How Mall of America creates a great guest experience

Executive summary

Mall of America (MOA) is more than just a collection of stores — their goal is to create fun, communal experiences for their millions of guests in a safe environment; including entertainment, celebrity appearances, socializing opportunities, as well as, of course, shopping. In an industry where experience is the best way to differentiate, build brand love, and drive repeat business, MOA found that they did not have an effective way of quickly surfacing opportunities to engage with customers’ comments and questions to resolve issues and drive brand love. They also wanted to drive a memorable digital experience to complement the in-person experiences they offered guests. MOA had a team of social media community managers, but they didn’t have a spot for all of them to collaborate. To accomplish their goals, MOA knew they needed a solid social strategy for both care and marketing, and they trusted Khoros to be their partner in delivering a seamless, memorable experience to their customers. To ensure all branches of the social marketing and care teams, as well as key departments within MOA, remain in communication and are working towards the same goals, MOA built a communication command center called the Enhanced Service Portal (ESP). This includes a headquarters for the social media team, with the Khoros Marketing platform at the core of their social community management strategy. The monitors within the command center not only reflect the activity of each social community manager at all times, but they also reflect what's happening on their social channels, allowing the whole team to work in a more cohesive manner.

Before implementing Khoros, MOA community managers didn’t have a reliable way to humanize their interactions, recognize spontaneous declarations of brand love, or make sure guests felt heard, let alone take action to engage with them in a timely manner. Without these signals, the process for engaging with customers was disjointed and inconsistent. With Khoros, the MOA team now has the ability to monitor and easily respond to all types of guest interactions — from crisis mitigation and helping customers resolve issues to taking opportunities for building brand love with guests who are having great experiences. Even without addressing a specific concern, complaint, or suggestion, MOA is now able to connect with guests on social to foster a lasting, positive brand impression. Sending guests messages like, “We’re so excited you enjoyed our event!” help guests feel like they’re part of a community and foster affinity for the brand. Social care and marketing are intimately linked at MOA. Their social care efforts influence their marketing campaigns, not only when it comes to organic social content, but when it comes to paid content as well. Now, messaging is consistent across the brand and strategies are transparent.

“We built our entire social team on customer care. We want to make sure that we are continuing to grow while remembering that our guests are our top priority, and Khoros helps us do that.”

— Nate Sandell
Senior Manager of Social Media, Mall of America