Customer experience: When it comes to content viewing, how can marketers incorporate it? 

There’s much more to a great customer journey than incorporating over-the-top UX experiences. Even while producing a major film or TV show, thinking about the best way to enhance your audience’s full interaction with it from pre-production to post mortem is a huge must for digital brands.

Not sure why? A recent study by Qualtrics reveals more than 65 percent of customers rate their experience on a website or app as at least a “very important” factor in their willingness to recommend a brand. Considering entertainment brands are increasingly more digital in this day and age, cradling the customer experience is worth doing.

Here’s why entertainment brands need to focus on their digital customer experience — and how they can get it right and take advantage of what’s at stake.

Have a clear idea of who your customers are

Before considering best methods to enhancing the customer journey and experience, it’s important to take note of *who* your customers are — and what they value.

Last year was the year of diversity for movie brands. The ultra-successful film Crazy Rich Asians proved this to be true by bringing in $174 million at the box office while centering a storyline around a culture underrepresented in film due to the idea that it wouldn’t have “commercial potential” at the box office.

Warner Bros. didn’t shy away from the customers it was looking to serve — and instead, it spoke directly to them with appropriate casting and embracing the storyline in trailers. The result? A box office hit.

Creating customer personas to help identify customers is now easier than ever with data. Analytics platforms such as Google Analytics and Facebook Ads can easily break down audiences by demographics, interests, preferred viewing platform (digital vs. desktop) and more.

VuPulse has the power to not only give you a full view of who you customers are and where they’re consuming your content, we can also determine where they want to go. For example, VuPulse collects valuable data like preferred viewing destinations (MVPDs, vMVPDs and OTTs for TV marketers and digital retailers for movie marketers), making it easier for brands to identify who their customers are and what their viewing preferences may be.

Be consistent

Three words: Game of Thrones.

While GoT was one of the biggest shows of our lifetime, its ending left many viewers angry and unsatisfied. 

Why?

Because it strayed too far from its years-long consistency of character development and morality of key characters.

By the show’s end, Daerneys was no longer the loyal queen; she destroyed everything she loved in order to gain power. For many viewers, this plot twist strayed so far from what they had experienced up to that point that it left them with a sour taste in their mouths.

Entertainment brands can embrace consistency by staying ahead of the game. Even when it might seem like your brand is winning in terms of conversions and engagement, you can’t stop there — always be thinking of your next move, whether that’s through personalized ads or continuously rethinking bundled products based on informed demand.

Reduce friction

If you want people to consume your content, it shouldn’t be difficult to do so. Reducing friction throughout the customer journey can ensure an easy conversion, rather than leaving customers with a headache trying to figure out the process.

One of the biggest entertainment and sports presenters, AEG, harnesses technology to make a seamless customer conversion experience. For example, the company will push proximity-based messages for brands directly to consumers in lieu of a big event; it also allows for in-app experiences or upgrades during an event for its most loyal customers.

By making these experiences nearly automatic, AEG helps brands meet customers where they are — both literally and in terms of technology — and allows them to engage with the brand in new and exciting ways. Not only will this encourage conversion, but it will set the stage for customers to retain brand loyalty in years to come.

Give customers plenty of feedback opportunities

Every customer wants to be listened to — it’s a brand’s job to take feedback in stride.

By providing plenty of opportunities for user-generated feedback, a brand has the opportunity to adapt and grow with its customer base. This feedback can be solicited throughout the customer journey, whether it’s through polls or surveys at the end of online ads or viewing programs.

Every marketer knows that retaining loyal customers are cheaper than acquiring new ones. At the end of the day, keeping an ear to customer’s wants and needs — and adapting the customer journey to their responses — will maintain the strength of your digital brand.

How VuPulse can help

Google says it best: our increasing digital age means “immediacy and relevance are now at table stakes for brands.” 

VuPulse does the hard part — it knows where and when your customers are watching and outputs valuable preference data to stay in the know. What you do along the rest of the journey is up to you.

 

Ready to enhance your customer’s experience? Get started with VuPulse today.