In this week’s installment of TheCustomer QT – The problem and the fix for CX, Honesty & empathy for the win(s), Robo-ethics, and a better way to measure brand loyalty.
Happy skimming!
CX
“I Love My Car But…”
Quick-Take: But now that Tesla is in the home — which for most people is by far their biggest asset — it’s a whole different ballgame. Installing Tesla Solar involves everything from pulling permits to potentially annoying your neighbors with the sound of construction. There are crews and equipment and materials that show up on your lawn; they’ll work on your roof for days at a time. Tesla’s lack of a dedicated, public-facing executive who owns Customer Experience in all its forms is really starting to show via complaints and lawsuits, and it risks hurting the brand.
Not Equipped to Deliver on Customer Experience
Quick-Take: The global study, which surveyed 1,700+ executives and 12,000+ consumers, uncovered that despite the majority of companies (66 percent) investing upwards of $250,000 each year evaluating the customer experience through Net Promoter Scores, reviews, and customer satisfaction surveys, 82 percent were unable to recall a single positive example of a recent frictionless customer experience-showing current customer experience processes do little more than wallpaper over the cracks.
CX Requires Leadership plus IT
Quick-Take: According to Forrester’s 2020 U.S. Federal Customer Experience Index. The report found that the federal average CX score of 15 key agencies and programs trailed nearly 11 points behind the private sector average and was “lower than any other industry or sector” we studied.
The CX Problem
Quick-Take: There’s a global problem with CX and it can be summed up in two intersecting statistics: 91 percent of CEOs think their companies are customer-centric, but only 13 percent of consumers would describe the brands that way.
The New Customer Experience Imperative
Quick-Take: According to Gartner, 89% of companies now compete primarily based on customer experience and a Walker study forecasts that CX will imminently overtake price and product as the key brand differentiator. Digital technology is the engine that is powering CX forward.
AI
Robo-Ethical Framework
- Robots must be designed for a positive impact: Robots must be built to contribute to the growth and well-being of the human workforce.
- Bias-free robotics: Personal attributes such as color, religion, sex, gender, age and other protected status are eliminated when creating robots so their behavior is employee agnostic.
- Robots must safeguard individuals: Careful consideration is given to decide whether and how to delegate decisions to robots.
- Robots must be driven by trusted data sources: Robots must be designed to act based upon verified data from trusted sources.
- Robots must be designed with holistic governance and control: Humans must have complete information about a system’s capabilities and limitations.
CONSUMER PSYCHOLOGY
COVID-19 Changed Consumer Behavior
Quick-Take: With all our Zoom-ing during the past year we’ve gotten an unfiltered look into our co-workers’ lives. We see each other’s kitchens, loved ones (furry and non) and the ordinary mess of our everyday. Brendan noted that this 360-degree view of our shared humanity was uncomfortable at first but has produced the magnificent result of strengthening our bonds and infusing more authenticity and empathy into our working lives. And he asked the question: As marketers, are we ready to look into consumers’ lives with the same degree of honesty?
The Next Boom
Quick-Take: “The biggest opportunity the pandemic has provided for us all: the chance to be more empathetic and human in our communications, engagements, and interactions with each other — not only in our personal lives, but in business too,” says Norman Guadagno, chief marketing officer of Acoustic. “Well wishes don’t cut it anymore; action does.”
CUSTOMER DATA
Optimizing Customer Data Platforms
Quick-Take: Data is a team sport. It’s every team’s responsibility to help make sure data is useful and easily accessible for the whole organization. It should be managed along the entire product development lifecycle, so that the value for each team compounds to the upside. The antithesis of that is when teams only think about their needs and data silos are created; the organization experiences an entropic state, which leads to a disjointed and inaccurate view of customer preferences. It’s a classic tragedy of the commons. This can inhibit or completely undermine the opportunity that companies have to drive holistic customer experience.
DATA & PRIVACY
First Data on User Behavior Exceeds Advertisers’ Worst Fears
Quick-Take: It seems that in the United States, at least, app developers and advertisers who rely on targeted mobile advertising for revenue are seeing their worst fears realized: Analytics data published this week suggests that US users choose to opt out of tracking 96 percent of the time in the wake of iOS 14.5.
METRICS
Metrics That Are Better Than NPS
Quick-Take: Gartner’s research shows that the effect of emotions on loyalty can’t be measured solely based on how customers feel about a company or product — which is what NPS measures. Rather, loyalty is driven by how customers’ selection of a company or product makes them feel about themselves. Enhancing the value that customers perceive through service interactions boosts their loyalty by raising their confidence in the purchase decisions they’ve made — and in their belief that they can achieve more with the company’s product or service.
By offering and measuring value enhancement during an interaction, customer service can deepen a customer’s relationship with that company. Measuring VES validates the impact that customer service’s value enhancement efforts have in boosting loyalty. NPS cannot provide this level of clarity and insight for customer service and support.
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Photo by Sara Garnica on Unsplash.
