{"id":48366,"date":"2022-05-26T08:22:00","date_gmt":"2022-05-26T12:22:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.litmus.com\/?p=48366"},"modified":"2025-11-05T13:32:26","modified_gmt":"2025-11-05T18:32:26","slug":"customer-centric-marketing","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.litmus.com\/blog\/customer-centric-marketing","title":{"rendered":"Customer-Centric Marketing is Critical: Email is the First Step"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\n\t<div id=\"simple-text-block-block_453200f1c848bf09425ee149760ea9f3\" class=\"block-simple-text-block alignfull bg-texture \" style=\"background-color:\">\n  <div class=\"container\">\n  \t<div class=\"row\">\n  \t\t<div class=\"col\">\n  \t\t\t<div class=\"copy\">\n  \t\t\t\t  \t\t\t<\/div>\n  \t\t<\/div>\n  \t<\/div>\n  <\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n\n\t<div id=\"simple-text-block-block_d7187abee10dc3c3b0470d0ec39b6e0f\" class=\"block-simple-text-block alignfull \" style=\"background-color:\">\n  <div class=\"container\">\n  \t<div class=\"row\">\n  \t\t<div class=\"col\">\n  \t\t\t<div class=\"copy\">\n  \t\t\t\t<p>As marketing leaders, many of us place high value on our organization\u2019s ability to deliver personalized and contextually relevant customer experiences\u2014in email and other marketing channels. But as <a rel=\"noopener\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.gartner.com\/en\/articles\/how-the-cmo-role-has-evolved-and-what-s-next\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Gartner recently pointed out<\/a> (and many of us are experiencing firsthand!), the\u00a0 senior marketing leadership role has evolved.<\/p>\n<p>We\u2019re now architects of the customer experience, and tasked with nurturing those relationships. We have to know what the customer wants and be equipped to give them a consistent and <a rel=\"noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/www.litmus.com\/blog\/personalized-marketing\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">personalized experience<\/a>\u2014every time they interact with our organization. When their needs, wants, or the competitive landscape changes, we have to be nimble enough to respond.<\/p>\n<p>I\u2019m incredibly proud to be a marketing leader at Litmus because we have forged a strong and meaningful relationship with our customers\u2014and the email community at large\u2014over the years. In that spirit, I\u2019d like to share how we\u2019ve applied a customer-centric focus throughout our organization\u2014fueled by our marketing program.<\/p>\n<h2>Personalized experiences don\u2019t end in marketing channels<\/h2>\n<p>When we surveyed marketers for our <a rel=\"noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/www.litmus.com\/resources\/state-of-email\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">2021 State of Email report<\/a>, 55% were making personalization a priority in their email program; 35% were focused on enriching their customer profiles in order to do that.<\/p>\n<p>Email is one of the rare channels marketers can (and should) use to form a direct customer connection. It provides access to <a rel=\"noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/www.litmus.com\/blog\/email-for-first-party-data\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">first-party data<\/a> and engagement signals that tell you exactly what your audience cares about.<\/p>\n<p>Email is the first place we see if an audience is engaging.<\/p>\n<p>Through our Litmus email program, we recognized trends that concerned the email community\u2014from <a rel=\"noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/www.litmus.com\/blog\/the-ultimate-guide-to-dark-mode-for-email-marketers\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Dark Mode<\/a> to <a rel=\"noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/www.litmus.com\/blog\/a-guide-to-bulletproof-buttons-in-email-design\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">bulletproof buttons<\/a> to <a rel=\"noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/www.litmus.com\/blog\/current-state-of-mpp-jan-2022-webinar-recording-qa\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Apple\u2019s Mail Privacy Protection (MPP)<\/a>\u2013\u2013before they were mainstream.<\/p>\n<p>We applied this insight to produce timely, relevant, and valuable content for our audience, across all channels. We collaborated with our product engineering teams, <a rel=\"noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/www.litmus.com\/blog\/our-secrets-to-outstanding-customer-support\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">customer support<\/a>, and sales teams to make sure we were equipped across our organization to help our audience navigate these topics.<\/p>\n<p>How we addressed them in each channel was very different, but we knew what mattered to our audience because we saw the <a rel=\"noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/www.litmus.com\/blog\/defining-your-email-marketing-through-data\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">early indicators in our own email program<\/a>.<\/p>\n<h2>Retention is key to revenue<\/h2>\n<p>Marketing\u2019s role has evolved into one that has to address the prospect journey and the full customer acquisition, retention, and expansion life cycle. That requires a continual feedback loop with other teams whose work impacts the prospect and customer experience. It sounds complicated, but simple information exchanges can have a major impact.<\/p>\n<p>To retain customers, we know it\u2019s critical to learn (clearly and quickly) which pain points our staff is talking with customers about, and the nature of them. We hold a simple quarterly meeting with our customer support and marketing groups to stay informed about customer experience, from the very people who solve customer problems every day.<\/p>\n<p>With that view of the customer experience, our marketing team can identify how to help customers avoid confusion entirely, and scale processes to make them more repeatable and effective.<\/p>\n<h2>The voice of the customer is everywhere (if you listen)<\/h2>\n<p>Many organizations focus so much on prospects that they know more about them than customers. But there is so much customers will share if you ask\u2014especially when they are early in their journey with your business.<\/p>\n<p>In email, <a rel=\"noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/www.litmus.com\/blog\/email-preferences-center-best-practices\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">preference centers<\/a> can be a way to gain that information. It\u2019s a snapshot into what your customer is interested in at a given moment\u2014straight from them. It may not feel like a formal \u201cvoice of the customer\u201d exploration, but it\u2019s valuable insight.<\/p>\n<p>For <a rel=\"noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/www.litmus.com\/conference\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Litmus Live 2022<\/a>, we\u2019ve applied the voice of the customer to bring what we hope will be a more inclusive and beneficial email conference for all. This once in-person experience went virtual last year due to the pandemic. This year, participants told us they wanted a virtual experience again\u2014and we have a global audience we\u2019d like to include. So, Litmus Live 2022 will be both fully virtual and budget-friendly.<\/p>\n<p>When we start to focus on next year\u2019s event, we\u2019ll check in to see what our audience wants at that time. (Which could mean a virtual, hybrid, or fully in-person event!) Regardless, we\u2019ll involve the voice of our community to help us decide the best approach.<\/p>\n<p>The role of the marketing leader might be getting more challenging, but you don\u2019t have to be equipped with state of the art research or a massive budget to adopt a customer-centric marketing strategy. It really can be as simple as using the customer insights you already have through your email program and other sources\u2014and getting creative with how to make them actionable.<\/p>\n<div class=\"cta\">\n<table style=\"background-color: #f2f3f6\">\n<tbody>\n<tr>\n<td class=\"block-1\" style=\"padding: 20px 10px 20px 20px\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-22947\" src=\"https:\/\/www.litmus.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/leading-fwd-hero.jpg\" alt=\"leading-fwd-hero\" width=\"1380\" height=\"725\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.litmus.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/leading-fwd-hero.jpg 1380w, https:\/\/www.litmus.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/leading-fwd-hero-300x158.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.litmus.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/leading-fwd-hero-1024x538.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/www.litmus.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/leading-fwd-hero-768x403.jpg 768w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1380px) 100vw, 1380px\" \/><\/td>\n<td class=\"block-2\" style=\"padding: 20px 20px 20px 10px\">\n<p class=\"zero\"><strong>Ridiculously smart content for marketing leaders\u2014like you.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p class=\"zero\">Get ridiculously smart content for marketing leaders via monthly emails, quarterly events, and whatever else we can dream up that will meet your needs.<\/p>\n<p class=\"zero\"><a class=\"btn medium orange button\" rel=\"noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/www.litmus.com\/leading-fwd-newsletter\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">SUBSCRIBE<\/a><\/p>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<\/div>\n  \t\t\t<\/div>\n  \t\t<\/div>\n  \t<\/div>\n  <\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":48807,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"tags":[10271,86,10222],"blog_category":[10306],"class_list":["post-48366","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-customer-experience","tag-engagement","tag-omnichannel","blog_category-email-marketing-strategy"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v27.5 (Yoast SEO v27.7) - 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