155 - Michael Crooks - Selling Luxury with Psychology

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Luxury marketing and cognitive psychology…

Michael Crooks (bio) joins Pavan Bahl, Rob Sanchez, and Marc Raco in front of a live audience at the Sennheiser pop up store in SoHo, NYC for FIYB LIVE. Crooks oversees customer insights currently at Gucci.

The meaning of a purchase, The Cognitive Triad, and an email test

Crooks reviews his extensive background, and consideration of how customers act and how to anticipate that to better market to them and anticipate needs. What’s important about paying attention to cognitive psychology in luxury markets, why understanding the nature of clients is important to selling a product effectively, categorizing a customer and looking at different demographic groups, tracking and recording a database, understanding implications of a purchase at several data points, the meaning of the purchase, acting like we need something that isn’t a base level requirement because of things attached to it, meanings attached to luxury, and how it all starts with capturing data.

A discussion of the experiments run at Jetsetter, Gilt Groupe, basic beliefs about self, environment and the future as the Cognitive Triad, and how understanding that can lead to predictions of how people react to things. How marketing is about product but need to get past that, and more about a premium on time. Recognizing that consumers deserve to be treated well, and they want a service that them a break and provides concierge. And a 2013 email test with and control groups working with 500k people of various demographics, and how differing text in emails led to dramatic differences affecting website bounce rates, pages/visit, and significant increases in orders/revenue.

A human touch with data, understanding the consumer, and millennial preferences

Crooks shares why the use of Exact Target as an email service provider, integration with data and creative, following ads, how granular data resulted in ratio of 1:1 in segmenting data. What is base level thing that gets people to convert, expanding data capture, the value of “human touch” on data in luxury marketing, why Millennials like to shop in physical stores more than online, the importance of balancing interpersonal and data aspects, tracking long lead time marketing efforts, and reception of cognitive psychology with younger vs. older brands. Plus, how the essentials of trying to understand the client at the core is really old school clienting.

First steps for new luxury brands, Hierarchy of Need, and Mark Cuban in the lowest segment

Plugging into massive data and analytic companies, and getting data in order before accessing third party data sources. How Mark Cuban could fall into the lowest “segment”. Why the auto industry is good at using third party data and how BMW’s ads are a great example of doing it right. Positioning a product for the benefit and what matters to that consumer segment. A use-case of how FedEx’s success focused on base need of Maslow’s Hierarchy of Need and that there are many types of need.

Suggestions for early marketing step approaches for new luxury brands include right systems to capture data, a platform to house creative and data with validation, a solid POS system that interacts with data base productively, and that data capture is essential at the point of consumer contact. Understanding who you are selling products to, and how not to be everything to, and having a point of view and being authentic. Navigating the obtaining of data without losing potential purchasers, and how that goes to behavioral training.