Forbes Insights and George P. Johnson surveyed more than 300 marketing executives about their levels of customer engagement. Among the findings: 97% view customer engagement as very (67%) or somewhat (30%) important, but 34% say their companies do a poor job of engaging customers and 27% have no specific strategy at all. Other findings:
• Customers (95%) are the top audience for engagement, but employees (61%) are also an important element.
• Only 59% of companies currently measure engagement; 36% do not.
• Methods to engage customers ratings: experiential (48%), opt-in (36%), live event sponsorship (36%), trade show (33%), print ads (24%) and broadcast ads (22%).
• CMOs aren’t necessarily aligning their marketing budgets to these priorities. Advertising (25%) and direct (20%) are getting the biggest share of budgets.
• Among the top customer engagement inhibitors inside companies: lack of a well-defined approach to engagement (30%) and poorly articulated benefits for loyal customers (30%).
Source: Forbes Insights/George P. Johnson
