avin narasimhan

No one in this business today is a stranger to the ongoing conversation around how we can better use marketing as a service, something that provides value to people beyond just words. One company I have personal experience that does an exceedingly fantastic job of that is Starwood Hotels- specifically my starwood preferred guest card. Obviously this connection comes through AMEX, which has a long track record of great customer service that has clearly filtered into SPG. No matter what the situation is, I've never been disappointed by the service I receive with this card- the few issues I've had have been immediately resolved. When I have an urgent request (such as asking AMEX to put my account under watch while out of the country), it took me no more than 20 seconds to get someone on the phone (compare that with waiting on hold with Bank of America for the exact same request, for 15 minutes before I finally said f*ck it).

But I digress. I got an email from Starwood over the weekend about my 'new social circle' and for a moment I cringed. Was Starwood trying to forcefeed me some new social network in an attempt to 'create' community around their brand? I always took them as one that understood people better than to do something like that, so I was a bit surprised.

But that turned out not to be the case at all. What they've done actually is pretty simple- aggregate activity from across the social spaces where they are engaging with their customers in (customer service on twitter, facebook as a place to collect and share vacation photos, a blog for travelers to share stories, etc) and where their customers are engaging with each other, in one place.

Feeds update in real time so you can see that there actually is some vibrant life in the community across different spaces. And, if you see activity from somewhere that you're not a member of (say you're a fan of SPG on facebook but don't follow them on twitter), it gives you an easy way to connect up. In just a few minutes of playing around with it, I already got great value out of the SPG insider in particular, which highlights local spots as seen by others in the SPG community.
 
I can probably count on one hand the number of times I've seen a traditional ad from SPG, but it's this kind of thing (not to mention the service, though I've mentioned it many times already) that keeps me loyal to them. Useful things that make my travel and credit experience better, without hard selling me on stuff I don't need. And those times when they do try to sell me, I'm so much more willing to listen because of all the other things they do for me that simply make my life easier.

And I guess that's really the point of why they do it-- they get that establishing a true quality relationship makes the product/service sales pitch infinitely easier. Just as I'm willing to listen to a friend recommend a product, if a company proves to me time and time again it's value, even when it's not actively selling, it makes my likelihood to purchase that much greater. And I think it's safe to say I'm not alone.

Seems so simple, yet still feels like a hard sell just to convince some that this is the right mentality.