“Touch points”?? This sounds like it’s going to be something about Covid measures!

What I’m actually talking about are all the possible contact points between you and your customers or clients.

Each of these touch points is an opportunity for you to reinforce your branding and to build in another positive experience with your brand.

Give me some examples I hear you say!

Okay, so I literally just bought a coffee half an hour ago. An impulse purchase (I don’t usually drink coffee apart from first thing in the morning).

I am already familiar with this brand. However, I am not even thinking of coffee as I’m driving through town and spot a pavement sign for Insomnia. The sign is positioned outside a Centra grocery shop but I still understand pretty quickly what the proposition is. So now I’m reminded of how good their coffee is and the memory triggers my inner Pavlov’s dog 😉

I walk inside and see the Insomnia coffee machines (all branded with their logo, fonts and colours), I pick up a branded cup, read their branded menu and press the button.

I take my coffee out to the car, enjoy the flavour and am happy with my purchase – as it tastes just the same as it did the last time I bought it. So this experience is now reinforcing the good opinion I have of the brand and I am likely to make a repeat purchase (and be a loyal customer).

You can see that there are several customer touch points here. They’re all on brand and for myself as the customer, they help instil trust in the brand. As a result, I chose to purchase this brand over the many unbranded (and cheaper) options available.

Now I did not go through all this thinking and deliberating when I was making my purchase! It was very much an automatic kind of thing. They have built a relationship of trust with me by being consistent wherever they turn up – both in their branding and consistency of products. I don’t need to waste time, pondering my decision – they’ve made it easy for me to make a quick choice that I know I’ll be happy with.

Try to do this with your customers – look at all the touch points between you and your customers and think about how you can make them even better. For example: product packaging, social media, invoices, uniforms, the product itself, emails, stationery, receipts, signage, vehicles, your own personal presentation; the list goes on and on. Sit down and take the time to write up all the places that relate to your own customers. It is well worth doing and makes it so much easier to plan how you will go about improving each one.