Google Glass used by SNCF to enhance customer satisfaction
This article is primarily about the use of Google Glass to enhance the customer experience. But let me first start by dealing with the iWatch (sorry … it’s the Apple Watch). The long awaited Apple watch got finally revealed on Sept 9th. Despite the displayed enthusiasm at the conference, I must confess that I was disappointed. It’s not that the apple watch is ugly, or useless. It’s just that waiting so long had made me build...
Delta Lloyd : qualitative methods used to reveal business opportunity
After the remarkable marketing campaign “The billable Talk” launched by Delta Lloyd to help independent workers get insured for revenue losses, we come back today with Karlien Kelgtermans, Marketing Communication Project Leader at Delta Lloyd Life, on the development of this project and its first results. IntoTheMinds: There are more than 1m independent workers in Belgium. Yet, only half of them are insured against revenue loss. Which other insights can you share with us on the current situation?...
The Delta Lloyd recipe to acquire new customers
Some customers segments are more difficult to reach than others. Independent workers are certainly one of them. They go by the “time is money” principle and usually try to make their days as productive as possible. As a consequence little –if any- time is left to handle formalities, go to the bank, take care of insurances, … Delta Lloyd had an interesting idea to capture that audience. 50% of independent workers have no insurance against revenue...
Gumelo lets you grow your own food
We met the entrepreneurial guys of Gumelo, a Portuguese startup in the food sector, at the SIAL 2014 fair in Paris. We just loved what they do and thought it would be good for them to get some exposure beyond the borders of Portugal. Grow mushrooms in your apartment As we explained in a previous article, the concept behind Gumelo is simple : wherever you live, you should be able to grow your own food. Gumelo’s...
SIAL 2014 : and the winner of the innovation award is …
You don’t need to present a new drink or a new food product to win the first prize of innovation at SIAL. The innovation is also about everything what revolves about consumers and new ways to consumer food. We already dealt with the nomadic market trend in an earlier article and this year’s innovation prize fits perfectly into this trend. This award rewards an individual who has understood what marketers call the “customers’ pains” and that...
Can a normal airline still compete with a low-cost pure player ?
After SN Brussels Airlines announcement to launch a low-cost alternative, Air France tried to do the same but the plan was stopped by 2 weeks of strike (which may have cost up to 300m€ according to newspapers). Yet what you observe on the market is that low-cost has become the dominant business model. Ryanair had been the undisputed leader for years (in terms of profit) and became the #1 airline in Europe. This year EasyJet took...
Produce your own food : the new trend
There is one weak signal that emerged this year at SIAL that we think may be interesting to follow : “grow your own food”. We detected at least 3 products that fall into this category and we’d like to present them to you. Don’t buy : make it on your own The concept behind the “grown your food” trend is simple. You can produce what your eat and it’s not limited to vegetables or fruits. Any...
Back from SIAL 2014 : pictures and impressions
Before publishing some detailed reports on the new concepts, innovative products we saw at this year’s SIAL in Paris, we thought it may be a good idea to give you a general overview. The SIAL 2014 was just amazing, as usual : outstanding organization, the broadest range of suppliers you can find on Earth (some 6000 exhibitors), the most innovative products … just everything was there to make this show one of the most successful ever....
Essential business tools for startups : 99€ training in Brussels on 29 November
Would-be entrepreneurs will be delighted : a 1-day training session will be organized on November 29th 2014 in Brussels to teach, refresh, train essential skills to successfully start or develop your venture. If you want to register, just follow this link and fill in the online form. Practical details on the workshops Price : 99€ early bid (if you register before November 15), 199€ otherwise Price includes lunch and coffee Venue : CoStation, 5 Parvis Sainte-Gudule,...
Zalando : e-commerce giant recruits clients offline
How can you push your organic growth in e-commerce? That’s basically the problem that Zalando is facing. The e-commerce giant is still not profitable and believes that profitability will come with economies of scale, which can only be achieved through recruitment of more customers. But customers are difficult to convince and Zalando must therefore go offline to find them. Two types of consumers with different behaviors This may seem like a caricature but there are only...
Marketing strategy : Hello Bank launches a pop-up store in Brussels
Pop-up stores belongs to the marketing toolbox as a promotion instrument. Fact is that they have been usually used by brands in the fashion sector to promote a collection, raise awareness in conjunction with another event (for instance the Fashion week), or to touch customers in some particular areas. Pop-up stores are much less used by players from other sectors and that’s why the initiative of Hello Bank (a brand of BNP Paribas) is so interesting....
How to transform a negative moment in a positive customer experience
Today we wanted to finish the week on a positive and joyful note. Today’s post is inspired by KLM, the Dutch airline. There are many frustrating experiences that can happen when you travel by plane, and insatisfaction can arise for many different reasons. Loosing something in the airport, forgetting something on the plane (think about your keys, your smartphone) can lead to intense negative emotions. Fixing what one may see as a complaint-like situation is a...
Quality improvement through reengineering of business processes
We are currently conducting a big assignment for a BEL20 company to improve financial provisions processes and increase operations quality. This assignment encompasses the description of AS-IS processes across several divisions, reengineering them into something “lean” and improving the quality of the output. A big challenge given the complexity of those financial processes and the variety of people involved. Most assignments of this type end up on recommendations that are never implemented. But what’s so difficult...
Suit Supply has found a nice way to measure customer satisfaction
Customer Satisfaction surveys have been popular for decades; Yet the response rate to online surveys is very low if there is no reward. One of the major problem is the time required to answer the survey. People don’t have time. Marketing experts have proposed solutions in the form of one-item satisfaction instrument. In other words you get only one question to answer. The NPS (Net Promoter Score) is a good example of such instrument (read our...
SIAL : the best place to conduct market research on food & drink trends
The worldwide largest food & drink fair will open next month (from Oct 19 until Oct 23rd). Some 6300 exhibitors from 103 countries (!) will attend the show and present what is thought to be the largest products range available on earth. The fair is held every 2 years and we have the pleasure to have be press-accredited for 4 years. Why is it important for us to visit the SIAL We visit the SIAL for...
How 5-star hotels enhance the customer experience
Customers of 5-star hotels are more and more demanding and hard to satisfy. Top-tier hotels have to undergo costly renovations (in Paris alone several palaces like the Ritz and the Lutetia have closed for long periods of time to enable building works) and must be highly innovative to improve the satisfaction of the visitors and provide an unforgettable customer experience. The latter has become a grail for top-tier hotel which strive for differentiation to keep loyal...
New pop-up stores project : weekly update #2
As we announced last week we are finalizing an online initiative to store and maintain accurate and up-to-date information about the best pop-up stores worldwide. This initiative is a kind of POC (Proof Of Concept) to test our ideas to build a larger website on all new ideas, innovations and creative development in the retail world. We chose the retail world on purpose because it’s moving fast and represent approximately 50% of the companies. We also...
RFID technology used by Nespresso to enhance customer experience
RFID technology has been around for some years now but its applications in B2C remained pretty scarce. In the B2B context it’s a little bit more popular although in most business contexts it’s still in its infancy or at the exploration stage. We were therefore extremely pleased to see one real B2C application rolled out at Nespresso that contributes significantly to satisfying customers. Waiting time conducts to unsatisfaction One of the huge issues Nespresso was facing...
Delvaux and Dandoy associated in a co-branding initiative
Let’s finish the week with a brilliant idea of co-branding launched by our beloved brand Dandoy in partnership with Delvaux. For those who don’t live in Belgium Dandoy is a century-old company manufacturing high-quality biscuits, and Delvaux a renown leather goods manufacturer. Both companies are based in Brussels and members of the association Brussels Exclusive Labels. More than a century of tradition Quite incredibly in today’s world of failures and bankruptcies, these two firms have been...
Where are we heading to with our consumption Society?
I started re-reading Jean Baudrillard’ “La Société de Consommation” the other day, an essay that was written in 1970 and that contributed to Baudrillard’s fame. More than 40 years after its publication this brilliant essay remains accurate and descriptive of current Society. I was amazed to read the prospective quality of Baudrillard, yet frightened of what can be predicted for the future of our Society. Is there a future actually ? What Baudrillard wrote about the...
Mistakes to avoid when measuring in-store satisfaction of customers
Measuring the satisfaction of customers in a point of sales has always been a challenge for retailers. Paper-and-pencil initiatives are usually launched to measure at a given moment, but until recently nothing was available to measure customer satisfaction continuously. Fortunately new devices were introduced on the market (look for instance this example of satisfaction measurement in Heathrow airport) that allow a simple measurement. The advantages of customer satisfaction measurement devices The advantages are obvious : first...
Pop-up stores: what do they reveal about the future of retail
I’ve received several interview requests during the summer to discuss the future of retail. In today’s article I want to share with you my thoughts about pop-up stores, a (relatively) new forms of retail that reflects changes in our world and changes in the way the consumers behave. 1999 : the start of the pop-up stores It seems that the first pop-up store opened in 1999 in Los Angeles. The word pop-up meant at that time...
Marketing strategy : how Tic Tac uses downsizing to make you buy
Tic Tac is a brand of the Italian group Ferrero that has a been on the market for more than 40 years. Literally everyone knows the little transparent box containing a few dozens of hard mints. In its country of origin (Italy, where it was introduced in 1969), Tic Tac is now also sold in a new packaging that fits with its time. Downsizing trends in packaging With the crisis we’ve witnessed a general downsizing of...
Belfius : 95% of satisfied customers. A customer satisfaction survey that failed?
Belfius prides of targeting 95% of satisfied customers. This score is actually so high that it becomes suspicious. In today’s article we’ll investigate the three mistakes Belfius may make that would lead to misinterpreting the results. Get in touch with our market research firm How did you define customer satisfaction ? The first question that arises immediately is whether or not the questions that were asked in the customer satisfaction survey were really relevant. Let’s have...
Differentiation: A bookstore paints a dictionary’s page on its facade
Getting future customers’ attention is difficult. Consumers are subject to thousands of auditory, visual and olfactory cues every day. Retailers must be very creative to differentiate themselves. A book store in Brussels has found an interesting way to be different, yet still coherent with its positioning. Exterior and interior identities aligned with the store’s marketing strategy The Ptyx bookstore collaborated with Edena and Art-Mural to paint 68sqm of façade with 7 portraits and ca. 2400 letters...
La Minute Retail : the future of retail and the impact of digital technologies
When you manage a blog about marketing you necessarily have to cover many different areas of interest. Retail is one of them. And what do you do to get new ideas, insights and keep up with the latest news in your field? You read others’ blogs. Laminuteretail belongs to my shortlist of blogs to follow. It was launched a little but more than a year ago by Anthony Leroy, a young and passionate marketing enthusiast living...
Customer satisfaction: BMW enables tracking of your order
A few days ago we were dealing with digital innovation in Brussels’ BMW Flagship store. BMW inspired us once again with an IT innovation proposed to customers ordering a new car. Ordering a car can be an amazing and joyful experience; accepting the delivery time can be much more frustrating especially with German cars which have long waiting lists. If you are an oversea customer this frustration is even higher as you know that you long...
How to effectively reduce your spending when shopping in supermarkets
Today’s post is about marketing; it’s actually about in-store consumer behavior. A team of researchers recently discovered one incredible trick that effectively reduces what consumers are spending in the supermarket. Read further if you want to know what it is and apply it yourself. Supermarkets profits are driven by unplanned buying behavior You know what we mean. You have experienced it before. You’re in the supermarket and know in advance what you need to purchase. While...
Augmented Reality used at BMW flagship store. Guess for what …
BMW has opened a while ago a flagship store in Brussels which welcomes some top-notch models as well as temporary exhibitions. Currently it hosts an exhibition dedicated to the i8 electric car on the first floor. On the second floor some more “regular” models are exhibited along with a range of interaction devices. Among them a very interesting (and quite entertaining) augmented reality device. Get into the engine The augmented reality device is located just between the M3...
Impossible to manage an HORECA profitably in Belgium ? Not true!
In a recent interview Diane Delen, president of the FedCaf (Federation of Coffee Shops and bars), complained about tax rates, monitored cash registers mandatory as from January 2015, too high employer’s contributions. Il all makes it impossible for an entrepreneur to be profitable, she said. She went a step further and explained that it lead to 4000 bankruptcies last year. Cash register at the heart of the debate Monitored cash registers (they will get a “black...
Uber banned, AirBNB in troubles. What’s the future of the sharing economy?
It seems that lobbies are wining some battles against newcomers in mature industries : UberPOP was banned from several countries or cities in the last months (Belgium, France, Italy, Germany) and we were wondering in a previous post whether AirBNB would be the next victim of the authorities. Unfortunately we predicted it right and AirBnb got in troubles. The Flanders region in Belgium threatened people using AirBnb to rent their house / apartment to fine them...
Greatest 3D printing quality on earth? Interview of TwinKind’s founder
We litteraly fell in love with TwinKind, a 3D printing startup located in Berlin that we visited in April. After the teasers of last week, here comes the time to go more in depth with an interview of Timo Schaedel, Twinkind’s founder IntoTheMinds: Timo, you’re the founder of Twinkind. Who are you and what have you done before Twinkind ? Timo Schaedel: I have been developing and directing international commercials for clients such as Mercedes-Benz, Panasonic, Audi...
Type Hype : superbly designed coffee and print shop in Berlin
You may remember that we dealt with Paper & Tea in a previous post, a concept store where the Art of tea meets the Art of print. Today we’re visiting Type Hype, another retail concept mixing two categories of products : coffee and design / graphical Art. Type Hype is located in the Rosa Luxemburg strasse (near Alexanderplatz), a street where you’ll find several retail settings worth the visit (have a look at our map of...
Interview of Dirk Steiger, a CFO who became baker and entrepreneur
One of the cool and well-known shops of Berlin is Zeit Für Brot, an organic bakery located near Alexanderplatz. We went there and loved the place, its atmosphere, its design and of course its products. We are pleased to publish today an interview of Dirk Steiger, the entrepreneur who developed the Berlin store. He has an unusual entrepreneurial path that deserves to be discovered. For the fellow readers among you you may make some parallels with...
Paper & Tea: a superb concept store in the middle of Berlin
Among the nice retail concepts that were born in Berlin, I liked particularly Paper & Tea, a small “concept store” where tea meets paper Art. This store proposes a customer experience that differs substantially from what you can find in come more classical tea shops. There is a touch of design, a touch of innovation that you won’t find elsewhere and that make the visit valuable. I spent a great time talking about the store and taking...
Mono-product marketing strategy : examples from Paris
In a previous post we reported on a store in Paris selling only one type of product : Éclair. L’Atelier de l’Eclair has reached the excellence and its reputation spreads online has you can see if you browse consumers’ forums. We stumbled upon other stores of the same type in Paris “Comme à Lisbonne” Even after touring in Paris so many times, you can still miss something. This is the case for “Comme à Lisbonne”, a...
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