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Scoring Points is the dramatic, previously untold story of how Clubcard was conceived, launched and developed. Clive Humby and Terry Hunt, two major influences behind Tesco’s spectacular transformation, and Tim Phillips, a leading business writer and broadcaster, bring us a compelling behind-the-scenes account of Clubcard: the successes, the failures and the invaluable lessons learnt.

Launched in 1995, Tesco Clubcard is the world’s most successful retail loyalty scheme. Since then, Tesco has transformed its relationship with its customers. Today, it is not only the United Kingdom’s number one retailer, but also the world’s most successful Internet supermarket, one of Europe’s fastest growing financial service companies and arguably one of the world’s most successful exponents of Customer Relationship Management (CRM).

Scoring Points is the dramatic, previously untold story of how Clubcard was conceived, launched and developed. Clive Humby and Terry Hunt, two major influences behind Tesco’s spectacular transformation, and Tim Phillips, a leading business writer and broadcaster, bring us a compelling behind-the-scenes account of Clubcard: the successes, the failures and the invaluable lessons learnt.

Understanding customer behaviour and responding to it in ways that are truly relevant are the twin keys to survival in an ever-more competitive business arena, argues Humby, an acknowledged world expert in challenging accepted marketing ‘wisdom’

Brand is dead, long live the Customer is an essential guide for organisations who want to understand their customers and take the guesswork out of marketing.

Understanding customer behaviour and responding to it in ways that are truly relevant are the twin keys to survival in an ever-more competitive business arena, argues Humby, an acknowledged world expert in challenging accepted marketing ‘wisdom’.

Humby drives his essential point home with a simple fable for business today. A Tale of Two Kings uses the language and metaphor of a child’s ‘once upon a time’ story to explore what happens when an organisation relies on the wrong measurements to determine brand value and fails to listen to its customers.

Brought to life with a series of original drawings, the entertaining little tale of Kings Talkandtell and Askandhear exposes the fatal flaws in conventional marketing strategies and illustrates why it is time for businesses to tear up the rulebook.

“The message is simple but it’s not getting through,” says Humby, chairman of international marketing consultancy dunnhumby.

“Organisations that continue to put the brand at their epicentre and pay only lip service to the notion that the customer is king, will fail. It’s just a matter of time.”

Humby develops the fable’s theme with a detailed look at where so much marketing activity goes wrong in the real world.

“A whole series of misconceptions about what constitutes brand value and a sustained focus on the non-existent average customer are the biggest obstacles to sustainable business success,” he says.

“Most organisations also fail to understand that marketing can have negative effects as well as positive ones. All these mistakes undermine not just brand but corporate value.”

Brand is dead, long live the Customer details the five fatal fallacies about marketing that will ultimately destroy organisations that fail to recognise them and make changes.

“Successful marketing isn’t an art,” insists Humby. “It’s a science with creative bits around the edges. Businesses fail to understand that at their peril.”

Brand is dead, long live the Customer is the first in a planned series of books from dunnhumby that will use original fables to look at what is wrong with marketing today – and what can be done to fix it.

In It’s marketing Jim, co-founder and CEO of dunnhumby Edwina Dunn outlines the four key steps to unlocking success through Relevance Marketing and looks at the bear traps along the way

There is no room for mistakes in today’s action-packed, fast-moving and unforgiving consumer marketplace.

The simplest sure-fire offer is the lowest price. But is that the only way to win? Customers might actually rate convenience or product quality over price and be willing to pay a premium

The businesses that win are those that understand exactly what their customers want - and then give it to them.

It’s called Relevance Marketing and it’s an alternative conquering strategy to being the cheapest. It’s about getting the right offer to the right customers at the right time, ensuring that they keep coming back for more.

In It’s marketing Jim, co-founder and CEO of dunnhumby Edwina Dunn outlines the four key steps to unlocking success through Relevance Marketing and looks at the bear traps along the way.

Dunn warns that giving customers what they want isn’t as simple as it sounds. For a start, finding out what people want demands a level of understanding and insight that may stretch the analytical capabilities of organisations.

Then responding to the understanding can be even more demanding since it threatens the status quo. Following the strategic path that has been illuminated by insight can require making fundamental changes that challenge even the most determined and robust organisation.

Dunn explains how Relevance Marketing can be used to eliminate much of the risk and fear factor of moving into uncharted territory.

It’s marketing Jim explodes some of the myths surrounding data and explains how, in the right form and in the right hands, it can be used to drive brand value by enabling businesses to respond to their customers in a way that is fast, flexible and relevant every time.

There is a creeping malaise in today's marketing world; a sickness that is spreading not just through business but across many areas of life - politics, education, health broadcasting ... the list goes on. 'Customers are for life, not just your next bonus' explains why marketing today is broken - and reveals how to fix it.

The condition is short-termism in all its expedient, lazy, self serving and inefficient manifestations.

It is a condition which, if left untreated, will prove terminal, argues master strategist Martin Hayward.

Marketing culture today is impatient for success, short on vision and anxious to earn its own rapid reward, even if this is at the expense of others and a better long term solution.

As a host of competitive, international and consumer pressures force companies to run faster just to stand still, the focus is shifting from long-term health to short-term survival and, more worryingly, from the customer's interests to the company's.

'Customers are for life, not just your next bonus' presents the deadly dangers of short-termism and exposes the sickly state of marketing today.

But Hayward's hard-hitting message is not all doom and gloom. There is a way out of Quickfix Kingdom for companies willing to remove their heads from the sand and find and follow the route - however difficult it proves to be.

And it is the role of marketing departments to make the maps and lead the exodus, says Hayward, former head of the Henley Centre and now Director of Consumer Strategy and Futures at dunhumby.

Customers are for life, not just your next bonus' explains why marketing today is broken - and reveals how to fix it

Based on a survey of 1,300 consumers and focused on eight sectors the Customer Centricity Report looks at how closely consumers feel that major UK companies and brands are meeting their needs.

Discovering what consumers really think of customer service

Summary Findings

• The dunnhumby Customer Centricity Report looks at how closely consumers feel that major UK companies and brands are meeting their needs.
• It is based on a survey of 1,300 consumers and focuses on eight sectors including supermarkets, airlines, car insurance, high street banks, mobile phone operators, fixed line telecom providers and electricity companies.
• It reveals the current leaders and laggards in the customer centricity stakes and highlights that an overwhelming number of companies either have yet to embark on the journey or have a long way to go.
• In particular, despite having significant marketing budgets, a significant proportion of companies are failing to fulfill some of the basic tenets of doing business and marketing – identifying what customers actually want and fulfilling those needs.

Particular findings include

• A significant number of companies are undervaluing their customers and struggling to recognize the importance of being customer focused.
• Over 50% of the companies in the report received a negative score for customer centricity.
• Fixed line telecoms providers and electricity companies received a red card for the relevance and quality of their customer proposition.
• Over two thirds of respondents felt their electricity company was unhelpful when they needed help.
• Just over one third of consumers would recommend their fixed line telecoms provider to a friend.
• Credit card companies were the poorest at understanding customer needs.
• Over a three year period consumers experience deteriorating relationships with high street banks.
• High street banks were the worst offenders for providing poor customer service and sending too much irrelevant mail.
• Supermarket retailers receive the highest rating and are regarded as nearly twice as customer centric as the runner-up, the airline industry.
• Supermarket retailers’ relationships with their customers improve over time.
• Nationwide, Virgin Mobile, Zurich and Tesco are the leading practitioners of customer centricity.
• New entrants to particular sectors can quickly win the trust of customers and usurp more established brands if they deliver highly relevant customer propositions. For example, in the insurance sector, Tesco has a strong customer ethos and its insurance business receives a top ten rating for customer centricity.