Important Marking Lessons from Maker's Mark

What's the difference between Maker's Mark and Netflix?

One company "gets it" and the other took months to understand what it means to "listen" to the customer.

Over the last several weeks we saw Maker's Mark announce that they were going to reduce the alcohol content in their whisky. What a backlash! Customers immediately hot every social media platform and also contacted the company. What happened? Maker's Mark listened and decided not to make the change---and all of this happened very quickly. 

 

 

Maker's Mark issued this statement: “You spoke. We listened. And we’re sincerely sorry we let you down.”

 

Now that's what it means to authentically listen to your customers. 

 

You can read their official statement here.

 

What happened to Netflix? Quite a different story.  

 

You will recall that in July 2011 Netflix announced it was splitting into two different services, meaning customers would have to sign up for two accounts.  What happened? More than one million subscribers cancelled their accounts, Netflix took a beating on social media platforms and in the media, and it took months before Netflix decided to back away from the change. 

 

The difference? Netflix was not listening to their customers, and if they were, they were not valuing what their customers were saying, or recognizing what their customers were doing as they cancelled accounts. 

 

The bottom line is that social media gives us an amazing opportunity like never before to listen to customers and potential customers, to have meaningful two way dialogues, to demonstrate that we care. Social media is not about "selling" for the next quarter, it is about showing that you care about your customers and potential customers.