Joseph Jaffe: Grow Your Business From the Inside Out

[ 0 ] March 22, 2012 | Joseph Jaffe

From March 11 through 15, genConnect.com was on-site in downtown Austin, Texas conducting personal interviews with speakers who appeared at the innovative South by Southwest (SXSW) Interactive Conference in Austin’s Convention Center.

We were at the event as credentialed press, hosting “2.5 Minutes With genConnect” in the Chevy Volt ReCharge Lounge during the conference.

We had the chance to sit down with Joseph Jaffe, President of jaffe, LLC, a thought leadership and marketing innovation consultancy, and accomplished author of three books. Watch our video interview with Joseph below to hear him discuss his latest book, Flip the Funnel: How to Use Existing Customers to Gain New Ones, growing your business from the inside out, and examples of companies he feels execute this practice:

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JOSEPH JAFFE: It’s good to be here again.KELLY HAYES: You’ve been here how many years?JOSEPH JAFFE: This is only my second, but I suppose in social media dog years it’s about 25.KELLY HAYES: You spoke this week about flipping the funnel, retention is the new acquisition. What exactly does flipping the funnel mean.JOSEPH JAFFE: Well, you know in a nutshell, the traditional marketing funnel is flawed. It gets smaller and smaller over time. And it ends with a purchase and then we forget about our customer and we go all the way back to the beginning, groundhog day. And I said wait a second. The funnel should be getting bigger, not smaller over time. Retention should be the new acquisition, if you in fact grow your business from the inside out. Through customer service, through custom experience, through really focused word of mouth coming from advocates. From customers who are truly passionate about the brand and influential. That’s really what the book is about.KELLY HAYES: So retention really means retaining those customers who have already been there and then growing that group.JOSEPH JAFFE: Yeah, because the thing is, retention has become an end unto itself. It’s defensive, it’s very passive, it’s don’t leave me, it’s churn and attrition related. And I’m saying wait a second. It’s a means to an end. It’s a strategic, proactive, dynamic differentiator. It is a means to an end and the end is the new acquisition. The considered credible referral coming from customers, because who knows your product and your brand better? Your customers. Who is the most credible to recommend your product? Your customers because they’re actually using it right now. So that’s what’s this idea is, that retention itself is reinvented. Loyalty, customer services reinvented in a social age.KELLY HAYES: So are there steps that companies can use for this retention process?JOSEPH JAFFE: Yeah, absolutely. I mean, what I did was, the traditional funnel has an acronym, AIDA– awareness, interest, design, action. And what I did is I kind of flipped that on it’s head and I created ADIA– which is acknowledgement, dialog, incentivization, and activation. And the activation is about connecting the dots between employees and customers, you know– customers to customers. Think about expert curated Q&A today. Acknowledgement– the two most powerful words in the English language– thank you. Actually thanking customer for their business. We have employees of the month, how about a customer of the month? Dunkin’ Donuts has a fan of the week on their Facebook page. So there is a customer activation process that I’ve actually create in Flip the Funnel to actually demonstrate how to move from beginning with the purchase to lifetime value of the customer, with voice of the customer closing the loop, involved. Where actually customers– we talk about crowd sourcing– customers become part of the very ecosystem, the R&D, the innovation engine of the company. And that whole model was in the book.KELLY HAYES: Can you give me an example or two of a company that’s successfully been able to flip the funnel?JOSEPH JAFFE: Well, you know, I talk about Best Buy a lot. And I like Best Buy because charity begins at home. So not only beginning with their customer, but also beginning with their employees. So they created Blue Shirt Nation. And then they created the Twelpforce course And CS, they did something brilliant with on CS. They were reporting directly to their customers, explaining to them what was hot and what was not, and what was coming down the pike. And I love this idea of marketing as a service, that brands can actually add value and create utility, as opposed to interrupting. So that’s definitely a company to continue watching.KELLY HAYES: Terrific. Joseph Jaffe here at South by Southwest, author of Flip the Funnel: How to Use Existing Customers to Gain New Ones. I guess the most powerful words in the English language are thank you. Thank you, Joseph.JOSEPH JAFFE: You’re very welcome.

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Tags: author, Best Buy, Flip the funnel, genConnect.com, jaffe LLC, Joseph Jaffe, president, retention, South by Southwest, SXSW, Texas

Category: Special Guests, SXSW2011, Videos

About Joseph Jaffe: One of the most sought-after consultants, speakers and thought leaders on new marketing, Joseph Jaffe is President and Chief Interruptor of crayon, a strategic consultancy that helps its clients achieve positive change and impact by [...]
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Joseph Jaffe: Grow Your Business From the Inside Out

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