Levelling of quality downwards, loss of product value and increased pressure on suppliers (On this point, see in particular our previous article Stop the price cuts... Focus on Customer Experience!). Generating profits through increased turnover and improved customer retention: this is sustainable, and it requires focusing on your customer experience. Today, companies that make profits and generate overall value are those that have understood that the customer is their primary asset, and therefore the primary lever to activate.
Wondering how to become a part of it? To achieve this, here are 5 tips to follow, based on the analysis of the winning strategies developed by leading companies in the field of Customer Experience. On your marks, get set... Perform!
1. Personalize the customer experience through intelligent data utilization.
Brands have never had access to as much customer information as they do today. The 'Big Data' buzzword refers to the vast amount of data that companies accumulate, which is still clearly underutilized.
An eConsultancy study conducted in 2015[I] reveals that nearly 80% of consumers say that brands do not know them as individuals.
How to change this observation? By taking ownership of this data and using it to enhance the customer experience. Here are some tips to guide you:
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- Establish multi-channel campaigns that are no longer solely designed based on the messages the brand wants to convey, but based on data derived from customer knowledge.
- Carry out individualized nurturing by paying attention to behaviors, purchasing patterns, and interactions.
- Involve your customers in product design, solicit their suggestions, and ask for their feedback on prototypes, using collaborative platforms and social networks.
- Continuously improve the customer experience by leveraging the numerous methods of listening to and analyzing the voice of the customer now available: semantic analysis of comments made on social networks, real-time on-site observation, satisfaction surveys and cold statistics, predictive analysis of behavioral data, etc.
This personalization effort must be combined with an effort to rethink the messages and marketing pressure you will exert. Personalizing the customer experience increases the trust your customers place in you, and therefore their loyalty.
2. Be "responsive": master multi-channel to adapt to customer choices.
Consumers today have the possibility to access your products and services wherever they want, at the time they want, through the channel of their choice. Multichannel is no longer an option, but a reality.
Therefore, your entire company and all of your services must become "responsive"[II]:
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- Your strategy, first and foremost: adapt your offer according to the demands and new uses of your customers. Test small series, adjust and multiply.
- Your customer service, of course: after-sales service and technical support must be consistent (in terms of discourse and identity) and easily accessible by all means: from the website to the telephone, via chat, video tutorials and paper instructions. Adapt the messages and service delivery according to the media, but always with a concern for overall consistency of the customer experience.
- Your services, finally: your customers like to order online and pick up in store or vice versa? Give them this option. Only a third of brands (34%) allow their customers to start a journey on one channel and finish it on another[III]. However, this practice is essential for better fluidity of the customer journey.
3. Foster a community of clients
Your customers are eager to be involved and want to share their experience! Don't believe it? However, in the age of collaborative consumption, and with digital word-of-mouth having a multiplied impact (both positive and negative...), there are real opportunities to integrate customer groups and unite them around shared emotions, passions, places, or desires.
The key to this community marketing is to encourage exchanges between consumers of a brand, around common values. Communication takes place between 'supporters' of a brand. Not only via social networks: also consider creating 'quality groups' with representative customers to constantly rethink and improve their purchasing experience.
Offering your customer community the opportunity to develop a connection based on passions or desires, and not just raw information about your products, is a very strong loyalty driver, much more powerful than loyalty cards. The customer feels « engaged » with the brand and therefore becomes your most effective ambassador.
Going beyond the reward logic linked to the level of purchase, creating a feeling of belonging to a group that loves and shares the same interests, developing a real community relationship... these are all levers that will engage the customer by your side.
4. "Delight" your customers: simplify and script the customer journey
A good customer journey is a simple journey! The trend, particularly with the contribution of new technologies, is towards consumer « relief » via journeys that are increasingly easy to understand.
According to the 3rd AFRC Customer Effort Barometer[I], across the 9 different sectors studied, 69% of the journeys assessed by French people did not require any particular effort.
A sign that brands are making progress in resolving issues. There is no shortage of examples of simplified purchasing processes, regardless of the channel used.
This reduction in customer effort through optimization of key steps in the customer journey helps to remove constraints that hinder purchase or limit loyalty. An efficient customer journey is a satisfying customer journey!
This wave of simplification will continue to intensify in the months and years to come with the arrival of connected objects. Because they are destined to enter consumers' homes, some connected objects will serve as a link, a bridge between the brand and its customers, to quickly resolve a problem, intervene, provide information... or reorder!
Enhancing the customer journey also sometimes involves small gestures, based on personalized marketing: your customers appreciate the small attentions you give them. A surprise box added to a package, a humorous message placed in an aisle, a unique ambient scent... These small touches will offer a surprising customer experience, a source of delight.
Hence – again – the need for particular attention to the proper use of collected data! Customers know they are entrusting you with personal data: they can be delighted by a relevant message sent at the right time... but conversely, an overly intrusive message, which shows a clumsy use of data, risks causing a resistant attitude.
5. Consider the customer as a true company « asset »
You must consider your client as an asset of your company, in the sense of a resource, in the financial sense of the term. The discourse heard, read and seen everywhere, which consists of « placing the client at the heart of concerns » must be translated into reality, because the impact of the customer experience on the acquisition and retention of customers, and therefore, in fine, on the revenues of your company is indeed real (as a reminder on the link between the quality of the customer experience and stock market performance of companies, reread our article: Stop the price cuts... Focus on Customer Experience!)
Companies that claim such a concern in their annual report and do not offer connected customer journeys, or do not use the customer data collected, are making empty statements that no one believes. Not even themselves.
How does a company truly demonstrate its willingness and ability to make the shift that positions the customer as an asset? Through projects and investments focused on improving the quality of the customer experience (especially on the various topics covered previously) and by establishing, monitoring, and analyzing real performance indicators and return on investment.
The pursuit of continuous improvement of customer experience can only be achieved by adopting these indicators, which allow the company to adopt a strategy and make decisions based on facts. Quantify and qualify your efforts. Equip yourself with indicators to measure your progress, adapted to the objectives you are aiming for, to your sector of activity and to the maturity of your company in the face of customer experience.
[i] Expérience client : écart de perception entre marques et consommateurs – Infographie E-Consultancy et IBM
[ii] Se dit d’un site internet au design responsive, c’est-à-dire qui a la faculté de s’adapter au terminal de lecture pour être consulté sur plusieurs supports différents.
[iii] Baromètre des pratiques digitales 2015 Sia Partners / Econocom / Ifop
For 10 years, KESTIO has been assisting companies – from SMEs to large corporations – in enhancing their Customer Experience to optimize customer loyalty and acquisition. We offer tailored support programs and exclusive methods to:
In the area of customer journey improvement, KESTIO has developed the exclusive WELCOME EXPERIENCE© method, based in particular on expertise developed with companies in the Leisure, Sports and Events sector.
