As I stated in my previous column “Towards the Good Will Marketing” I went back to my lovely hometown, Jakarta eight weeks ago. I flew with Singapore Airlines (SQ) from Sydney to Jakarta, transiting in Singapore. When I arrived at Soekarno-Hatta, I immediately went to pick up my luggage. While I was waiting for my luggage, my name was suddenly called on the PA system by one of the airport staffs. Basically my luggage had not arrived with me together in Indonesia. The reason being was because the transit time in Singapore was only twenty minutes and the was not enough time to transfer the luggage from one plane to the next. Hence the luggage will arrive with the following Singapore-Jakarta flight.
At that particular moment I was disappointed and confused with what happened. I was not the only person who experienced this particular problem. To be honest, I did not trust with the Indonesians’ work ethic which always tries to complicate all the procedures especially in the occasions like this.
Conversely, I was treated very well at that night by the Singapore Airlines staffs. The procedure was simple. Basically the luggage will be delivered in two hours at the same night. I was promised that I will be contacted in the first hour just to ease my confusion. In one hour indeed, they made a call to inform me that the luggage had arrived safely and will be delivered via courier to my house as soon as possible. Approximately two hours later, the luggage arrived safely, being delivered by a courier who was very friendly to me. The following day, SQ phoned me to apologize for what had happened and to ensure that I had received the luggage safely without any hassle. Frankly, I was amazed by the values that their services had generated for me. The value of flying safely, the value of hassle-free compensation and the value of integrated professionalism as a company that were generated immediately impressed me.
In this particular column I would like to point out how important to create the outstanding values of your business in marketing. A true marketer once told me that being in business means creating value instead of merely providing product or service. Customers are never satisfied with values that they have. The true marketers will always be able to find new values to be their new opportunities. The true marketers also believe that great integrated values behind their product or service do not always mean cheaper price. In fact, Singapore Airlines tickets are considered to be more expensive compared to other flight carriers and yet they are always ranked as one of the best flight carriers in the world.
According to the Macquarie dictionary, a value could be thought of as the property of a thing that makes it highly regarded, desirable, useful, worth, merit. The marketing actually happens after the sales have been finalized. Therefore creating wonderful after sales value is particularly crucial in business. Again I would like to point out some real life examples to draw the thick correlation between the marketing principles to the daily routines.
Let us think about Mercedes-Benz, BMW, Louis Vuitton, Versace, Vertu and the other high-end brands which cost us hundreds and thousands of dollars just to buy their items. We know that it is not the end of our life not to purchase these items. Besides, everybody knows that it takes only less than half of the retail price to produce these items. Why then do we always have the desire to buy these items? One of the most obvious reasons is that they provide prestige - the impression and sense of being successful. It cannot be denied in the modern society that having these items make us feel good about ourselves and make others admire us (self-importance value).
Everybody knows MasterCard, with their slogan “There are some things money can’t buy, for everything else, there’s MasterCard”. This slogan really simplifies the value that MasterCard offers to their customers which is convenience. MasterCard is accepted around the globe. Even different currency does not create a boundary for them. Everything that could be bought by money can be handled by MasterCard.
For Him Magazine (FHM) and Male Emporium (ME) magazines are the other example. We know that these magazines contain nothing but funky and crazy articles that do not educate in a sense. However, FHM in fact is a global magazine which exists in 31 different countries. This is due to the fact that these magazines create an outstanding value that provides their customers an escape from boredom and a way to reduce stress.
These examples outline the importance of value creation bundled into their product and service. These examples do not follow the old and conservative marketing definition that to win the market, the product or service has to be cheaper. By creating new wonderful values, the company will become closer to their customers. Hence, they would be closer to the market. As I stated in my previous column “Global Strength, Local Approach” the market is actually more important than the marketing itself. Therefore, our marketing tactic should be able to follow and to be implemented into the dynamic and modern market.
I understand that this column is still far from perfection. Hence, any comments, questions and opinions would be greatly appreciated
David Herlambang
MarketingFirst
At that particular moment I was disappointed and confused with what happened. I was not the only person who experienced this particular problem. To be honest, I did not trust with the Indonesians’ work ethic which always tries to complicate all the procedures especially in the occasions like this.
Conversely, I was treated very well at that night by the Singapore Airlines staffs. The procedure was simple. Basically the luggage will be delivered in two hours at the same night. I was promised that I will be contacted in the first hour just to ease my confusion. In one hour indeed, they made a call to inform me that the luggage had arrived safely and will be delivered via courier to my house as soon as possible. Approximately two hours later, the luggage arrived safely, being delivered by a courier who was very friendly to me. The following day, SQ phoned me to apologize for what had happened and to ensure that I had received the luggage safely without any hassle. Frankly, I was amazed by the values that their services had generated for me. The value of flying safely, the value of hassle-free compensation and the value of integrated professionalism as a company that were generated immediately impressed me.
In this particular column I would like to point out how important to create the outstanding values of your business in marketing. A true marketer once told me that being in business means creating value instead of merely providing product or service. Customers are never satisfied with values that they have. The true marketers will always be able to find new values to be their new opportunities. The true marketers also believe that great integrated values behind their product or service do not always mean cheaper price. In fact, Singapore Airlines tickets are considered to be more expensive compared to other flight carriers and yet they are always ranked as one of the best flight carriers in the world.
According to the Macquarie dictionary, a value could be thought of as the property of a thing that makes it highly regarded, desirable, useful, worth, merit. The marketing actually happens after the sales have been finalized. Therefore creating wonderful after sales value is particularly crucial in business. Again I would like to point out some real life examples to draw the thick correlation between the marketing principles to the daily routines.
Let us think about Mercedes-Benz, BMW, Louis Vuitton, Versace, Vertu and the other high-end brands which cost us hundreds and thousands of dollars just to buy their items. We know that it is not the end of our life not to purchase these items. Besides, everybody knows that it takes only less than half of the retail price to produce these items. Why then do we always have the desire to buy these items? One of the most obvious reasons is that they provide prestige - the impression and sense of being successful. It cannot be denied in the modern society that having these items make us feel good about ourselves and make others admire us (self-importance value).
Everybody knows MasterCard, with their slogan “There are some things money can’t buy, for everything else, there’s MasterCard”. This slogan really simplifies the value that MasterCard offers to their customers which is convenience. MasterCard is accepted around the globe. Even different currency does not create a boundary for them. Everything that could be bought by money can be handled by MasterCard.
For Him Magazine (FHM) and Male Emporium (ME) magazines are the other example. We know that these magazines contain nothing but funky and crazy articles that do not educate in a sense. However, FHM in fact is a global magazine which exists in 31 different countries. This is due to the fact that these magazines create an outstanding value that provides their customers an escape from boredom and a way to reduce stress.
These examples outline the importance of value creation bundled into their product and service. These examples do not follow the old and conservative marketing definition that to win the market, the product or service has to be cheaper. By creating new wonderful values, the company will become closer to their customers. Hence, they would be closer to the market. As I stated in my previous column “Global Strength, Local Approach” the market is actually more important than the marketing itself. Therefore, our marketing tactic should be able to follow and to be implemented into the dynamic and modern market.
I understand that this column is still far from perfection. Hence, any comments, questions and opinions would be greatly appreciated
David Herlambang
MarketingFirst
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