I recently reread an article about customer experience written in 2019 which is not that long ago, and was relieved to see how far our understanding of this vital part of our customer (communications) strategy has come. The article asked the question ‘who should implement it?’ and suggested marketing, branding or possibly technology professionals. Whichever of the three, this approach seems quite narrow.

Customer experience is not an isolated thing – it can’t be delivered by just one or even three departments of an organisation. Unless everyone is part of, and understands their role in, delivering customer experience, your company will never be fully able to deliver the optimal experience. However, in order to make sure that customer experience is not defined differently by different departments in the organisation, it is important that one department, usually marketing, takes ownership of any customer experience strategy to ensure cross-company consistency.

What is customer experience

Customer experience can be defined in many ways and that is part of the problem. It is defined by the team responsible for it, by the platform that can support it, and by the quantifiable data that measures it, but ultimately customer experience is the impression your customers get of your brand across each and every touchpoint in their customer journey.

When a customer interacts with your organisation, whether in person or online, through service delivery personnel or with a product, they expect their interactions to be smooth, and when that is not the case, their view of your brand can be severely damaged. But the opposite is also true, when their interactions with, and experience of, your brand are excellent, they can become your best advocates.

“Customer experience is the impression your customers get of your brand across each and every touchpoint in their customer journey.”

So, does customer experience really matter?

When a customer has a good customer experience, you may in fact never know about it, but when they have a bad one, you almost definitely will. When an organisation fails to understand the role of customer experience in brand reputation, they put their entire business at risk. Reputational damage, and negative word-of-mouth, can be very costly in immediate lost business, and very difficult and resource consuming to recover from even over time. And even if you can recover, the financial cost of restoring your reputation can be very high.

The benefits of good customer experience

When a business, or any organisation, understands the importance and value of customer experience, and invests in the operational structure, process flows, staff, internal and external communications, sales team and everything else that can affect your customer’s enjoyment of their contact with you the rewards can be great. A customer who has had an excellent (rather than just a good) experience with you, will defend you to someone who had a lesser experience. They will be more inclined to give you the benefit of the doubt in any given situation. They will be more likely to return and purchase from you again (customer retention) and they are also more likely to refer business to you (brand advocacy). This is due to the fact that when a customer has a really good experience with your brand, it strengthens their loyalty to you.

In a world where many offers appear identical or at least the differences appear miniscule, customers will choose on the basis of service, interactions with your people, efficiency and consistency.

Critical to remember though, is that your customer’s customer experience will only ever be as good as the weakest link in the touchpoint chain. Investing in designated resources to find and remove hiccoughs in the buyer journey, has a potentially very high ROI.

Customer experience metrics

Measuring customer experience is not as difficult as you might think.

• Running regular surveys (annual or bi-annual) on your website, in-house or via your sales staff allows you to keep an eye on key trends.

• Measure your customer churn.

• Keep a close eye on all customer communications – reviews, complaints, service requests – they can provide valuable data and also highlight areas of excellence to communicate, and areas of poor delivery that can be addressed.

How to deliver an exceptional customer experience

1. Understand your customers: Take the time to understand your customers' needs, preferences, and pain points. Gather feedback, conduct surveys, and analyse customer data to gain insights into their expectations. Develop clear customer personas.

2. Train and empower your staff: Invest in comprehensive training programs to ensure your employees have the knowledge and skills needed to provide exceptional service. Empower them to make decisions and solve problems on the spot.

3. Personalise the experience: Treat each customer as an individual and tailor your actions and conversations to their specific needs.

4. Be responsive and accessible: Be available to customers through relevant channels, such as phone, email, chat, and social media. Respond promptly to enquiries, complaints, and feedback.

5. Anticipate customer needs: Strive to be proactive in meeting customer needs. Identify potential pain points or challenges they may face and provide solutions or assistance before they even ask for it.

6. Create a seamless experience: Ensure a smooth and consistent experience across all touchpoints, both online and offline, whether it's your website, physical store, or customer support. Remove any barriers that could negatively affect the customer journey.

7. Exceed expectations: Go the extra mile to surprise and delight your customers. You can do this by offering unexpected perks, or special rewards, but also by being responsive and by delivering what they need when they need it. Many companies don’t.

8. Listen actively: Actively listen to your customers' feedback, concerns, and suggestions and when you use their input to improve your products, services, and overall customer experience, let them know.

9. Foster a customer-centric culture: Create a culture within your organisation that prioritises the customer experience. Demonstrate this to all employees, from frontline staff to executives, so that they too embrace a customer-centric mindset and make customer satisfaction a shared goal.

10. Continuously improve: Regularly evaluate and analyse your customer experience efforts. Collect data, measure key performance indicators, and seek feedback to identify areas for improvement. Implement changes and iterate based on customer insights.

By implementing these tips, you can create a customer-centric approach that fosters loyalty, satisfaction, and a positive brand reputation.

Excellent customer experience means business – make it yours.

If you would like to talk to us about how we can help you to develop an exceptional customer experience for your company, please get in touch.