How to Build a Customer Lifecycle with Saumil Mehta: An EOFire Classic from 2021

0:01Light that spark fire nation JLD here and welcome to entrepreneurs on fire brought to you by the HubSpot podcast network, the audio destination for business professionals with great shows like Marketing Made Simple. Today, we're pulling a classic episode from the archives, and we'll be breaking down how to build a customer lifestyle. To drop these value bombs, I have brought Samo, Meta, and the EO Fire Studios. Samo leads Square's Square Point of Sale and CRM business unit. His responsibilities include overall ownership and organizational management across multiple functional disciplines, including product engineering and design.

0:32In Fire Nation, for today's value bombs, we talk about as entrepreneurs, you can now use the most robust tools available to design an exceptional customer lifecycle that helps your brand be omni-channel friendly and how it's not too early to get started today in producing outstanding customer experiences and brand advocates and so much more. And a big thank you for sponsoring today's episode goes to Somal and our sponsors. Success Story, hosted by Scott D. Clary, is brought to you by the HubSpot Podcast Network, the audio destination for business professionals. Success Story features Q &A sessions with successful business leaders, keynote presentations, in conversations on sales, marketing, business, startups, and entrepreneurship.

1:09A recent episode discussing the billion-dollar health secret with the founder and CEO of Whoop is a must-listen. Listen to Success Story wherever you get your podcasts. Is this your year to grow a successful business? Attend the world's highest-rated business growth workshop taught personally by Clay Clark and now featuring Rich Dad, Poor Dad author Robert Kiyosaki and Eric Trump at thrivetimeshow.com slash EOFire. Again, request life-changing tickets today at thrivetimeshow.com slash EOFire. Samo, say what's up to Fire Nation and share something that you believe about becoming successful that most people disagree with.

1:56What's up, Fire Nation? Great to be with you all and obviously great to be with you, John. Thank you so much for inviting me. And, yeah, it's a great question. What I would say, and I don't know how unpopular this will be, but what I would say is that unlike what most people would say, I am comfortable with both regret and jealousy as emotions. You hear a lot these days about how regret is bad and you should just kind of put that aside or how jealousy is terrible. You should just run your own race. And there's truth to all of that. What I found over the years, though, is that if you can pay attention to your feelings and if you can pay attention to why there's regret or why there's jealousy, and of course, put that aside and use that to inform your future actions, it's a more productive way to live and a more informed way to live than to simply say, well, regrets are terrible, jealousy is terrible, let's just move on.

2:58So that's maybe one thing that I can offer. And Fire Nation, that's why I love starting off with that question, because it brings some really unique perspectives. And that's exactly what we're trying to do here, give you some different perspectives about how to look at life, how to think about life, how to operate within business. And as I mentioned in the introduction, Samuel, I mean, he leads Square's point of sale and CRM business unit. And we'll be talking about building a customer lifecycle today. But first off, Samuel, I want to dive in and have you tell us a little bit about Square so Fire Nation can get a good gist of what Square is and does and specifically what you're trying to solve.

3:38I could talk about this for hours, but I will aim to keep it short. So Square's mission is economic empowerment. We wish to democratize access and participation in the economy for audiences that we would consider traditionally or even currently underserved. Many people know the story, but if you don't, we started over 10 years ago with the smallest of small businesses, the flower shop or the flower cart down the street that wasn't accepting credit cards and thereby losing business. the taxi cab driver that was stuck with a pretty poor way to actually manage transactions and accept payments. And over time, we've also started to serve consumers through Cash App and hopefully artists in the future through Tidal.

4:28Me and my colleagues are focused on the seller business, on the seller side of the business, which serves businesses, what we call them sellers of all sizes, all categories, and increasingly more and more countries. On the seller side specifically, we help businesses start, run, and grow their business through well-integrated, well-designed tools and a collection of what we would call APIs to boot. And the purpose, again, is to help these businesses get access to tools that they might not have, to help them grow their business through tools that were previously unavailable. and to hopefully do it with great design and great customer service.

5:10Well, that's one thing that we're going to be focusing on for the rest of the interview today is the word customer, because we all do hear this phrase, customer lifecycle. But to be honest with you, most people don't have a clue of what that actually means. What the heck is a customer lifecycle? Break it down for us. It's one of those things that's tossed around, but somewhat poorly understood. Good. So we can break it down and simplify it. Customer lifecycle is the different stages that a consumer or a purchaser or even a prospective purchaser of your business, whether you're selling goods, services, something in between, goes through from being aware that they have a need for your product or service to being a loyal customer and a brand advocate.

6:00And so it's effectively this question of how do we get purchasers and prospective purchasers from point A to point B, point A being awareness and point B, which is the final destination, essentially being a brand advocate or a loyal customer. We usually break it down into five stages and different folks will use four or six stages, but let me tell you the five stages that we think about. So the first stage of the customer lifecycle is awareness, right? you can't buy something that you don't necessarily need, or you might not even be aware that you need it. So the awareness stage is essentially making a prospective customer aware of you, your brand, your offerings, you stand for, what you value, and what you offer.

6:49And if they have that need, they should be aware of it. And if they don't necessarily have that need but might have that need, they should still be aware. And so awareness is how you achieve that with the broadest pool of prospective purchasers in your industry. Let me give you an example. So I live in San Francisco, and I became a homeowner a few years ago, and stuff's always breaking down around the house. I'm sure you know this feeling. and I go on YouTube and find amazing videos of like simple home repair things that you could do by yourself, DIY. And that's how I've become aware of various home repair pros in my area.

7:30And the day that something actually goes wrong that I certainly can't fix, I should be able to remember and say, oh boy, you know what? Those home repair pros that I saw two months ago that were really helpful, I better call them because I now need this thing and now I'm aware of them, right? So that's the awareness stage. Super important. The next stage down from awareness is consideration. So I'm aware that I have a need. Now I have to consider my options. And that is the consideration stage. And of course, it varies by the type of business. Think about a coffee shop, right? I move into a new neighborhood.

8:08I'm walking around the first morning, I'm going through a consideration stage to figure out where I'm going to get my morning coffee, but it's going to be pretty quick, right? I'm going to look at a place. I'm going to consider it. If it looks good, I'm just going to jump in and buy me a coffee and be on my way. Home repair, of course, completely different. If I'm going to do a$5 ,000 flooring job, which unfortunately I'm personally going to be needing to do soon here, I'm going to go through and take my time, right? I'm going to sit down with my computer at my desktop for an hour, and I'm going to pull up all the review sites, and I'm going to do my Google research, and I'm going to look on YouTube, and I'm going to be calling businesses to see if I can get a hold of them.

8:49I'm going to be looking at their websites. And so that's a consideration phase where you're saying, okay, I have this awareness. I have this need. Now I've got to consider my options and pick the best one for me. So that's consideration. Next one down from that, conversion. Obviously super important, right? How do I actually convert? How do I actually conduct a transaction, the actual act of commerce with the business owner? Once again, picking the two disparate examples, coffee shop is super simple. I go in there, pay at my point of sale, hopefully it's a square point of sale, I might add, and be on my way.

9:26But of course, if it's home and repair, it's going to involve something completely different. I might get an estimate and then I might pay an invoice. And so that's the conversion step of actually doing the first transaction with the business owner and with the business. And then, and this is the part where most people could use more time and attention, the next step down is retention. It is hard to get the first transaction from a prospective purchaser. But it is just as hard and a lot more beneficial if you can actually retain the customer, right? Get the customer to do transaction number two, three, four.

10:03And once again, that's going to vary by stage. If it's a bakery, well, you might visit a bakery and be a retained consumer, one that goes back over and over again, four, five, six times a month. But if you are a gutter cleaner, right, so again, to pick a completely different example, a retained customer looks like somebody who comes back once or twice a year. So retention is also going to vary by business category and the needs of the purchaser. But that's the next step. And the final step, difficult to achieve with most consumers, but the best brands and the best businesses do it successfully, is loyalty or advocacy.

10:39This is the most coveted stage because you can be retained and still not loyal. I won't name names here, but my internet provider, I'm retained. I pay my bill every month. But you can bet your bottom dollar I'm not an advocate. And most people that you know are not advocates for their internet service providers for all the reasons that we're familiar with. And so how does a brand or a business owner design their lifecycle in a way or design their customer experience in a way that produces advocates, that produces loyal customers? And this is something that more businesses would do well to pay attention to and one that certainly we continue to focus attention on Square when we serve our own customers.

11:24So that's how I would set up the five stages of the customer lifecycle. And of course, in today's day and age, the customer lifecycle continues to get yet more complex because of the way we live, right? I mean, think about the acceleration that we've gone through with COVID over the last 18 months. And now everything's online, everything's contactless, everything's online plus offline. And so how do we design the customer lifecycle in response to the world around us is an ongoing challenge. So Fire Nation, I want to run through this real quick because it's a critical process, this customer lifecycle.

12:01One is awareness, then you move into consideration, then that actual conversion, then the retention. And then this is something I think a lot of people don't think about very deeply is the loyalty, becoming an advocate, it's like actually being an evangelist, like talking about it, being like so excited. How do you think the Netflix movies that we all watch get around? It's because we all advocate for them. We love certain shows and then we talk about them, we advocate for them. And then of course, if your friends talking highly about something and you respect and trust that friends, I mean, that's going to be something you're going to go off and say, Hey, heard about a great show today.

12:38Let's make it happen. So let's talk about the tools that businesses can actually use in this building out of the customer lifecycle. Another great point, right? We are fortunate as business owners, and we're fortunate at Square, certainly, to have the most concentrated set of tools available to us in today's day and age to design an exceptional customer lifecycle that helps the brand stand out, that helps the brand be omni-channel friendly, that helps the business attract and retain consumers that will become advocates. with the help of good tools, unlike ever before in business history. So let's talk about that.

13:24I'm going to tell you tools, but I'm going to break them down again with the five stages to make it simple. So let's start with awareness. There's a series of tools available for awareness, and I'll cherry pick a couple of examples. YouTube is a fantastic source, right? Blogs are a fantastic source of creating awareness. Consumers and prospective purchasers, when they become aware, what is the first thing they do today? They actually go online on their phone and they basically try to understand what it is that they could be doing in a completely different context. As I said, there could be a DIY YouTube video for a home repair business, and that content is being put out into the world not to immediately attract the consumer, but to create awareness for the business and to build a brand that exists to serve the consumer, even if the transaction isn't happening for months or years down the road.

14:23So for awareness, we would recommend YouTube, blogs, Instagram, and certainly the plethora of ad formats that are available on social media and on Google and elsewhere. So awareness is just about ensuring that you have great content and great advertising. The next stage is consideration. And in consideration, we would advocate that your website really should be the number one option. Put yourself in the shoes of a consumer. If they're evaluating amongst three, four, or five different vendors, they're going to pay attention to the level of completeness of your website, to the level of professionalism and care that the brand has shown in making sure that the consideration step is paid.

15:09to the consumer. So that is the number one tool we would recommend because in today's day and age, consumers certainly look at websites and ensure that information is clear, that the process for the way goods and services are delivered is clear, that if it's a self-checkout, that is super seamless, that everything works successfully on mobile devices. And so for consideration, the number one tool we would recommend is ensuring that the website is A+. And then beyond that, we would also recommend messaging tools. So depending upon the type of business, the consumer may want to message the business directly and hear back from them before they make a purchase decision.

15:52This is why Square has invested heavily in products like Square Messages, which allow businesses and prospective consumers or existing consumers to communicate with each other before the consumer makes a purchasing decision. And finally, we would also advocate for reviews. Reputation, online reputation specifically on various review sites is the coin of the realm in 2021. And so anything that businesses can do to ensure that they have fantastic online reputation is going to be a critical part of the consideration step. So website, reputation management, messaging. Those are the three things we would advocate for in consideration.

16:33Then there's the conversion step. And again, we live in an omni-channel world. Consumers expect to be able to buy online, they expect to be able to buy offline, and they expect all this to work seamlessly. If your business is an offline business, or at least has an offline presence in the form of a store, or even a field operation, we would of course recommend that a point-of-sale product is absolutely must-have in today's day and age. And if you're going to pick a point-of-sale, you should pick something that is mobile-first, cloud-first, and omnichannel-friendly. And of course, we can recommend one to you, but there are several options available.

17:17And Square Point-of-Sale, I'm certainly biased, but is one of the best ones out there. And additionally, an online store with e-commerce capability is also critical for conversion. In today's day and age, consumers may prefer to buy online, pick up in store. They may prefer to buy offline and or buy online and return in store. They may want to buy offline and print a shipping label to return from their homes. And so a wonderful e-commerce presence alongside a point of sale for offline businesses, and ideally both of these things working together, will be critical for the conversion step and certainly also why we continue to invest heavily in Square Online, which is our online store offering.

18:06Then we come to retention. Two types of tools that are super valuable. The first is customer relationship management software, more colloquially known as CRM. Once you have this base of customers, we need to be able to recognize who they are. We need to be able to understand what they've purchased from us, how often they visit. Did they have a good experience last time? How can we make their experience better? And all of this data is usually managed and analyzed and stored and recorded in CRM software. Once again, lots of different options online, lots of options by category of business even. And certainly Square paired with its point of sale and Square online offerings also offers an integrated CRM system that manages all your customer data online and offline synced together all at once.

19:00We would also recommend marketing software. Certainly email marketing and text message marketing are both popular options today. And marketing and retention software, what it allows you to do is take the consumer data that's now in your CRM, which hopefully you have, and allows you to ensure that you message these consumers thoughtfully. if you have a new promotion, if you have a new discount, if you have new store hours, if you have new staff, all of these things are things that the consumer would benefit from and keeps your brand top of mind from a retention perspective. And so we would recommend marketing software and CRM software for retention.

19:43And finally, for advocacy, we would recommend a loyalty program, whether your business is primarily in store or primarily online or increasingly both. A loyalty program is a fantastic, proven, successful way to ensure that consumers have a reason to keep coming back, to ensure that consumers feel special for transacting with you versus somebody else down the street or somebody else that's two clicks away. And of course, as we all know, there's a reason we're all obsessed with our points because these points programs, these loyalty programs certainly work. And the final thing I would say is gift cards.

20:28Gift cards are once again a powerful mechanism to build brand advocacy and loyalty because once you get to the point that you've purchased a gift card to give to your friend, you are effectively doing advocacy on behalf of the brand to your friends and family, which is also amazing. So awareness, which is YouTube blogs, Instagram ads, consideration, which is website, messaging, reputation, conversion, which is point of sale and e-commerce online store, retention with marketing software and CRM software, and advocacy with loyalty programs and gift card programs. Wow, Fire Nation, this is one of those episodes where you're just like, I need to go back with a team of note takers and just take notes vociferously because there is so much knowledge, so much value being shared here, so many takeaways and things to implement and insert into your business literally today.

21:23And we're going to be talking about some really important things when we get back from thanking our sponsors. If you're a marketer, then you know what it's like to feel like you're moving in a hundred different directions at any given time, like you're spread too thin. Between creating content, launching campaigns, generating and nurturing leads, and more, you barely have a moment to breathe, let alone do your best marketing. What if there was a better way? This is where HubSpot and Breeze, its new built-in AI, come in. When you combine the power of Marketing Hub and Content Hub, you can have your best quarter every quarter.

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22:35See thousands of success stories and testimonials from real people just like you who Clay Clark has mentored and coached into prosperity at thrivetimeshow.com slash EO fire. Clay's proven business coaching program is month to month and it costs less than hiring a minimum wage employee. Yes, it's month to month and it costs less money than hiring a minimum wage employee. Schedule your free 13 point assessment with Clay Clark himself today at thrivetimeshow.com slash eofire. Because Clay only takes on 160 clients and only allows 300 attendees to each business conference, you will interact with Clay directly, see thousands of real success stories, and learn about attending the Thrive Time Show two-day in-person workshop featuring the legendary Robert Kiyosaki and Eric Trump today at thrivetimeshow.com slash eofire.

23:22Become the next success story. Schedule a free consultation and request tickets to join Eric Trump and Robert Kiyosaki at Clay Clark's next business conference today at thrivetimeshow.com slash EO Fire. I have a question for you, Fire Nation. Do you feel like your life is optimized or do you feel like you're leaving a lot on the table when it comes to health, wealth, and relationships? After interviewing over 4 ,500 successful entrepreneurs, I have found that every one of them have optimized their life to a high level. In over 12 years of running a multi seven figure a year business myself while staying healthy and raising a wonderful family, I figured out how to optimize my life to an amazing level.

24:02It didn't happen automatically. There was a lot of struggles, but through mentorship from others and a lot of intentional work, I got there. And if you think you could use some personal guidance in optimizing your life, let me help. I've created a program called Optimize where I will personally work with you one-on-one to get to know you, your life, your goals, and your dreams. Then over a three-month timeframe, we will create a fully optimized life that will set you up for a lifetime of optimized health, wealth, and relationships based off your goals and your dreams. An optimized life does not happen automatically.

24:36It only happens through intentional work and guidance from someone who has reached that level that you are striving for. My goal is to turn you into a fully optimized human based off of your life goals. If you want to learn more about this program, visit eofire.com slash optimize. We'll jump on a call. We'll discuss the specifics of the program. And if we both feel to fit, we'll talk about next steps. eofire.com slash optimize. So I'm going to work back and we all hear this word, omni-channel. What role does omni-channel play in actually building this customer lifecycle we've been talking about?

25:12Another one of these buzzwords that happens to be super important. So let me first start by defining omni-channel, John. So omni-channel is effectively the process by which businesses meet consumers where the consumers are or choose to be, right? Simple concept. Today, consumers live online, offline, and everywhere in between at all hours of the day. The kind of logical separation that we had between our quote-unquote online life and offline life, that's gone, right? That was a thing 10 years ago, 20 years ago. That's gone. We're glued to our phones. We're walking around with them. We're buying online, picking up in store.

25:57And so Omnichannel effectively says, how am I going to design my customer lifecycle and my customer experience in a way that reflects the way my consumers and actually all humans these days live? And if they want to purchase online, great, we can offer that. If they want to book appointments by calling me on the phone, we could do that. But if they want to do that online, we could do that too. if they want to check my hours of operation at 11 p.m. at night while they're checking out their favorite Netflix show instead of waiting to call me at 9 a.m. the next morning, we can do that too for them.

26:36So Omnichannel, in summary, if you step back, represents a reversion of control from the seller to the buyer, right? 20 years ago, you would be calling around five different places and asking them, how late are you open today? In today's day and age, if that information isn't available on their website, you're not getting that customer, right? So in this way, and many other ways, Omnichannel represents a reversion to the buyer, and as a result, asks sellers to design their customer lifecycle in a way that is Omnichannel friendly. So what does that mean? We talked about the five stages, right? Awareness, consideration, conversion, retention, advocacy.

27:21You can design a thoughtful customer lifecycle for your bakery, let's say, right? And what that could look like 20 years ago is I have a great sign, I have great signage, I have a well-led store, I'm in a great location. When the customer comes in, I'm going to make sure that the person who serves them or takes their order is a friendly person. And by the way, I'm going to give them a punch card on the way out the door and ask them to come back for 10 punches. That's a customer lifecycle and a good customer experience 20 years ago. In today's day and age, that's great, but it doesn't quite work because the consumer lives differently.

28:03So the question in front of us is how do we design a customer lifecycle that is thoughtful and authentic and careful, but friendly to the omni-channel environment that we live in, which of course has been accelerated over the last 18 months through the crazy COVID world that we've all been living through. What does that mean? Well, what that means is that each stage, we have to break down how the consumer is living and then design and redesign and tweak our customer lifecycle in reflection of that. So for example, if we're talking about awareness for that bakery, certainly they should be having great signage and a well-lit store, but they should also consider if they need to be posting on Instagram about how they bake their baked goods to generate awareness amongst local consumers who live down the street, but also check Instagram four times a day.