KOLOA, Kauai–A former executive with companies that ranged from fast food to video games to Irish beer had some advice for credit unions: giving members exactly what they want typically doesn’t work
Speaking to Co-op Solutions’ CEO Conference, Reggie Fils-Aime, who was most recently president/COO of Nintendo, said whether consumers are called customers or members, winning marketshare all comes down to meeting their needs, delivering the best experiences, and understanding the company’s “core.”
Fils-Aime, author of the book, “Disrupting the Game: From the Bronx to the Top of Nintendo,” told Co-op Solutions’ CEO Conference that every business must understand the customer and the business while thinking about “where those intersections meet with your own ability to change and ability to meet customer needs.”
To that end, he outlined what he called “Reggie’s Consumer Principles.” Those principles include:
Know Your Consumer
Yes, this is the basics, Fils-Aime agreed, citing demographics, behaviors, and desires.
“There are so many different things your customers want. You’re trying to figure out what those expectations are and how can you can ‘wow’ the consumers,” said Fils-Aime. “It’s delivering against a particular vector that makes them sit up and take notice and see you as a differentiated provider against those expectations.”
Fils-Aime shared an example drawn from his eight years with Panda Express, the fast-food chain that began life as a few California full-service restaurants called Panda Inn.
With Panda Express, the company had a vision of creating a store that could be on any corner in the world, although several early iterations failed. The reason, said Fils-Aime, was the company had attempted to take what it had been doing in the full-service restaurants and just import that in a new environment. Fils-Aime said his approach to providing a “wow” experience was recognizing it had to begin with what it is best known for, its food and especially its orange chicken.
‘Everything Else Had to Change’
“But everything else had to change. The expectations in drive-up and delivery are fundamentally different,” he explained. “These stores needed to generate about a million dollars in revenue annually and the P&L needed to be managed very carefully. It also has to be prepared to deliver quickly during the two massive rushes each day.”
With those steps in place, the company has since grown into a successful chain and now is a significant player in fast food in the U.S.
“The core fundamental in this story was we needed to understand what was core to the brand, and then we needed to innovate in ways that delivered on a great consumer experience to beat the competition,” said Fils-Aime.
Data Vs. Insights
Credit unions, like all businesses, have a tremendous amount of data on their members, as was a frequent theme during the Co-op meeting.
“The key is how do you turn that data into insight that can drive the company forward,” he said.
As an example, Fils-Aime drew upon his experience at Nintendo in the early 2000s when the video gaming category was stagnant and not growing. One out of every three adults played video games in a market dominated by Sony. And the overall numbers were declining.
“All of the industry had the same data. Everyone could see what was happening. Nintendo’s competitors, Microsoft and Sony, saw the issue as one of ‘We just need to give the customer more horsepower in their systems. Then the consumer will come back into the industry’,” Fils-Aime recalled.
A Different Problem
“Nintendo, in looking at the data saw a different problem. Nintendo saw the industry was stagnating because the games all looked the same,” he continued. “It was sequel after sequel after sequel. And the controls were getting too complicated, so we couldn’t expand the playing universe. Nintendo said if we make games that are more intuitive and easier for the player to get engaged in, we’ll drive more players into the category. And if we make games that are fundamentally different and offer experiences not seen before, we will drive more players.”
In response, in 2004 Nintendo rolled out the Nintendo DS, a handheld system, the first hand-held to use a touch-screen. The system sold 150 million devices and 950 million different pieces of software, and the “software is where the profitability is.”
Unexpected Relevance
Simply giving customers exactly what they want typically doesn’t work, according to Fils-Aime. “You’re not creating that wow experience. I find that driving innovation with relevance with an unexpected twist is what drives the business forward.”
Fils-Aime also held an executive position with famed Irish brewer Guinness, which was exporting stout to the U.S. prior to the American Revolution. But the world was also changing.
“For many consumers the quintessential Guinness experience is having a stout in a pub, but that changes for people at home,” Fils-Aime explained. “The challenge became how to deliver a great Guinness-like experience at home. The solution was in what gives Guinness its flavor, nitrogen, which makes it smooth and creamy. The solution was to find a widget that was filled in a can and bottle that when opened the change in pressure would inject nitrogen into the liquid. It was a way to deliver a ‘wow’ for the consumer.”
But Watchout!
Fils-Aime cautioned credit unions that when thinking about new experiences for members in ways that leverage all the data available, leaders need to be careful.
“You have to think about how all these ideas play to your own strengths and how they will play in the marketplace. This can be a little dangerous,” he said.
As an example, Fils-Aime shared that prior to his arrival at Guinness, executives saw light beers emerging in the marketplace and sought to find a way to create a light-colored beer. It responded by launching Guinness Blonde, which didn’t sell and which was then rebranded it as Baltimore Blonde (“I have no idea why.”) The product is no longer in the market.
“You have to be careful in looking at data and think about your own equity and how you apply it to any initiative,” said Fils-Aime. “You have to be careful with anything that drives against your core fundamentals, even when the opportunity is there.”
Leadership
Finally, Fils-Aime offered three behaviors he said make for better leadership:
- Drive a greater vision. “The first thing I would highlight is, as a leaders your role is to paint a great vision for where you are trying to drive the business forward. How are you looking to be differentiated in the market and how are you looking to deliver on consumer expectations in a way that is unique and differentiating? There must be a key, clear, articulated vision.”
- Develop individual contributors and teams. Fils-Aime said he learned while with Proctor & Gamble that “if you empower your team to do their best performance to succeed against a superior goal, you are going to do more than what the boss expects you to do.”
- Courageous decision making is required.
Has Everyone But You Heard the News?
Don’t forget to check your Spam/Junk email folder if you haven’t been receiving your free, popular and daily CUToday.info news headlines.
And if you haven’t yet signed up for the new email solution on which CUToday.info has partnered with ResponseGenius, you can do so here. Signing up requires less than one minute of your time.
CUToday.info has received very positive response from readers following the move to an improved provider of the daily headlines, but many also noted they did need to go to their Spam/Junk folder and mark it as safe.
The new email solution has not only improved every reader’s delivery experience, but it also features a fresh, new format that is easy to read, especially on mobile devices.
Please note and/or make your IT department or email administrator aware the emails will be coming from the domains CUTodayinfo.com and CUTodayinfoReply.com.