How Samsung takes a customer-first approach to the shopping journey
11 August 2021 | By: Heather Eng, Sr. Editorial lead
As Samsung has grown their brand across Europe, one objective has been at the forefront: innovating to improve their customers’ experiences. This goal has remained especially true during the last year as Samsung rethought how they connected with customers on digital channels when in-person shopping wasn’t possible.
“Consumers deserve amazing online shopping,” says Benjamin Braun, CMO of Samsung Europe.
At Mobile World Congress 2021, Braun joined German Martinez del Olmo, Head of Advertising, Amazon Ads Spain, for a discussion on “The Future of Personalized Advertising”.
“Both Amazon Ads and Samsung approach the customer experience by focusing on the customer and working backwards,” says Martinez del Olmo. “Samsung has worked on a number of brand-building strategies that provide value for their consumers so they can know, feel, and experience their products.”
Here’s a look at highlights from the talk, on how Samsung has done just that.
Providing the benefits of in-store shopping on digital touchpoints
For many years, Samsung gave customers a thoughtful shopping experience at their retail stores. “We explain our products and their features, give demonstrations, and help guide people to the product that best fits them,” says Braun.
Last year, when physical stores closed across Europe, Samsung needed to refocus on their digital channels. “We had to help customers even though they could not go into a store,” says Braun. “In the space of a few weeks, we moved our experience from traditional retail to online selling. We recreated the experience online.”
When thinking about that online experience, Samsung wanted to offer customers the same information they would receive at a brick-and-mortar store. Samsung created live video chats and demos with product experts that shoppers could access from home.
At Samsung’s Store on Amazon, “Customers could see that we were helping to provide support at every step of the way with product photos, filters, and in some cases, product-specific, pre-recorded videos similar to in-store demonstrations,” says Braun. “Almost like the traditional store, we want to show our customers the fantastic products and how they work.”
Samsung built their Store on Amazon to help customers discover and learn about new products.
Tailoring interactions based on insights
Samsung is a global brand with a wide product range that includes TVs, refrigerators, vacuum cleaners, ovens, laptops, phones and more. As such, “It is impossible to use one message to try to capture all those different products that we have under the Samsung brand,” says Braun. “Equally, customers are in different phases when they are looking, from researching a product, to understanding more specifics, to choosing a product, to buying a product.”
Samsung starts by using insights to understand different customer groups and their specific needs.
“We believe evidence-led thinking goes hand in hand with creativity,” says Braun. “Focus on not only innovating your customer experience, but also evolving how you use audience insights to embrace different channels to land the right message to a specific audience, in a creative and engaging way.”
Exploring new channels
Samsung continues to test new digital channels and formats to reach their customers.
“As a marketer, there are so many channels you can reach customers through. For all the traditional channels that we are used to using, we are always looking to finding new ways,” says Braun. “Amazon also has music streaming, so this is another channel where we can leave a specific message to a different audience and make it a far more tailored experience. Of course, as we use these different channels, we learn more about works well with them, what doesn’t work well.”
“Innovation never stops for Samsung,” he adds. “We are working to deliver an innovative and interactive customer journey to engage with customers and different audiences with experiences that resonate.”