified by different perspectives and contexts of the engagement process. These are determined by the brand, product, or service, the audience profile, attitudes and behaviours, and messages and channels of communication that are used to interact with the customer.Since 2009, a number of new definitions have been proposed in the literature. In 2011, the term was defined as "the level of a customer’s cognitive, emotional and behavioral investment in specific brand interactions," and identifies the three CE dimensions of immersion, passion and activation. It was also defined as "a psychological state that occurs by virtue of interactive, co-creative customer experiences with a particular agent/object ". Researchers have based their work on customer engagement as a multi-dimensional construct, while also identifying that it is context-dependent. Engagement gets manifested in the various interactions that customers undertake, which in turn get shaped up by individual cultures. The context is not limited to geographical context, but also includes the medium with which the user engages. Moreover, customer engagement is the emotional involvement and psychological process in which both new and existing consumers become loyal to specific types of services or products. The degree to which customers pay attention to companies or products, as well as their participation in operations, is referred to as customer engagement.
At present, practitioners view and define customer engagement as interaction between a firm and its customers, while academic researchers define it as a psychological state of the consumer.
Ethics
Efforts to boost user engagement can raise ethical concerns and privacy issues, further amplified with the rise of the use of modern artificial intelligence. Facebook and several other social media platforms have faced criticism for manipulating user emotions to enhance engagement, even if it is knowingly false content. Professor Hany Farid summarized Facebook’s approach, stating, “When you’re in the business of maximizing engagement, you’re not interested in truth." Various other techniques used to increase engagement are also considered abusive. For example, FOMO, infinite scrolling, and incentives for users who frequently engage with the service.Online customer engagement
Offline customer engagement predates online, but the latter is a qualitatively different social phenomenon, unlike any offline customer engagement that social theorists or marketers recognize. In the past, customer engagement has been generated irresolutely through television, radio, media, outdoor advertising, and various other touchpoints ideally during peak and/or high trafficked allocations. However, the only conclusive results of campaigns were sales and/or return on investment figures. The widespread adoption of the internet during the late 1990s has enhanced the processes of customer engagement, in particular, the way in which it can now be measured in different ways on different levels of engagement. It is a recent social phenomenon where people engage online in communities that do not necessarily revolve around a particular product but serve as meeting or networking places. This online engagement has brought about both the empowerment of consumers and the opportunity for businesses to engage with their target customers online. A 2011 market analysis revealed that 80% of online customers, after reading negative online reviews, report making alternate purchasing decisions, while 87% of consumers said a favorable review has confirmed their decision to go through with a purchase.The concept and practice of online customer engagement enables organisations to respond to the fundamental changes in customer behaviour that the internet has brought about, as well as to the increasing ineffectiveness of the traditional 'interrupt and repeat', broadcast model of advertising. Due to the fragmentation and specialisation of media and audiences, as well as the proliferation of community and user-generated content, businesses are increasingly losing the power to dictate the communications agenda. Simultaneously, lower switching costs, the geographical widening of the market and the vast choice of content, services and products available online have weakened customer loyalty. Enhancing customers' firm and market-related expertise has been shown to engage customers, strengthen their loyalty, and emotionally connect them more closely to a firm.
Customer engagement on social media
The utilization of social media platforms has emerged as a modern way of improving customer engagement strategies. By curating content that resonates with the interests of customers, businesses cultivate authentic connections and communities online. Platforms such as Instagram and Twitter serve as useful tools for meaning dialog, enabling businesses to make lasting relationships with customers and amplify brand visibility online.Marketing value
Customer engagement marketing is necessitated by a combination of social, technological and market developments. Companies attempt to create an engaging dialogue with target consumers and stimulate their engagement with the given brand. Although this must take place both on and off-line, the internet is considered the primary method. Marketing begins with understanding the internal dynamics of these developments and the behaviour and engagement of consumers online. Consumer-generated media plays a significant role in the understanding and modeling of engagement. The control Web 2.0 consumers have gained is quantified through 'old school' marketing performance metrics.The effectiveness of the traditional 'interrupt and repeat' model of advertising is decreasing, which has caused businesses to lose control of communications agendas. In August 2006, McKinsey & Co published a report which indicated that traditional TV advertising would decrease in effectiveness compared to previous decades. As customer audiences have become smaller and more specialised, the fragmentation of media, audiences and the accompanying reduction of audience size have reduced the effectiveness of the traditional top-down, mass, 'interrupt and repeat' advertising model. A Forrester Research's North American Consumer Technology Adoption Study found that people in the 18-26 age group spend more time online than watching TV. Furthermore, the Global Web Index reported that in 2021, YouTube beats any mainstream media platforms when it comes to monthly engagement. This is partly due to the fact that 51% of U.S. and U.K. consumers use YouTube for shopping and product research, a service that traditional media can't really provide.
In response to the fragmentation and increased amount of time spent online, marketers have also increased spending in online communication. ContextWeb analysts found marketers who promote on sites like Facebook and New York Times are not as successful at reaching consumers while marketers who promote more on niche websites have a better chance of reaching their audiences. Customer audiences are also broadcasters with the power for circulation and permanence of CGM, businesses lose influence. Rather than trying to position a product using static messages, companies can become the subject of conversation amongst a target market that has already discussed, positioned and rated the product. This also means that consumers can now choose not only when and how but, also, if they will engage with marketing communications. In addition, new media provides consumers with more control over advertising consumption.
Research shows the importance of customer engagement in the modern market. The lowering of entry barriers, such as the need for a sales force, access to channels and physical assets, and the geographical widening of the market due to the internet have brought about increasing competition and a decrease in brand loyalty. In combination with lower switching costs, easier access to information about products and suppliers and increased choice, brand loyalty is hard to achieve. The increasing ineffectiveness of television advertising is due to the shift of consumer attention to the internet and new media, which controls advertising consumption and causes a decrease in audience size. A study conducted by Salesforce shows an overwhelming 8% of customers acknowledge that their experience with the business is equivalent to the quality of its products or services. Therefore, it is important to prioritize customer engagement as a business strategy.
The proliferation of media that provide consumers with more control over their advertising consumption and the simultaneous decrease of trust in advertising and increase of trust in peers point to the need for communications that the customer will desire to engage with. Stimulating a consumer's engagement with a brand is the only way to increase brand loyalty and, therefore, "the best measure of current and future performance".