2.1.1. Following the customer wherever they buy: from multichannel to omnichannel

Consumers’ trajectories are increasingly complex: for a given purchase, they easily mix the real and virtual worlds throughout their journey. For example, they can search for information online and then go to a physical store (offline) to see the product in real life and make their purchase (ROPO phenomenon – Research Online, Purchase Offline). They can also find and try products in shops (showrooming principle) and then buy them on the Internet by looking for the best possible offer because of price comparison websites.

Thus, the emergence of new digital technologies allows companies and their brands to offer multiple access points to their customers and, more generally, to consumers seeking information. As a result, brand sites are increasingly interactive and new digital tools are offering current or potential customers new ways to learn, interact with the company or buy, beyond the traditional points of sale. Thus, many companies have developed a multichannel offer, offering Internet access to their products and/or services on a model almost identical to the traditional physical distribution channel. This is particularly the case for companies in the banking and insurance sectors.

While multichannel has long been perceived as placing the digital circuit of websites in competition with the physical circuit of stores, companies have now understood that it is in their interest to rely more on the complementarity of these circuits. The challenge for them is now to move from a vision of multichannel silos – where each channel would be managed and optimized in isolation – to an omnichannel proposal: the objective is to offer a coherent and global offer with a transversal vision of distribution channels, and to play on the synergies between channels to create visibility and traffic from one to the other, and ultimately, to foster the attractiveness for the company and its brands.

Levis Strauss has thus modified its strategy regarding its various distribution channels on several occasions. At the beginning of Internet sales, it only offered a very limited number of items online in order to not compete with the official shops. Then, in July 2003, it launched Signature, a specific brand for the mass retail market. This new offer at Wal-Mart in the United States and Carrefour in France was supposed to boost sales. However, after only 3 years, the experiment was stopped abruptly: sales did not take off and the impact on the brand’s image was catastrophic. Since then, the company has once again focused on its expertise and the value of its brand by offering more than 150 jean items adapted to all styles and morphologies. This very broad offer allows it to reaffirm its status as a benchmark in the denim market and to supply all these distribution channels.

2.1.2. Communicating with the customer wherever they come into contact with the company: the touchpoints

Companies have long considered that they inform consumers about their brands through their media communication and direct contacts at points of sale. The digitalization of society – and in particular of communication – has drastically changed this pattern.

A first step involved taking into account more broadly all the opportunities for interaction with customers and potential customers as possible touchpoints, each providing information about the brand and participating in the construction of its image. Indeed, while this type of information always passes through the traditional media (advertising, advertorials, etc.), other communication tools have significantly developed outside the media (in particular, direct marketing) and the multiple ways for consumers to be in contact with a company are now taken into account, whether it is physical meeting points (stores or agencies, corner shops, ephemeral stores, exhibitions and trade shows, etc.), dedicated telephone lines (toll-free numbers, after-sales services, etc.) or the website, for example. It is essential for companies to consider all these points of contact and ensure consistency of discourse throughout the customer journey to optimize brand image management.

This consistency is at the heart of unified customer management at Disneyland Paris², for example, where the brand’s objective is to support potential and current customers throughout their journey by avoiding irrelevant and repetitive messages, which bring unnecessary or even negative marketing pressure to the brand. Thus, because of the data management platform, people who have already booked a stay are removed from prospecting emailing campaigns and are no longer oversolicited by new e-mails. Capping, a technique that involves limiting the amount of exposure an individual has to the same message, is used as much as possible to reduce the irritating nature of repetitions. In addition, the CRM and Media teams are working to reduce the repetition of messages to customers and prospects using mobile phones, tablets and computers.

The second step is to take into account the transformation of society and the almost systematic use of other sources of information by consumers on the Internet. In addition to the information resources set up by the company, they obtain more information from sources that are not controlled by the company, such as forums, social networks and blogs. Advertisements, store vendors or brand sites are competing with all types of influencers and bloggers on YouTube, Instagram and Snapchat, for example. Brand communication is invading virtual space beyond the control of companies.

A company that wants to collect an overview of its brand exchanges with consumers can no longer limit itself to the information it delivers and the exchanges it controls (through traditional media, email exchanges, websites, telephone services and face-to-face physical sales outlets), but must identify and take into account all the direct or indirect touchpoints it shares with consumers. This is why social listening studies (which study the flow of reviews and all kinds of comments about the brand on social networks) have grown exponentially in recent years. This is also the reason why brands today work and cooperate with influencers to ensure as much as possible that the discourse they miss remains positive.

2.2.1. A constant search for a demonstration of transparency

Hyperconnected and aware of brand information in near-real time, consumers have gained power over brands as they are potentially whistleblowers. This power deters any company from defrauding or hiding its mistakes. In addition, the current reflections of the economic, political and global world of society on corporate social responsibility encourage companies to set an example in terms of respect for individuals and the environment. The positive will of companies to be aware of their responsibilities, linked to the risk of a negative viral campaign against them if they do not comply, pushes them toward a desire for transparency with consumers, which is expressed through communication such as concrete actions of openness.

Thus, to prove that they have nothing to hide, brands are opening their doors more and more frequently, literally and figuratively. For Blédina, a leading brand of infant nutrition, trust is crucial, as parents are committed to their children’s health. The brand is, therefore, increasing its demonstrations of transparency toward consumers to give them every possible assurance in terms of product quality. This demonstration involves open-door operations and numerous procedures staged on the brand’s website. For the past 7 years, the “Witness parents” operation has consisted of offering volunteer parents a visit to a Blédina factory (Brive-la-Gaillarde in 2017) and meeting with the brand’s partner farmers. This operation reported on the site under the title “What if we told each other everything?”³ and allows Blédina to recall the strict procedures allowing it to guarantee an irreproachable level of quality. The visit to suppliers’ orchards gave rise to a sidebar entitled “Our agricultural practices”, which highlights the selection of farmers, the Blédina specifications provided to them and the monitoring of production. The cooking workshop organized with a Blédina chef is presented in the “Our recipes” sidebar, which discusses the importance of balance in recipe development. In the “Fabrication & Control” sidebar, the factory visit made it possible to review the quality tests carried out during the manufacture of small jars.

In the same vein, Blédina is offering a series of films on its website and on YouTube (for example, “The odyssey of baby food jars” posted on YouTube in February 2018) to show the entire production process for both raw materials and finished products.

While the number of “open days” is increasing (as shown by “Les journées particulières” (special days) organized by LVMH since 2011, which provide access to product manufacturing workshops and promote their artisanal character⁴, or “Les Portes Ouvertes de la Bananeraie” at Michel and Augustin, which offer tastings and testings of new recipes every first Thursday of the month), another form of transparency is to give the company’s employees a voice. Employees are perceived as more credible in talking about what is happening in their company, compared to both executives and celebrities, who are frequent spokespersons for brands in advertising. In the eyes of consumers, CEOs are interested in brand results and are potentially biased in their discourse; as for celebrities, they are paid by brands to say good things about them without necessarily knowing them or even using them [FLE 14]. Since then, brands from all sectors have been showcasing their employees, particularly in the services sector (SFR, McDonald's, SNCF, Houra.fr, Uber). The fact that brands let their employees speak for themselves allows consumers to identify themselves in a way that is linked to the horizontality of the relationship. Indeed, while managers and celebrities are perceived as superior, or not belonging to the same world as the average consumer, employees share real life experiences with consumers and are therefore perceived as more accessible and credible. This new form of endorsement thus brings greater transparency and proximity to brands.

2.2.2. Indirect speaking: the growing role of influencers

The Internet and social networks and other exchange platforms that have emerged have marked the advent of a new source of communication about the brand: influencers, bloggers, instigators and YouTubers; they are characterized by their audience (number of followers) and often their expertise in a specific area of competence (beauty, sport, fashion, travel, etc.).

While traditional advertising is perceived by consumers as intrusive and not very credible, they are informed by blogs, forums and social networks and are perceived as more credible because they are independent of brands. The influencers who provide their comments have such a direct and indirect audience that they have the ability to be trend-setters and have acquired a form of quasi-normative power through social networks. As Nicolas Riou notes [RIO 16, p.16], “the digital world and its new uses shape the individual, their beliefs and their value systems. Digital culture influences the perception of what is desirable and what is less desirable, and structures the desire to buy, well in advance”.

Faced with these two combined phenomena of questioning brand advertising discourse and the takeover of the digital world, it is becoming essential for brands to use influencers to convey their messages effectively. When working with an influencer, brands face a trade-off between the breadth of diffusion (maximizing the number of followers) and influencer expertise. We can thus distinguish the top influencers (more than 100,000 subscribers) from the microinfluencers (less than 10,000 subscribers). More than just the number of followers, influencers’ performance depends on their ability to engage with their community, measured by the number of likes, comments and sharing of the post concerned. Loyalty and dedication prove that the community is not passive. It also makes it possible to put aside the “ghost” followers that would have actually been bought by influencers, a practice recently questioned by brands⁵.

For an influencer to effectively convey a brand’s message, it is essential that he or she be credible, and in particular, that he or she be perceived as sincere and authentic and not paid by the brand to say good things about it. In 2016, Scott Disick, the American reality TV star, posted a message on Instagram for a sports food supplement brand… forgetting to remove the part of the sentence that was intended for him (“at 4 pm, write the message below”). The exposure of this commercial practice caused a catastrophic negative buzz for both the brand and the influencer.

2.3.1. Increasing consumer participation

Globally, brands are increasingly integrating consumers throughout the process of developing new products or (re)positioning their brands.

2.3.1.2. Co-creation and crowdsourcing

Brands also benefit from easier access to genuine exchanges with consumers to integrate them into the concept development phases (ideation, creation of the product concept, packaging, etc.) and the development of products or services (brand choice, advertising catch line, video creation, etc.). Thus, speaking of cocreation and consumer co-producers is common today, the latter becoming a stakeholder in the launch of the new products or services (see Chapter 9).

Lego, for example, places co-creation at the heart of its innovation policy by offering its customers of all ages the opportunity to create their own product on the Lego Ideas⁷ website. Beyond a sufficient number of votes in favor, the product is launched on the market. Similarly, the Rebrick platform is managed as a collaboration between the brand and its adult fans. Out of 12 million videos on Lego, only 3 million are made by the brand.

2.3.1.3. Participatory financing or crowdfunding

Participatory financing (or crowdfunding) is another way of integrating the consumer, this time downstream of the project. The principle for the company (usually start-ups) is to finance a project without going through banks but by addressing the crowd of consumers directly. In return, the person making a donation can receive a copy of the product (presales principle, sometimes with a discount) and/or bonuses, see their name appear as a donor, receive stakes in the company in the form of shares (equity crowdfunding), etc. Brands generally use platforms dedicated to participatory financing, such as Ulule, My Major Company, Indiegogo or KickStarter.

The Wado brand, which offers “fair-trade sneakers”, is being launched according to this principle⁹. It offers its shoes at a discounted price compared to the price that will be recommended in store. The project is therefore backed by a fundraising campaign financed by presales and associated with a fair trade and sustainable development approach. For a contribution of €10, Wado will plant two trees, for €59, the customer will have a pair of sneakers, a Wado bag and two trees will be planted, then the rate decreases according to the number of pairs of sneakers ordered. Launched in March 2018 with a fundraising target of €11,000, the project had raised €363,761 with 3,379 contributors by July 1, 2018.

2.3.2. An increasingly personalized relationship

The implementation of gigantic databases (big data), combining sociodemographic and behavioral data linked to the knowledge that the company accumulates about its customers throughout the relationship, allows brands to set up communication and offers that are increasingly adapted to consumer profiles.

When in 2012, Nestlé launched BabyNes, a child nutrition system consisting of a connected machine and a range of milk capsules, with a variety of nutritional elements, the brand launched a fully personalized service program¹¹. In addition to the touchpoints made available to parents to communicate daily if they wish (e-mails, telephone line, chat, physical sales points, etc.), the brand calls parents 10 days after the purchase and then 2 months later to ensure that the system is being used correctly. The services offered are themselves entirely personalized since they make it possible to prepare the bottles according to the child’s needs, to record in a logbook the composition of these bottles and the evolution of the child’s growth, to share these data with the paediatrician, to manage the parents’ stock of capsules and to facilitate replenishment orders, etc. There is even an application that allows you to prepare bottles remotely using a smartphone.

In addition, consumers also have the opportunity to express themselves about their relationship with the brand (call centers, chatbots, e-mails, points of sale, aftersales service, etc.) but also on social networks. Their relationship with the brand therefore becomes visible, as a result, to a potentially much larger number of people than in the case of word of mouth or only face-to-face communication. This personalization of the desired relationship and the fact that it is publicly assumed by the individual enables it to be analyzed in light of brand identification concepts [FOU 98], commitment [BEN 03] and even performativity [BÔ 13]. The individual plays a role in society through the brands they visibly consume and which construct their identity: thus, the individual practices them publicly, shares their values, the ritualistic gestures that accompany them, adhering to their vision of the world, etc. From then on, the consumer engages in a real performance inspired by brands, in the sense of a theatrical performance.

2.3.3. A relationship based on utility and meaning through commitment

Brands do not escape the quest for meaning that characterizes and shapes today’s society. Thus, they tend to bring more value to their offer, either by strengthening the overall consumer benefit associated with the said offer, in particular through digital applications and connected objects, or by defending values or causes valued by their consumers.

2.3.3.1. The necessary utility of the brand

The brand must be useful since its positioning is based on a benefit by which it allows the consumer to solve a problem. The way it solves this problem allows it to establish a point of differentiation and bring added value to its customers [TAL 18]. This approach is therefore quite old. On the other hand, new digital technologies make it possible to make it visible and accessible, to stage it and to accelerate its effectiveness.

In this spirit, many brands offer applications on smartphones or tablets to optimize the use of their products. The entirety of content on these applications is guided by the desire to be useful to consumers. The Weber application¹², for example, offers tips on how to use the barbecue (such as the best ways to light it), recipes, a shopping list that appears on the phone or tablet if you click on the chosen recipe and combines all the necessary ingredients if you select several recipes, a stopwatch to monitor cooking time, etc.

Because of the emergence of new technologies and connected objects, consumers can benefit from new services offered by brands such as the possibility of trying on a garment virtually in the fitting room. A true revolution. This is what Prada has set up in New York: interactive mirrors in the shop’s fitting rooms to virtually try on the outfits¹³.

Through their websites, applications and other digital tools, companies also target non-consumers of the brand. In this respect, they go beyond a simple service oriented relationship. They are specialists in the field who seek to provide quality content, genuine and selfless support, and significant added value.

The Nike Run Club is full of tips for achieving better running (training programs, breathing, nutrition, etc.), offers runners the opportunity to connect with a club or each other, offers them an application that gives them personalized coaching and finally helps them in choosing their running shoes. The commercial aspect, tinged with technical advice, only appears discreetly on the site. Similarly, the Skip brand offers a whole section on its website dedicated to washing advice according to the types of fabrics and stains.

The brand’s utility, therefore, depends on providing information that is relevant to the consumer without being intrusive: according to the inbound marketing principle, the brand places this information on its website without imposing it: it is up to the consumers to go to the website when they are looking for an answer to a question or a solution to a problem. This makes a big difference compared to advertising, which is imposed by the brand and suffered by the consumer.

2.3.3.2. The engaged brand

While it is not new for brands to participate in the construction of individuals’ identities and to allow them to express themselves, social networks increase the visibility of consumers’ statements about their brands. As a result, individuals expect brands to defend values and engage from a societal perspective. Supporting a brand then makes it possible to get involved in concrete actions, in accordance with its values and beliefs. Finally, by committing to causes, ideas or values, brands help consumers to commit themselves. An ADN article published on June 29, 2018¹⁵ reports on a recent study (“Teens’ views on social activism and cause marketing and why it matters for brands”) conducted on 2,000 adolescents in the United States. Young people, in particular, expect brands to share their convictions and 72% of them feel that they are not sufficiently devoted. According to the study, “68% of them believe that it is the responsibility of companies to solve major societal problems. Two-thirds of them say they pay more attention to the communication campaigns of an engaged company. 62% of these young people also say they are more likely to buy products from a particular brand that discusses its commitments. Generation Z’s expectations are high and the disappointment is even higher. Only 28% of respondents think that a brand’s positive impact is sufficient. This generation that is growing up in a world of fake news and greenwashing does not want to believe in just anything and is looking for authenticity first and foremost. Only 44% believe in a brand’s actions if they are promoted in advertisements”.

While some brands base their positioning on defending values, such as the Ben & Jerry ice cream brand, which is highly committed to the climate and environmental protection, or to societal issues such as marriage equality for example, others are striving to implement actions on a daily basis. In a press release, Monoprix, for example, “made the choice to permanently remove grade 3 eggs from its shelves as of April 11, 2016”¹⁷. The company no longer wishes to sell eggs from caged hens and thus demonstrates its commitment to animal welfare.