This month, we published a couple articles in the Denver and Dallas Business Journals. The article I wrote, which focuses on relationship marketing and video production, includes insights that I think are worth sharing again here.
Why?
Because building relationships can be so valuable! It’s a huge part of what I do each day. In fact, I’d love to hear your thoughts on what I share here, or any other insights you might have about relationship marketing.
So, here it is. A sneak peek at our business journal article:
Your marketing efforts may already fall squarely in the relationship camp. Or perhaps you tread more heavily in the transactional marketing approach. Each has its merits.
Transactional marketing is easier to tie to direct drivers of growth. Relationship marketing, while harder to measure and quantify, can create brand loyalists, even brand advocates, in the long term. If you invest in a relationship, you are more likely to have repeat customers with less effort required to get them to transact next time.
There are strong indicators that now is a great time to invest in relationship marketing.
For example, the great resignation of 2021 – an unprecedented movement of people leaving their jobs – illustrates our collective search for meaning and autonomy.
Just as people are changing jobs for a greater sense of purpose (and work-life balance), people’s expectations of brands are shifting too. It’s especially prevalent among young consumers. They want more than a product or a service. They want to believe in something. They want to embrace companies that align with their beliefs on sustainability, equality and social betterment.
One way to think about strengthening relationships is to create an ongoing dialogue.
Start by envisioning what kind of experience you want prospective customers, or prospective employees, to have when they encounter your business.
Are they able to find the specific information they are looking for? Or is it all very general? Does your site deliver a compelling story (i.e., about company culture, or mission) that inspires people to spend more time there?
A readily available library of content can solve these communication gaps, and make all the difference in strengthening connections.
At One Floor Up, we’ve been particularly inspired by recent collaborations with institutes of higher education and human resource departments.
For example, the University of Colorado in Denver worked with a cross-section of students, alumni, professors and staff to refresh the university’s purpose. Together, they resolved to transform lives, expand economies and uplift communities.
CU Denver also created a solid plan for how to get there. They crafted goals toward the year 2030, with a focus on things like equity, innovation and researching society’s grand challenges. The video we produced for CU Denver features various representatives across campus who bring these ideas to life.
Similarly, we partnered with the human resources department at Air Methods to create purpose-driven recruitment videos for their life-saving flight crews. To attract the right applicants for the job, Air Methods wanted to accurately convey the intensity of life-saving missions, but also the more routine downtime of life at the Air Methods base.
We created a variety of videos for their content library, including ones that depict the true-to-life moments of being an Air Methods nurse, paramedic or pilot.
Authentic recruitment tools like this, that help prospective employees accurately assess their own interest and aptitude, go that extra mile toward creating win-win employment partnerships – based on mutual trust, job satisfaction and longevity.
For all the benefits that relationship marketing offers, it’s worth taking a moment to consider how your efforts stack up against 2022 standards.
