Center the Customer
Learning Objectives
After completing this unit, you’ll be able to:
- Describe how to manage the competitive spirit with empathy.
- Give examples of how to provide better customer experiences.
- Describe key customer experience measurements.
Tune In with Empathy
It’s natural to be competitive: You might want to write the best code, send emails with the highest click-through rates, or close the most deals on your team. But sometimes a competitive spirit creates friction, like when you and your teammates have different points of view on a sales strategy, product positioning, or the best way to provide support.
If you have a customer-facing role, this friction can spill into customers’ experiences. Keep customers out of the friction zone by practicing empathy. When you adopt your customers’ challenges and make them your own, you feel what they feel. It becomes easier to solve their business problems and deliver more meaningful experiences.
To focus on what the customer experiences, ask yourself these questions.
- Where are they in the customer lifecycle?
- What do they want to accomplish?
- What do they need next?
- What other resources can I share with them?
Build Trust, Demonstrate Value, and Minimize Effort
In addition to being empathetic, here are some other important ways to improve customer experience.
- Build trust. Trust is associated with important factors like data security and uptime, but it’s also grounded in transparency and integrity.
- Demonstrate value. Value is based on the balance of cost and return in terms of technical, service, social, and time benefits. Customers want clarity and consistency when it comes to their investment.
- Minimize effort. Effort has to do with the customer’s investment of time and resources. Great customer experiences happen at every interaction, so make each experience as easy as possible.
Here are some examples of what we do when we address these three efforts.
| If the customer says: | Do this: | This is an example of: |
|---|---|---|
|
“Acquisitions have led to multiple solution names and experiences—we’re confused about which ones are right for us.” |
Offer to review their current products and solutions. Make sure the solutions are relevant to their current business needs. |
Building trust |
|
“The overall cost is high. The advertised pricing leaves out a lot of the real cost.” |
Prove and emphasise return on investment (ROI) while being clear about the holistic cost as early as possible, including working with partners to help with budget, strategy, and implementation. |
Demonstrating value |
|
“Pricing and packaging are confusing. There are too many choices and add-ons.” |
Provide clear and consistent documentation around packaging and pricing—take time to review details and answer questions. |
Minimizing effort |
The Human Side of Trust
Think about it like this: Businesses are made up of people. The people who make decisions for businesses are always thinking about how to do what they need to do and about the people they support—employees, patients, citizens, consumers, readers, and many more. Everything, and everyone, is connected.
Every decision a customer makes about doing business comes down to trust. And that trust is built when you consistently show up and address their business needs. This is the human side of trust. Aim to make business decisions that support your customers’ most immediate needs.
Put the Customer at the Center of Everything You Do
Wherever a customer is in the lifecycle, and whatever difficulties they may face along the way, it’s important that you always demonstrate your commitment to their success. Listen to your customers and center them in your overall strategy.
Your customers expect to have great experience with you, and being committed to delivering that experience for them is a must. Next, let’s talk about how to keep track of the experiences you deliver.
Customer Experience Industry Standards
More businesses are developing customer-centric cultures. They recognize that customer experience is a key factor for growth and success at every stage of the customer lifecycle.
Many businesses use the Gartner Customer Experience Management Maturity model to assess how well they’re managing customer experiences. This model includes five levels: ad hoc, establishing, performing, optimizing, and embedding.
| Gartner Customer Experience Management Maturity Model | |
|---|---|
|
Ad Hoc |
Purpose and strategy: Reacting, fighting fires Customer insight: No research team or budget Personas and journeys: None exist Voice of the Customer: Irregular surveys |
|
Establishing |
Purpose and strategy: Reducing complaints, developing strategy Customer insight: Dedicated researcher Personas and journeys: Developed Voice of the Customer: Standardized surveys |
|
Performing |
Purpose and strategy: Implementing a unified CX strategy Customer insight: Dedicated research team Personas and journeys: Used to identify and prioritize efforts Voice of the Customer: Limited, closed-loop feedback process |
|
Optimizing |
Purpose and strategy: Optimizing to meet CX goals Customer insight: Continuous Personas and journeys: Detailed, and represent full journey Voice of the Customer: Fully operationalized across the org |
|
Embedding |
Purpose and strategy: Pursuing innovation, whole org buy-in Customer insight: Insights widely distributed, used daily Personas and journeys: Used throughout the org Voice of the Customer: Continuous monitoring |
Approximately 80 percent of business-to-business (B2B) businesses are currently at the ad-hoc level, which is when a business reports on customer experience metrics, but their metrics are isolated from the rest of their business.
To differentiate your business as a leader in customer experience, you must take the steps necessary to progress through the customer experience maturity levels.
Key Measurements to Level Up
Establishing a solid way to measure customer experience is key to leveling up. You can measure your customer experience based on three key measurements: satisfaction and sentiment, value, and engagement.
| Measurement | How to Measure | Goal |
|---|---|---|
|
Satisfaction and sentiment |
Customer satisfaction scores (CSAT) or net promoter score (NPS). |
Customer is happy and recommends you to others. |
|
Value |
Asking customers for feedback. |
This keeps your value top of mind to customers by always making them aware of the value they feel they are getting from working with you. Note that each customer has a different set of standards by which they measure value, so it’s up to you to find out what metrics are important to them. |
|
Engagement |
Surveys, attending events or webinars offered, following what people are saying on social media. |
Customers who are engaged are happy and recognize your business value. |
Staying tuned to your customers adds value for them and helps you be the best possible partner.