Definition
In March 2006, the Advertising Research Foundation announced the first definition of customer engagement the first definition of CE at the re:think! 52nd Annual ARF Convention and Expo:
"Engagement is turning on a prospect to a brand idea enhanced by the surrounding context."
However, the ARF definition was criticized by some for being too broad.
Customer engagement can also refer to the stages consumers travel through as they interact with a particular brand. This customer engagement cycle, or customer journey, has been described using a myriad of terms but most often consists of five different stages: awareness, consideration, inquiry, purchase and retention. Marketers employ connection strategy to speak to would-be customers at each stage, with media that addresses their particular needs and interests. When conducting search engine marketing and search engine optimization, or placing advertisements, marketers must devise media and/or keywords and phrases that encourage customer flow through the customer engagement cycle, towards purchase.
Because the various definitions often focus on entirely different aspects of CE, they are not in every case competing definitions but, rather, illuminate CE from different perspectives. Eric Peterson's definition for example frames CE as a metric: "Engagement is an estimate of the degree and depth of visitor interaction against a clearly defined set of goals."
At the moment the ARF, World Federation of Advertisers, Nielsen Media Research, IAG Research and Simmons Research are in the process of developing a definition and a metric for CE.
Read more about this topic: Customer Engagement
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