CUSTOMER
EXPERIENCE
How to acquire loyal and
returning customers
Author
Christoffer Hansen
ch@hanei.se
Customer experience is all about your customer’s interaction and experience with your company through their customer journey, from the very moment they get in contact with you to become a loyal customer.
The customer experience is an integral part of your CRM system and a positive experience that ensures all interactions are easy, enjoyable, and seamless results in a loyal and repeat customer. Still, to achieve that result, you must invest in the experience.
If a customer has a negative experience with your company, such as being treated poorly or ignored, they will probably stop doing business with you. Therefore, customer experience is of the utmost importance.
THE CUSTOMER IS THE REASON
YOU ARE IN BUSINESS
IN THE FIRST PLACE
The customer is the reason you are in business in the first place, and therefore executives and managers should focus on retaining new customers and keep the existing ones. But even though customer experience is a top priority, most companies fail to deliver a customer experience perceived as pleasing to the actual customer, which, in part, is due to rising customer expectations. If their experience is exceptional at one company, they expect it to be just as good or even better at your company. Bad customer experience involves:
• Difficult purchasing processes
• Poor customer support
• Waiting too long on hold
• Ignoring customer feedback
So, what can companies do to avoid bad customer experience and make it a great one?
7 STEPS TO A GREAT CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE
- Customer experience vision
Define your vision by creating a set of statements or values that guide principles. Everyone in the organization should know these. - Understand your customer
To understand your customers’ needs and wants, create personas to help your customer support recognize who they are, and understand them better. - Emotional connection
If customers remember how they felt when using your product or service and get emotionally attached, they are more likely to become loyal customers. Create an emotional connection by considering how you deliver your message and what YOU can do for your customer. Emotionally attached customers are:
• Three times likely to recommend your product or service
• Three times more likely to re-purchase
• Less prone to look for another solution
• Less price sensitive - Customer feedback
Ask your customers about their experience to determine what you are doing right and what needs improvement. Use chat tools, e-mail, and surveys to gather information about how your customer perceived the experience with your company. - Develop your team
Identify what training your customer support team needs to succeed. The quality framework takes assessment one step further by scheduling and tracking each members’ progress through coaching, eLearning, and group training. - Employee feedback
Use project management software or social media tools where your employees can leave feedback and ideas on how to improve the customer experience. - ROI from excellent customer experience
Ask your customers a simple question: “Would you recommend us to a friend or relative?”
It is vital for a great customer experience to understand the entire customer journey and have a clear understanding of the whole experience back-to-back and how interactions are received through the whole journey.
WHAT MATTERS THE
MOST TO CUSTOMERS?
Value for money, customer support, and product satisfaction, but an emotional connection sets companies apart, including brand identification, social responsibility, innovation, and trustworthiness. The best companies generate both value for money and an emotional connection, and in some cases, emotional connection is more important than value for money. How customers identify with a brand and how innovative they perceive it to allow for premium prices.
POST COVID-19
The pandemic drastically changed customer behavior and expectations, and companies were forced to change how they interact with customers. It is best to act now and not wait to get back to normal since this is the new normal. So, how do we transform our customer experience to fit in with the times? According to *McKinsey (2020), there are three building blocks:
- Build aspiration and purpose
Define the experience you want to deliver and align it to the company’s aspiration. The aspiration is your company’s purpose and brand promise; imagine your company as a person. Who is that person at its core? Inspirational? Nurturing? What can customers expect from you? What value do you have in the customers’ expected behavior when their needs evolve? - Transform the business
Create a team that is in charge of developing platforms and technology. A team that is agile and cross-functional can reimagine the customer experience, products, and services. They should have real expertise in technology, experience design, and looking to improve the project continuously. - New capabilities
• Customer-centric mindset – To ensure that employees can deliver a great customer experience, they should be provided with the right skills and tools. Companies should provide courses, workshops, and support through the employees’ development.
• Integrate technology – For a successful omnichannel experience, companies need digital platforms with microservices and apps that quickly offer a service to the customer. A contact-center with chat, video chat, e-mail, and a single platform that integrates the platforms.
• Agile operating model – Establish an agile decision-making process where team members can negotiate and have the team leader make formal decisions.
• Performance management – Implement management systems that teach employees which behaviors give the best result and guide innovation teams on where to focus. Management tools predict current satisfaction and future spend based on experience.
Combining these three building blocks will give companies an advantage in their field and emerge on top after the pandemic.
*Reference:
McKinsey & Company. (2020) The three building blocks of successful customer-experience transformations ( https://www.mckinsey.com/business-functions/marketing-and-sales/our-insights /the-three-building-blocks-of-successful-customerexperience-transformations) (2020-11-20)
SO
WHAT?
Having a great customer experience is vital for consumers to become loyal and returning customers to your company. For a great customer experience, it is essential to understand the entire customer journey and how the experience is at every touchpoint.
The customer expectation changed once the pandemic started, and companies need to adapt to the customers’ new needs to have an advantage and stay on top of their field.
If you want to learn more about Customer experience and how it helps companies stay on top in their field, feel free to reach out to us at Hanei Consulting Group.
If you want to learn more about Customer experience and how it helps companies stay on top in their field, feel free to reach out to us at Hanei Consulting Group.
About us
We are a team of independent professionals from diverse backgrounds who want to make consulting simple. We have extensive experience from strategy- and technology consulting firms, start-ups, and corporations, where we have solved problems in 50+ countries – from start-ups to Fortune 500 companies. We are the architects of your growth.
