Stop With The Start-Up Envy, Just Build A Customer-Focused Culture For Success

Stop With The Start-Up Envy, Just Build A Customer-Focused Culture For Success
B&T Magazine
By B&T Magazine
SHARE
THIS



In this guest piece, Five by Five’s Matt Lawton (pictured below) argues why big corporates don’t need table tennis and kombucha on tap to emulate the best part of start-up culture.

Matt Lawton

It seems the obsession with becoming ‘agile’ among Australian corporates is engrained in attempting to achieve the impossible: emulating hot start-up culture.

But we all know it takes more than a ‘lab’, pool table and free coconut water to realign culture, so corporates should stop messing around at the edges and focus on the more meaningful changes they can make to re-launch themselves.

Corporates can help create start-up cultures just by structuring their businesses in a way that puts them closer to the customer. In a recent Launch Marketing Council meeting, I heard about long established successful businesses that are doing four things:

  1. Elevating the status of customer service within the organisation.
  2. Physically sitting marketing department folks within the customer service team.
  3. Making customer service a marketing function with a reporting line into the CMO instead of the COO.
  4. Changing the focus of customer service teams to customer experience so they become innovators and not just reactors.

Whilst all of these things seem logical, it can be tough for established companies to get around to them.

I’d argue that a new product launch is a good time to consider making these changes, because you only get one chance to do it right. Offering a highly responsive and attentive service to positively impact customer experience before, during and after a launch is the best way to establish a culture that drives success.

One of the concepts that interested me most during our recent roundtable were comments made by Maria Loyez, formerly of Society One. Whilst many people have become obsessed with the notion of minimal viable product (MVP), Maria argued we need to be producing minimal loveable products (MLP).

The idea of investing in a deliberately unsustainable initial level of service to support a new product is counter-intuitive to most of us. But by delighting customers way beyond their expectations whilst encouraging them to change behaviour – either with a new product, service or platform – is all about securing disruptive levels of advocacy amongst your target audience.

Being loveable could be the best investment in marketing new products, and being loveable through an over-investment in customer service may be the best way to deliver a successful launch.

I’m not sure you need to spend hundreds of millions of dollars on ‘digital transformation’ projects that take years to implement to achieve that.

Often, we still don’t think about ‘brand’ beyond visual identity and marketing communications. The most powerful brands integrate their values into their day-to-day behaviours and interactions, employment policies and operations.

Often, it’s the founder of the business who has to get this right from the outset, but in the case of established brands, there are many case studies of charismatic leaders having a dramatic impact on culture at all levels. As Xinja’s Camilla Cooke put it to our group, ‘Brand is culture is brand’.

Strong businesses of any size need the input of their leaders to form a culture that reflects their brand and creates customer value. After all, the very definition of a brand states it is “a name, term, design, symbol, or other feature that distinguishes an organisation or product from its rivals in the eyes of the customer ”.

So, next time someone tries to evoke the mysticism of start-up culture, remind them it’s just about adopting a customer view. And any business can learn to do that. Pass me a coconut water.

Please login with linkedin to comment

five by five Matt Lawton Start-Up start-up culture

Latest News

The Five Values For Business Success
  • Opinion

The Five Values For Business Success

Here's a serious business article that hopefully ticks B&T's quota box for serious business articles.

Opinion

by B&T Magazine

B&T Magazine
Is B2B Marketing Missing Its Emotional Touch?
  • Media

Is B2B Marketing Missing Its Emotional Touch?

B2B marketers could learn a thing or two from their B2C colleagues, argues WP Engine VP APAC sales Mark Randall in this guest post. It surprises me how many B2B organisations are not quite hitting the mark when it comes to reaching their audience. When talking directly to businesses, many brands are missing an opportunity […]

Opinion

by B&T Magazine

B&T Magazine
Burger King Trials Reusable Packaging
  • Media

Burger King Trials Reusable Packaging

Here's a top initiative from Burger King that does kinda sound like a slightly tedious Craig Reucassel documentary.

Recommended

by B&T Magazine

B&T Magazine
Smarter Use Of Art & Science Stretch Auto Budgets Further
  • Media

Smarter Use Of Art & Science Stretch Auto Budgets Further

The majority of adverts uploaded to Facebook aren’t created for Facebook as its priority. This is causing huge inefficiencies and poor performance for brands, many of whom are facing up to shrinking budgets. Tom Phillips (main photo) managing director at Connecting Plots shares lessons from 12 campaigns they optimised for auto brands… It’s no secret […]

Opinion

by B&T Magazine

B&T Magazine