Each week, we aggregate the insights, issues and ideas dominating the conversations about brand engagement, customer loyalty and the future of marketing.

Why Customer Engagement Trumps Loyalty

Calling customer loyalty a misleading business metric that’s notoriously difficult to measure, Forbes BrandVoice examines why engagement is the much better indicator of loyalty and profitability. Forbes looks at three key characteristics of customer engagement, notably that it’s highly correlated with revenue, and predicts that it will be a vital measure of business performance in the future.

Read: Loyalty is Dead. Long Live Engagement!

Source: Forbes BrandVoice 

Should Brands Expose Their Vulnerabilities?

Just be honest. It probably says a lot about traditional thinking that that simple sentence almost seems counterintuitive. CNNMoney shares four examples of businesses that drew back the curtain to allow for honesty, transparency and vulnerability.

How did it work out? Ask Domino’s Pizza, which saw stock prices skyrocket after sharing results of a survey that showed customers didn’t like their pizza. The story argues that brand transparency creates loyal followings by allowing consumers to act in their own best interests as a result of “knowing the bigger picture.”

Read: How to Deepen Customer Loyalty – Be Transparent

Source: CNNMoney

Loyalty and Engagement in the Digital Age

What drives our decisions? iMedia Connection answers the question with Chris Malone’s groundbreaking theory that it comes down to two factors: intention and competence.

As Cult has covered before, Chris Malone looked into how those basic instinctual perceptions drive our relationships with brands for his book The Human Brand. While digital channels have weakened social accountability in the past, the rise in e-commerce and social networking is leading enlightened brands to prosper from a relationship renaissance.

Read: Building customer loyalty in the digital age 

Source: iMedia Connection

Why Brands Need to Tap Into Authentic Storytelling

Why do so many brands favour visually bland, inauthentic content when, from our earliest days, we’re wired to connect through emotions? ClickZ looks at how corporations can become truly compelling brands by being honest, using multimedia content, and demonstrating authenticity and passion. How a company connects with their audience comes down to emotional storytelling.

Read: Social Marketing Needs the Real You

Source: ClickZ

 New Gartner Research Report: Four Attributes of Customer Engagement

Understanding that engaged consumers are more loyal and better advocates of their favoured brands, online magazine PCB007 breaks down our understanding of engagement into four defined attributes — active, emotional, rational and ethical — and explains how each will contribute to a brand’s success achieving a following of brand evangelists.

Read: Gartner Highlights Key Attributes of Customer Engagement

Source: PCB007

Infographic: How Video is Redefining Brand Engagement

With videos now accounting for one in every four posts to social media, Digital Information World examines how visual content is revolutionizing the way brands reach new audiences. A recent study showed that brand videos surpassed more than 8 billion views last year, while 36 per cent of Internet users share video they have found online. Fascinating video and infographic at the link.

Read: Social Video & Brand Engagement

Source: Digital Information World