Key Business Factors That Can Transform Your Customer Experience
5 min read
The global markets are rife with competition; businesses are constantly struggling to distinguish themselves from the crowd. It is no longer just one business trying to reach more customers, but a business focusing on convincing customers why they are better than their competition.
Generating brand value and influencing customer recall is essential to grab the spotlight.
Most businesses attempt to do so by going above and beyond at strategic touch-points with the aim of striking a connection with their customer. For example, if a delivery service delivered a parcel before time, or when a store offered a special birthday discount – these are all feel-good experiences that customers cherish. However, they are just one-off experiences, and as such don’t contribute to the entirety of customer interactions that define the brand.
Instead, if you truly want to create an impactful CX strategy, you need to refine and develop several key aspects of your business. The following are factors that every business comprises of, however those that prioritize customer experience are usually doing it better than those that don’t.
- Structuring the Organization
Is the design of your organization conducive to the customer-first approach? Take an objective view of the organizational structure with the help of a customer journey map, and ensure that every touchpoint works in tandem with your overall goals. Whether it is customer interactions with the help of your customer service team, the chatbot pop-up on your website, or the ease of checkout, it all comes together to create a holistic experience for your customers.
Enhance it with the help of technology, make information more seamlessly available, and get all the teams together on the same page to facilitate a seamless organizational structure.
- Strategizing Your Interactions
Once you map the customer journey, you can begin strategizing customer interactions at every touchpoint. Center it towards the goals you’d like to accomplish at each stage to create an experience that effortlessly leads customers on to the next key stage.
By optimizing each interaction, you can create a CX journey that stays with your customer long after they conclude business with your company.
- Technology that Transforms
Nearly everyone uses multiple modes of technology and communication, whether it is to interact with a business, research, or get in touch.
So you need to ensure that your business is able to perfectly cater to it all. A customer that has a great experience on your website but a terrible interaction with your customer service might continue to see the company in a negative light.
In order to ensure optimum CX, you need to maintain every touch-point experience at its prime.
- Data Analytics
No customer experience is complete without personalization – and on a large scale this is only possible with the help of data analytics.
Understand your audience, segment the varied personas, and cater to each on a more thoughtful level. The more useful an experience is, the more captivated a customer will get.
Moreover, data analytics can also help you in recording and creating files of previous customer experience interactions which you can then reference in future communications. Just remembering the smaller details can make a customer feel heard and valued, adding a further layer of personalization to the mix and creating an unforgettable experience.
- Setting Expectations
A significant part of your CX actually depends on what your customers are expecting. That’s why you need to begin by setting expectations just right. Never promise the impossible. Expectations set too high are often met with disappointment.
So a good rule of thumb is to always under-promise and over-deliver, creating a positive impact on customers as they interact with your organization. (Exactly what Amazon does when it comes to delivery schedules – have you noticed that most of the times your parcel arrives before time?)
- Quantify Your Success
Only when you can visibly measure improvement and success can you know the impact of your efforts.
Send out regular NPS surveys, ask for customer feedback, and keep an eye on the Customer Satisfaction Score.
The more information you have, the better it will be for you to understand what needs to be done.
This will also alert you about any new experience gaps that may have arisen along the customer journey, creating a continuous cycle of feedback and improvement.
- The Product
How you treat your customer at every touchpoint determines how the customer will perceive you. With market competition at a new peak, customer experience is seen as the key differentiator amongst businesses. Customers are willing to pay premium prices for brands that offer a better experience.
However, that is not to say that the product isn’t essential.
It’s up to you to deliver a product that not only matches but succeeds its competition while living up to the expectations set by your CX. Without that, the entirety of the efforts placed in customer experience would crumble.
Importance of First Contact
The customer experience journey is what business are focusing on. In fact, the world’s leading businesses have identified this as utterly integral to the continued growth and success of their brand.
However, that is not to say that individual touchpoints don’t have a defining impact on your customers. Take the first interaction, for instance. The very first interaction that a customer has with your brand can set the tone for the future.
So even as you are investing in optimizing the entire customer journey, the first interaction is key to ensuring that the customer takes the journey you’ve designed. While customer experience is a key part of the business strategy, don’t do it at the cost of under-delivering experiences along with key individual interactions and touchpoints.
The Impact of Customer Experience
Your business is comprised of several factors, your structure, ease of accessibility, technology, data analytics, and more. In order to connect with your customers and provide a smooth experience, it’s imperative to optimize the structure from within.
Take every facet of your business into account and create a friction-free environment for communication and working. By creating a customer experience that takes every facet of the business into account, you can create a holistic journey for your customers and also get your entire workforce on the same page.
In doing so, you’ll notice that different departments can begin working more effortlessly together, nurturing a more efficient work environment.
This, in turn, will get reflected in the attitude of your employees and your customers, leading to a positive atmosphere for everyone.
Author Name: Krause Leia
Author Bio: Krause Leia is a content marketer and a market researcher who is on the spree to capture multiple facets of industry through creativity and innovation. Krause is a content geek who writes for market research, digital marketing, and startup niches.
