Traditionally Marketing has played the central role in bringing the Customer Experience (CX) to the attention of the organization, and while the intent is good the impact is often very, very bad.
Why? Marketing is noted for their soft and fluffy approaches and when it comes down to delivering they simply do not connect sufficiently with the rest of the organization. Often times it isn’t their fault. Consider if you have been trained in marketing methods from the last century – why should we then criticize the marketers when those approaches don’t work? especially now in the digitized promiscuous customer age? Seriously, we must get more scientific about the customer experience and be brutally truthful, science and marketing are worlds apart.
Don’t lose hope if you are a victim of a marketing led CX effort.
Based on 2017 research with 300+ global organizations* the BPG distilled winning strategies in terms of what is delivering in our rapidly Uberfying world…
1. Forget the theory.
It was written for a different time and no amount of trying to make it fit will address the challenges of rebellious, promiscuous and impatient customers who are literally connected to social media around the clock. You need to anticipate and navigate the ever-changing environment without calling another meeting, needing to talk with the other C levels, or indeed brief the Public Relations department. Simply put – You do not have the time.
2. Connect the dots across the organization.
Customer experiences create all our work, without exception. Fundamentally, you can link everything that is going on inside your company with an interaction somewhere at some time. Can you see that connection and is it known the rest of the organization? If you can’t then start connecting those dots to explain how everyone is intimately connected to successful customer outcomes.
3. Ensure rewards pay people for the right things.
Here is a paradox. If you pay people for doing things do not be surprised if the stuff they do doesn’t contribute to success for the customer. For instance, call centers are wedded to managing calls. Average Handle Times, Abandon Rates, Failure demand and so on. How much of that relates to achieving an effective resolution for a customer (not the scotch mist type of help desk support and closed calls)? Next practice suggests reward structures based on delivering successful outcomes. It is less about measuring what is done and more about delivering successful outcomes.
4. Dashboards.
Are you Key Performance Indicators (KPI’s)pointing you towards success, or are they just number blinding you? Here is a quicky to try… Look at your top 20 KPI’s and mark them red, amber, green. Red is for outputs (how many, where and when), Green is Outcomes (the result of outputs). If the balance is red you need to shift the emphasis, and in doing so the important measures of Outcomes become the ‘beacon on the hill’ to guide all activity to the right place.
5. Learn to see around the corner.
The future isn’t predictable, precise and cast in concrete. If recent times tell us anything it is that the business of prediction is more wrong than right in our turbulent world. You need a team around you that understand no amount of planning and due diligence will get you there. While you are offsite planning the next five years your competitors are winning the ever fickler customers who regard your brand as staid and ‘yesterday’. Up your game and make sure the people around you understand the new dynamic. Stop them relating to 20th-century models and get them thinking and delivering to the new order of business. It is now or never.
If you want to stretch your team join us for the one day ACXP ‘hands-on’ doing session designed to let you take away actionable strategies and techniques fine-tuned in world leading organizations like Apple, Emirates, Zara, Zappos, Bentley, Disney to name a few!
Here’s the place to find out more: http://bit.ly/ACX2017
* The BPG conduct periodic research across its membership of 90,000 professionally qualified registrants based in 116 countries.
