Customer Experience, a cross-functional topic
Customer Experience being the trace left in the customer's mind, it is the result of the various responses, interactions and experiences lived with the company throughout the customer journey: before, during and after the transactional phase itself. (To learn all about the notion of Customer Experience and how it differs from customer satisfaction or CRM, read our article “Are you sure you have mastered the 3 key approaches to customer loyalty?“)
It is therefore necessary to set the same level of requirement on all possible points of interaction: the information disseminated on the website, the content of an email from a marketing campaign, the use of the product, the exchange with the customer service person by telephone, the passage to the checkout of a store, etc... must generate a coherent and qualitative feeling.
Experience (both rational and emotional), as well as brand attachment, are therefore not the sole preserve of the 'Customer Service' department but of all relevant departments (whether directly or indirectly related to the customer).
This is a cross-functional subject that can be complex to address.
…Which the executive committee must address!
Customer Experience improvement projects can only be born and successfully deployed if they are led by the Management Committee itself.
This is for three reasons:
1. They require real decision-making power
Unlike managing a project confined to a single department within the company, led by a project manager, all operational departments must take ownership of the subject to size investments appropriately and make the right decisions.
Projects focused on improving the quality of the Customer Experience are strategically important, directly impacting sales performance and closely aligning with the company's overall strategy. Entrusting these projects to project leaders who are removed from the decision-making level, no matter how brilliant they may be, risks failure because they will lack the status, decision-making power, and strategic vision necessary to drive such a transformation.
2. Their operational deployment involves profound changes.
We realize that these projects, in addition to being cross-functional, most of the time generate needs for changes in the organization, processes, tools and/or skills. Their operational monitoring is therefore complex and concerns a large number of people and parameters. Ensuring their coherence and dynamism therefore implies both having a global vision and being able to drive such sometimes profound changes.
3. The monitoring and management of these projects are at a strategic level
Defining the very indicators for monitoring the quality of the customer experience is a strategic issue, as they must reflect the vision and ambition that the company sets for itself. Depending on the company's objectives and maturity on this subject, one will opt for the Net Promoter Score, or one will work to define the Customer Effort Score, for example (see our upcoming article on customer experience measurement and management indicators). One can also track the retention rate, the average basket or the speed of recruiting new customers.
In all cases, it is indeed the company's revenue and margin that are at stake, but these more precise intermediate indicators can be very useful.
The Management Committee will then have to adjust its management method to the available data and tools.
That's why, in this type of project, KESTIO consultants join the Management Committee from the upstream phase of defining the approach and sizing the ambition.
We also note (with pleasure!) that, while some directors are sometimes not very convinced of their usefulness at the beginning of the process, they become more and more involved during the project and sometimes even enthusiastic... they see in a pragmatic way how much their team finds meaning in improving the customer experience, thus "humanizing" the objective of company performance!
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