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Executive Report on Customer Experience Spring 2013 Define, Design, Deliver, Calibrate

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Page 2: CMIQ - 2013 Customer Experience Report

Executive Report on Customer Experience Spring 2013

www.customermanagementiq.com 2

Contents

1 Contributors

4 Executive Summary

5 Key Findings

5 Methodology and Demographics

8 Defining the Customer Experience

11 Designing the Customer Experience

13 Delivering the Customer Experience

22 Calibrating the Customer Experience

25 Conclusions

27 Knowledge Center

28 About Our Sponsors

28 About CMIQ

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Executive Report on Customer Experience Spring 2013

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Dann Allen*Head of Experience Design & Improvement AAA Northern California, Nevada, Utah

Dann is a Customer Expe-rience (CE) leader with a passion for shaping how organizations interact with

their customers. For over 10 years, he has led cross-functional programs and managed internal functions to deliver dramatic improvements in loyalty, satisfaction, revenue, and cost reduction.

Dann is Head of Experience Design & Improvement for the Automobile Association of America’s 2nd largest club, based in Northern California. He uses voice of the customer data and leads cross-functional efforts to improve value propositions and multi- channel experiences.

Prior to AAA, Dann was Head of Customer Experience for Sprint’s Prepaid Division. During that time, Dann won Sprint’s “Circle of Excellence” for his outstanding contribution to CE. His division progressed in JD Pow-ers’ survey rankings during that time and achieved #1 in 2010.

Prior to Sprint, Dann held various senior leadership roles in Sales, Marketing, and Operations at Beyond Philosophy, a Customer Experience Consulting firm with offices in London and Atlanta.

http://calstate.aaa.com / www.aaa.com

Anecdotal insights add valuable perspective to data gathered through the survey and interview process. This report featured views and experience from practitioners representing well-known and leading brands as well as from experts who represent field knowledge gathered by our spon-sorship partners in this research.

Erik Eaker*Director, Group Segment Experience Practice Humana

Erik leads Humana’s Group Segment Experience Practice and is responsible for the end-to-end experience of brokers, employers and members across

the full suite of Humana’s health and productivity solu-tions. Prior to this role, he served as Chief of Consumer Experience for Humana Vitality, a comprehensive well-ness solution focused on physical activity, education, screenings, tobacco cessation and nutrition. Erik has served Humana overseas, living five years in London consulting with England’s Department of Health, directing international business development activities throughout Europe, South America, the Middle East and Asia, and serving as Operations Director for Humana Europe where he oversaw the delivery of commissioning knowledge, tools and program management capabilities to it’s NHS customers in England.

After beginning his career at Blue Cross and Blue Shield of North Carolina in 1997, Erik was recruited by Humana’s Chief Innovation Officer in 2000 to spearhead the design and implementation of a new e-enabled, consumer-centric care strategy. Erik received his MHA and BSPH from the University of North Carolina at Cha-pel Hill’s School of Public Health and served as a U.S. Peace Corps volunteer in the Philippines.

www.humana.com

ABOUT OUR CONTRIBUTORS

* This contributor is a presenter at CMIQ’s 2013 Customer Experience Summit. www.customerexperiencesummit.com

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Executive Report on Customer Experience Spring 2013

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Mike HennessyVice President of MarketingIntelliResponse

Mike is responsible for all aspects of IntelliResponse corporate marketing, includ-ing demand generation, brand strategy, corporate messaging, advertising, public relations,

and partner marketing. Previously, Mike was the VP of Marketing and Alli-ances for Truition, an international retail and manufac-turing software provider, where he headed corporate re-branding, partner development, lead generation and market entry strategies for North America and Europe. During his years as a Marketing Communica-tions consultant for a number of world-class agencies, Mike managed a client base that included Amazon.com, Dell, the Royal Bank of Canada, Hewlett-Packard and Pfizer Pharmaceuticals.

Mike holds a master’s degree in business administra-tion from Queen’s University, a post-graduate diploma in marketing communications from Seneca College and a bachelor’s degree from Mount Allison University.

www.intelliresponse.com

Ivar KroghrudChief Executive Officer QuestBack

Ivar has been with Quest-Back since the Company was founded in 2000, and is responsible for the over-all running of the company. Before joining QuestBack,

Ivar worked as a management consultant, focusing on strategy and eBusiness. Ivar holds a bachelor’s degree from the Royal Norwegian Naval Academy and a master’s degree from the Norwegian School of Management (BI).

www.questback.com

John PurcellDirector of Customer Care Products LogMeIn, Inc.

John Purcell is Director of Customer Care Products at LogMeIn, Inc. In this role, he is responsible for growing the Customer Care business by shaping vision, solution strategy

and product direction. John’s team creates application user experiences that delight customer care agents and empower them to fully satisfy customers.

John has developed deep, hands-on experience solv-ing customer support problems and frequently shares his insights via speaking engagements at industry events held by organizations such as the Help Desk Institute (HDI) and Technology Services Industry Asso-ciation (TSIA). In doing so, he helps companies evolve their support organizations in order to overcome new challenges and capitalize on fresh opportunities.

More specifically, John was one of the first in the industry to discuss how social media and the prolifera-tion of smartphones, tablets and other mobile devices are critical new factors in the customer experience. He often advises on how to integrate social, chat and support technologies to create a proactive customer management approach, which results in happier and more loyal customers.

Prior to joining LogMeIn, John spent 12 years in the mobile telecommunications industry, and held senior technology, sales, and business development roles at LogicaCMG (now Acision) and Red Bend Software.

www.logmein.com

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Amas TenumahVice President, OperationsTeleflora

Amas is a customer experi-ence fanatic, and a self-described “contact center geek,” specializing in contact center operations and cus-tomer experience strategy for

a “Twitter-first” century. He has spent the last decade managing contact center operations for companies like Coca-Cola and Convergys Corporation, and currently serves as Vice President of Operations for Teleflora. Amas brings a unique perspective to the world of customer experience that he shares regularly at industry events and publications. He is also a proud dad and an avid Yankee fan who enjoys playing com-petitive soccer when home in Oklahoma City.

www.teleflora.com

Ian ZafraVice President, Account Management SPi Global

A seasoned customer care executive with more than 12 years experience in call center operations and client services, Ian Zafra heads the SPi Global CRM Account Management

Division. As an executive committee member in the SPi Global Engagement Model, his leadership role includes the cultivation of existing client relationships and fostering internal & external partnerships that optimize value, performance, and profitability for our company. His primary objective is to better client and customer engagements, optimizing account satisfac-tion and targeting opportunities that exemplify the total 360º servicing model upheld by the SPi Global Customer Relationship Management (CRM) business unit. Over the past two years at SPi Global, Ian has occupied key positions in operations that centered on business intelligence, site development, client engage-ment and process improvement. Prior to his joining SPi Global, he held similar BPO roles in global operations and client services, commonly prioritizing performance and achieving high satisfaction levels for all accounts managed.

www.spi-global.com

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Business recognizes the importance of customer expe-rience. According to 75.9% of customer management executives and leaders who participated in this research initiative, their organizations have rated customer experi-ence a 5 on a scale of 1-5 (with 5 being of highest impor-tance). (See figure 1)

Of their total annual bud-gets, 17.3% of organizations represented will spend more than 11% of their dollars on their customer experience pro-gram. (See figures 2 and 3)

As these businesses put money and resources behind customer experience pro-

ExECUTIvE SUmmARy ANd KEy FINdINgS

0% 5% 10% 15% 20%

0% 5% 10% 15% 20% 25% 30% 35%

0%

5%

10%

15%

20%

25%

30%

35%

Figure 1: Importance of the Customer Experience to the Organization

1 = Low Priority

2

3

4

5 = High Priority

Figure 2: Total Annual Budget for 2013

0%

2.5

5%

7.5

10%

12.5

15%

17.5

20%

22.5

25% 0%

5%

10%

15%

20%

25%

30%

35%

40%

45%

50%

49

<$100,000

$100,001-$500,000

$500,001-$1 million

$1,000,001-$5 million

$5,000,001-$10 million

$10,000,001-$25 million

$25,000-$50 million

$50,000,001-$100 million

$100,000,001-$500 million

$500,000,001-$1 billion

>$1 billion

I don’t know

I prefer not to answer

Figure 3: Percentage of the Organization’s 2013 Budget Dedicated to Customer Programs

0%

2.5

5%

7.5

10%

12.5

15%

17.5

20%

22.5

25% 0%

5%

10%

15%

20%

25%

30%

35%

40%

45%

50%

49

Customer Experience Program

Customer Service

Contact Center

Customer Service/ Contact Center

Technologies

gramming and initiatives, they must be careful to guard those investments. This research shows a concerning amount of unevenness in the defini-tion, design, delivery and calibration of the customer experience across participating organizations. However, the data also shows that there are entities that are emerging as strong performers in the area of customer experience as a differentiator among competitive fields and, as we will see, as a potential cost saver.

2.9%

1.5%

4.4%

15.3%

75.9%

3.8%

4.5%

3.8%

5.3%

8.3%

5.3%

6.0%

3.8%

3.0%

24.8%

24.1%

0.0%

7.5%

44.1%11.8%

3.1%0.8%1.6%

38.6%

<10%

11 - 25%

26 - 50%

51 - 75%

76 - 100%

I don’t know

33.6%18.4%

8.8%0.0%0.8%

38.4%

38.4%12.8%

8.0%1.6%0.8%

38.4%

34.4%18.4%

7.2%0.8%0.8%

38.4%

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• Most survey participants agreed that the definition of the customer experience should include all interactions with the organization, from both the lifetime and transac-tional perspectives.

• A clear majority of respondents believe the customer experience cycle begins when the organiza-tion communicates with customers and prospects via marketing and promotional materials. A promising hand-ful understand the cycle to begin when the customer first becomes aware of its prod-ucts and services, no matter the method of awareness.

• Despite the fact that in a majority of organizations, the executive suite is involved in defining the organization’s customer experience, fewer than half have a member of the executive suite dedicated to focusing on customer

experience and/or related programs.

• In those organizations that have identified customer expe-rience priorities within their industries, customer service and ease of doing business were the leading two priorities.

• Functional roles in a concerning number of orga-nizations do not have at least a passing familiarity with how customer feedback around preferences and priorities is collected, possibly revealing a lack of organizationwide communication on customer experience programs and strategies.

• Many businesses do not have a consistent customer experience across all channels (including telephone, email, chat, social media and Web self-service, among others) and touchpoints (from aware-ness to loyalty), and they do

Key Findings

not have a plan in place to remedy the inconsistency or do not have confidence in their current remedial plans.

• Although the research identified that customers are not having a consistent expe-rience across all customer touchpoints, at least a few organizations are beginning to take steps to understand where and why the inconsis-tency exists.

• New channels, such as self-service and social media, and nuanced approaches to customer touchpoints will increase complexity for orga-nizations, particularly in the contact center and customer service operations. This growing complexity should be evaluated when plan-ning growth and expansion to ensure that fundamental delivery and improvement of the customer experience is not hindered.

To determine the value that business places on the customer experience and how organizations define, design, deliver and calibrate it, Customer Management IQ surveyed 146 customer management leaders using an online questionnaire over a six-week period starting in December 2012 and ending in January 2013.

Companies of all sizes from 29 countries are represented

in the results. The majority of organiza-

tions represented here are in North American, and most of those are from the United States (62.4%) and Canada (8%). The next largest repre-sentations are from Australia and the United Kingdom, each making up 4.2% of countries respondents reported from. Countries counted in the 21.2% “other” are: Armenia, Austria, Belgium, China, Columbia,

methodology and demographics

Croatia, France, Greece, Guatemala, India, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Kuwait, Mauritius, New Zealand, Nigeria, North-ern Ireland, Philippines, Saudi Arabia, Singapore, Slovenia, South Africa, Spain, and Swit-zerland. (See figure 6)

Nearly half (48%) of those organizations operate small-to-medium contact centers (75 agents/representatives or less), with another 21.2% operating jumbo contact

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Figure 4: Contact Center Size

0% 5% 10% 15% 20%

0% 5% 10% 15% 20% 25% 30% 35%

0%

5%

10%

15%

20%

25%

30%

35%

0

1-10

11-20

21-49

50-75

76-150

151-250

251-500

501-1000

1001-5000

5001+

7.0%

16.9%

10.6%

10.6%

9.9%

11.3%

6.3%

6.3%

8.5%

9.9%

2.8%

Figure 6: Participants by Country

0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70%

Australia

Canada

United Kingdom

United States

Other

4.2%

8.0%

4.2%

62.4%

21.2%

Figure 5: Number of On-Site Customer Service/Sales Representatives

0% 5% 10% 15% 20%

0% 5% 10% 15% 20% 25% 30% 35%

0%

5%

10%

15%

20%

25%

30%

35%

0

1-10

11-20

21-49

50-75

76-150

151-250

251-500

501-1000

1001-5000

5001+

21.4%

17.1%

8.6%

9.3%

9.3%

6.4%

7.1%

4.3%

5.7%

4.3%

6.4%

centers (more than 500 agents/representatives). (See figure 4) Less than one fifth (16.4%) reported jumbo on-site customer service/sales operations of more than 500 representatives, and 44.3% reported operating small-to-medium in-person service/sales. (See figure 5)

Participants’ roles and responsibilities in their organi-zations range broadly. Nearly half (46.2%) of respondents serve at the director/manager level. C- and V-level execu-tives represent nearly one fifth (18.2%) of respondents. (See figure 7) Respondents’ scope of management, as defined

by the number of direct reports, varied, but most (32.8%) manage between 1 and 10 employees while another 19% manage 11 to 20. (See figure 8)

A wide variety of indus-tries were evenly (for the most part) represented in the survey results; however, finance and insurance were most robustly represented. (See figure 9)

Slightly more than one quarter (26.1%) of orga-nizations represented are outsourcers that provide contact center, customer management, business pro-cess and other services.

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0% 5% 10% 15% 20% 25%

0% 3% 6% 9% 12% 15%

Figure 9: Industries/Markets Represented

Advertising/marketing/publishing/ media/entertainment

Computer or telecommunications manufacturing or software publishing

Computer or telecomm

Systems or network integrator

Telecommunication services

Manufacturing (Non-computer related)

Finance/banking

Insurance

Real estate

Legal

Government and military

Utilities

Healthcare/medical

College/university

Wholesaling or distribution

Retail (catalog)

Retail (online)

Retail (all other)

Transportation/Aviation/Aerospace

Outsourcer/Teleservices provider

Consulting/Training

Other business or professional services

Travel/Hospitality

Other

Figure 7: Survey Participants by Title/Role

0% 5% 10% 15% 20% 25%

0% 3% 6% 9% 12% 15%

CEO/Owner

VP/SVP

Chief Customer Officer

General Manager/Director

Director/Manager

Call Center Manager

Supervisor

Quality Assurance/ Quality Monitoring

Trainer

Workforce Manager

Workforce Management Team Member

Chief Technology Officer

IT Team Member

Marketing

Customer Support Representative

Customer Support Representative Team Lead

Vendor

Consultant

Association

Other

4.2%

7.0%

7.0%

5.6%

21.8%

16.2%

3.5%

2.8%

0.7%

0.7%

0.7%

0.7%

2.1%

5.6%

0.7%

2.1%

2.1%

6.3%

0.0%

9.9%

Figure 8: Number of Employees Respondents Directly Manage or Are Responsible For

0% 5% 10% 15% 20%

0% 5% 10% 15% 20% 25% 30% 35%

0%

5%

10%

15%

20%

25%

30%

35%

0 1-10 11-20 50-75 76-150 151- 251- 501- 1001- 5001+ 250 500 1000 5000

25.5%

32.8%

19.0%

10.9%

4.4%

1.5%2.9%

1.5% 0.7% 0.7%

4.2%

7.7%

1.4%

0.7%

6.3%

6.3%

14.1%

8.5%

0.7%

0.0%

4.9%

4.9%

5.6%

0.7%

3.5%

0.7%

2.8%

2.8%

2.1%

4.2%

2.1%

4.2%

0.7%

10.6%

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Figure 10: Most Popular Definition of Customer Experience

The sum of all experiences a customer has with a supplier of 39.6% goods or services, over the duration of their relationship with that supplier. From awareness, discovery, attraction, interaction, purchase, use, cultivation and advocacy. It can also be used to mean an individual experience over one transaction; the distinction is usually clear in context.

A customer experience is an interaction between an 35.3% organization and a customer as perceived through a customer’s conscious and subconscious mind. It is a blend of an organization’s rational performance, the senses stimulated and the emotions evoked and intuitively measured against customer expectations across all moments of contact.

The sum-totality of how customers engage with your company 16.5% and brand, not just in a snapshot in time, but throughout the entire arc of being a customer.

How customers perceive their interactions with your company. 6.5%

Other 2.2%NOTE: The customer experience definitions provided to survey respondents were taken from organizations and sources that are some of the most vocal regarding valuing and defining the customer experience, as well as those that simply populate the top tier of search results: (in order of survey rank) 1 Wikipedia; 2 Beyond Philosophy; 3 Harvard Business Review; 4 Forrester.

defining the Customer Experience

Much discussion has been devoted to defining the cus-tomer experience — yet there appears to be no major agree-ment. Survey respondents, when presented with four popular definitions of the term, reached no real majority con-sensus. (See figure 10) What does stand out is that most survey participants agreed that the definition of the customer experience should include all interactions with the organization, from both the lifetime and transactional per-spectives. And while there is not one runaway leader, 39.6% selected the following defini-tion as the most appropriate: The sum of all experiences a customer has with a supplier of goods or services, over the duration of their relationship with that supplier. From aware-ness, discovery, attraction, interaction, purchase, use, cultivation and advocacy. It can also be used to mean an individual experience over one transaction; the distinction is usually clear in context.

The customer experience includes products and ser-vices (as well as quality and support), customer service, usability, marketing and sales. Nearly all (92%) of the survey respondents identified the contact center as a common element in their organizations’ customer experience. (See figure 11)

More than three quarters (79.7%) of respondents said that the contact center is

Figure 11: Customer Experience Elements

0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 100%

0% 5% 10% 15% 20% 25% 30% 35% 40%

0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80%

Product service

Service support

Customer Service

Product quality/reliability

Ease of doing business

Pricing

Relevance of sales offers

Relevance of marketing offers

I don’t know

Other

68.8%

84.8%

92.0%

70.3%

81.2%

57.2%

47.8%

44.9%

0.0%

6.5%

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involved in defining the cus-tomer experience, along with the marketing department (63.8%) and the executive suite (60.9%). Nearly half (47.8%) said that the cus-tomer is not involved in this process (however, we can hope that customer involve-ment is slightly higher, at least indirectly, through the contact center as a proxy). (See figure 12)

Somewhat troubling is that, although 60.9% said the executive suite is involved in defining the organization’s customer experience, less than half (48.1%) have a mem-ber of the executive suite dedi-cated to focusing on customer experience and/or related programs. (See figure 13)

Integral to defining the cus-tomer experience is identifying when it begins and when it ends. Customer Management

Disconnect on Customer Experience Signals EvolutionWhile the majority of both individuals surveyed and the organizations they rep-resent believe the customer experience never ends, there’s a noticeable gap between the two (70.6% of individual respondents and 50.7% of the organiza-tions they represent said there’s no end to the customer experience).

“This shows an apparent divide between when a company thinks the customer experience ends, and when the respon-dents individually think it ends,” says LogMeIn’s John Purcell. “This suggests a potential misalignment. It’s not altogether surprising, though, since attitudes on the subject are evolving in the industry and there are often differences in opinion. Furthermore, there is often a time-lag between thought leadership, and opera-tional and organizational action.”

Figure 12: Personnel/Departments Involved in Defining the Organization’s Customer Experience

0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 100%

0% 5% 10% 15% 20% 25% 30% 35% 40%

0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80%

Executive suite

Marketing

Sales

R&D

Manufacturing

Service

Customer service/contact center

Information technology

Customers

Other

60.9%

63.8%

54.3%

18.8%

12.3%

52.2%

79.7%

34.1%

52.2%

16.7%

Figure 13: Teams with a Dedicated Member Focused on the Customer Experience and Customer Experience Programs

0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80%

0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80%

0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90%100%

Executive suite

Marketing

Sales

Service

Customer service/ contact center

Information technology

Yes

No

I don’t know

48.1%38.3%

13.5%

53.1%35.4%

11.5%

48.1%40.5%

11.5%

68.0%

25.0%7.0%

75.6%18.5%

5.9%

26.6%57.0%

16.4%

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IQ asked participants to share the starting and ending points by both corporate and individ-ual standards: Their answers yielded interesting differences between the two.

Respondents said that, from their organizations’ perspectives, the customer experience begins early on, either when the organization communicates with customers and prospects via marketing and promotional materials (45.7%) or when the customer first inquires about buying a product or service (29.7%). However, from the individual respondents’ perspectives, a clear majority (54%) believe the cycle begins when the organization communicates with customers and prospects via marketing and promotional materials. (See figure 14) A rare few respondents (less than 3%) reported that they and/or their companies believe the customer experience begins the moment a prospec-tive customer hears about the company, regardless of the means (e.g., they hear a friend or relative talking about the organization or its prod-ucts and services). The good news is that very few or none of our participants said their organizations make the mis-take of taking a “firefighting” approach, where they might wait to jump in until there’s an

Figure 14: When Does the Customer Experience Start? Customer Management Company Leader

When our organization communicates with 45.7% 54% customers and prospects via marketing and promotional materials

When the customer buys a product or service 7.2% 2.2% from us

When the customer first inquires about buying 29.7% 19.4% a product or service from us

When the customer walks into our store or 0.7% 0.7% brick-and-mortar location

When a customer interacts with our contact 10.1% 7.9% center or on-site agents or our website for general questions or support

When a customer complains to us about our 0.0% 0.7% products or services

issue with billing, payment, products or services, or a customer service complaint (either to the company or in a public forum, such as social media or news outlets). This means that they understand the holistic and ongoing nature of customer experi-ence, at least to some extent.

The gap between corporate and individual perspectives is even greater when we try to identify when the customer experience ends. While the majorities of both entities and

individuals believe that the customer experience never ends, that majority is greater for individual respondents (70.6%) than for the corpora-tions they represent (50.7%). The next-leading point of customer experience termi-nation is identified by both individuals and entities as when the customer notifies the organization that he/she would no longer like to deal with or be contacted by the company (15.4% and 27.2%, respectively). (See figure 15)

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designing the Customer Experience

Designing an effective customer experience — one that is meaningfully positive for both the customer and the organization — requires matching the customer’s needs and desires with what the organization can deliver.

Respondents reported the involvement of a variety of departments in the customer experience design. The con-tact center (64.5%), marketing (57.2%) and the executive suite (56.5%) are involved in customer experience design for the majority of organiza-tions represented, followed by the sales department (42%). Though not as heavily repre-sented, it is refreshing to see levels of involvement from quality assurance (34.1%), information technology (21.7%), workforce manage-ment (19.6%) and human resources (14.5%). (See figure 16)

But while corporate self-eval-uation can be accomplished, to some degree, in a vacuum, understanding what is impor-tant to the customer cannot. More than one quarter (25.9%) of survey respondents said their organizations either don’t know (12.6%) or are not sure of (13.3%) their customers’ cus-tomer experience priorities.

The most common methods for collecting information on customer priorities are cus-tomer satisfaction surveys (79.1%), feedback forms (53%), unsolicited complaints (51.5%) and unsolicited

Figure 15: When Does the Customer Experience End? Customer Management Company Leader

When the customer rejects our products or service 8.1% 2.9%

When the customer purchases our product or service 2.2% 1.5%

When the customer has not purchased a product 6.6% 3.7% or service from us over a given period of time

When the customer passively does not renew 6.6% 5.1% a contract

When the customer actively rejects a new contract 7.4% 4.4%

When our organization “fires” the customer 6.6% 2.9%

When the customer notifies us that he/she would 27.2% 15.4% no longer like to deal with or be contacted by our customer

Never 50.7% 70.6%

I don’t know 2.9% 0.0%

Figure 16: Personnel/Departments Involved in Designing the Customer Experience

0% 5 10% 15 20% 25 30% 35 40%

0% 5 10%1520%2530%3540%4550%5560%6570%0%

5

10%

15

20%

25

30%

35

40%

45

50%

55

60%

65

70%

75

80%

85

90%95

100%

Executive suite

Marketing

Sales

R&D

Manufacturing

Service

Customer service/contact center

Information technology

Customers

Other

56.5%

57.2%

42.0%

64.5%

21.7%

34.1%

19.6%

14.5%

3.6%

16.7%

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customer praise (43.3%). Primary research, such as customer focus groups, is the least-used (35.8%) method reported by respondents. (See sidebar Understanding and Aligning with Customer Priorities) Nearly one tenth (9.7%) reported that they do not know how information on customer priorities is col-lected. (See figure 17) Lack of such knowledge may be accounted for by the fact that not all respondents serve in functional roles in the organiza-tions represented; however, it is troubling that functional roles do not have at least a passing familiarity with how customer feedback around preferences and priorities is collected in that it possibly reveals a lack of organizationwide communica-tion on customer experience programs and strategies.

In those organizations that have identified customer expe-rience priorities within their industries, customer service (84.1%) and ease of doing business (74.6%) were the leading priorities, followed by service support (e.g., repairs and service calls) and product reliability/quality (with 62.3% and 52.9%, respectively). (See figure 18)

As a point of interest, con-sidering customers’ high priority for ease of doing busi-ness, although just 14.6% cur-rently employ customer effort scoring, 3.1% plan to employ it in 2013 and another 24.6% said their organizations are investigating it. (See figure 19)

Figure 17: How Customer Experience Priorities Information is Collected (for Organizations that Know Customer Priorities)

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On a positive note, 65.4% of respondents reported that their customer experience priorities always (17.6%) or frequently (47.8%) align with customer priorities. Still, a full 25% said that such alignment only sometimes (24.3%) or never (0.7%) exists.

As fundamental as knowing customer priorities is knowing whether customers are satis-fied. Although a strong 77.5% of respondents said their organizations do measure cus-tomer satisfaction, 22.5% said that their organizations don’t measure (19.6%) or that they don’t know if they measure it (2.9%).

delivering the Customer Experience

Once an organization has defined and designed its cus-tomer experience (or at least its current stage, as it should be an ongoing process, as we’ll see in the next section), effectively delivering on the brand promise is critical. At the end of the day, even an orga-nization with the most diversity in regard to teams involved in the process will likely have one division that “owns” the cus-tomer experience.

Who Owns Customer Experience?

In the best-case scenario, customer experience belongs to and is driven from the top (executive suite) down. (See sidebar The Customer Experience Buck Stops in the Contact Center?) Survey respondents reported owner-ship at high levels, such as a

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C-level dedicated customer service executive (18.2%), V-level dedicated customer service executive (10.2%), C-level marketing execu-tive (4.4%), V-level market-ing executive (2.2%). But in 16.1% of survey participants’

organizations, the customer experience belongs to the call center. (See figure 20) In theory, the contact center is an optimal owner because of the volume of contact that it has with customers and the customer feedback that it can

Figure 20: “Ownership” of the Customer Experience

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gather and process; however, in practice, the contact cen-ter often has very little control many elements in the broad spectrum of customer experience.

As an example of the breadth of the customer expe-rience spectrum, refer back to what the majority of respon-dents included as elements of their customer experience pro-grams in figure 11: customer service (92%), service support (84.8%), ease of doing busi-ness (81.2%), product quality/reliability (70.3%), product service (68.8%) and pricing (57.2%). Does the contact center have control over prod-uct quality/reliability? Pricing? Not likely; therefore, it cannot deliver the entirety of a brand promise that might involve those and other elements out-side its scope of control.

Furthermore, consider what phases are included in respon-dents’ customer experience processes:

Attraction — includes all of the customer touchpoints and interactions during initial sales and marketing activities

Interaction — includes all customer touchpoints and interactions during payment, service, and delivery

Customer Retention — includes all touchpoints and interactions after a purchase or transaction as part of loyalty, reward, and managing inbound and outbound communications that will occur in the future

Nurturing — includes reten-tion touchpoints and interac-tions and is based on customer

segmentation and analysis by past behavior and likelihood of future behavior

Note that while the great majority (84.7%) of respon-dents said their businesses include the interaction phase in their customer experience process, fewer (75.2%) include customer retention, and just 54% include nurturing. (See figure 21)

The Customer Experience Buck Stops in the Contact Center?Of note in our survey data was the response to the question “Who owns the customer experience in your organization?” In 16.1%, the contact center is the title holder. Dann Allen of AAA NCNU isn’t surprised.

“Customer experience ownership is typically a mixed bag. But in larger, more diverse companies, you’re more likely to see the call center as the owner because there are a lot of quick wins there,” Allen says. For example, when there is a combination of brick-and-mortar operations, call center and diverse and complex products, businesses can more quickly tackle improvements in quality within the contact center than they can in brick-and-mortar stores.

And contact centers are a frequent customer experience starting point for quick wins on cost savings. “The call center is the next biggest spend after infrastructure, so companies want to focus on driving cost down. And when you can provide a better customer experience, customers don’t have to call, and they naturally expect call center costs to go down. You can also see an uptick in net promoter scores and better quality scores.”

Some organizations roll out customer experience in the contact center then branch out from there. Allen gives an example from his former role at a telecom provider. “We set up the customer experience in the contact center because we knew it could make a difference quickly there. When we started offering pre-paid wireless services and products, we began our customer experience initiative in the contact center and then pushed it out to product design and usability.”

It’s important to remember that while the contact center is likely a good locus for the customer experience, the contact center can’t control the business, as Teleflora’s Amas Tenumah points out. “In the end, the contact center can’t be more responsible than the executive suite, and everybody has to take owner-ship. For us, most customer frustrations happen in the sales process early on and then progress to frustrations in the contact center. You have to apply customer experience throughout the organization.”

Does the contact center have control over prod uct quality/ reliability? Pricing? Not likely; therefore, it cannot deliver on a brand promise that might involve those and other elements outside its scope of control.

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Then look at how well sales and marketing are (or are not) communicating with the contact center. Nearly half (45.6%) rated commu-nications from the marketing department to the contact center as a 3 or below (on a five-point scale where 5 is the best rating for communica-tion). More than half (50.7%) rated communications from the sales division to the con-tact center as a 3 or below. (See figure 22)

Although the call center (and customer service) is the division most involved with executing on the customer experience, according to respondents (77.6%), market-ing (66.4%), sales (46.4%) and the executive suite (53.6%) are also high on the list. But manufacturing and R&D lag in responsibility here. (See figure 23)

Figure 21: Phases Counted in the Customer Experience Process

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Figure 22: Ratings for How Well the Organization Communicates Information about Campaigns to the Contact Center and On-Site Representatives Marketing Sales Division Division

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Figure 23: Personnel/Departments Involved in Executing the Customer Experience Design

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How Is Customer Experience Supported?

It’s safe to say that every member of the team has something to contribute to improving the delivery of the promised customer experi-ence — getting the right peo-ple involved at the right time, of course, is important. Sup-porting the personnel behind delivering on the brand prom-ise is an array of processes and products, technologies and services. (See figures 24 and 26)

Analytics tools, from the simple to the more complex, are being deployed to seg-ment customers, as well as contacts, by type, for the most appropriate routing and right-channeling. In fact, 44.4% of respondents said their orga-nizations are using segmen-tation to push special offers/services for top-tier and other customer segments. Nearly half (40.6%) are using cus-tomer segmentation to route top-tier and other customer segments to specific agent groups or service channels. And 61.4% use segmentation to route customer contacts by type to specific agent groups or specific channels.

Only 40% of organizations can say that their customer-facing technologies and pro-cesses are integrated across all channels and touchpoints. (See figure 25)

The good news is that where there are disconnects between those processes and technologies, 40.9% of respondents say they know

Figure 24: Processes used to Support Customer Experience Design

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Figure 25: Integration of Technologies and Processes across Channels and Touchpoints

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Figure 26: Product, Technologies and/or Services Used or Planned to Support the Customer Experience

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Figure 26: Product, Technologies and/or Services Used or Planned to Support the Customer Experience (continued from previous page)

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where that disconnect is. But our findings show that just 20.5% of the organizations represented have developed a plan or plans to remedy the disconnect. Unfortunately, only slightly more than one third of those organizations with reme-dial plans rate their confidence level in those plans as high as a 4 or 5 (on a 5-point scale where 5 equals the highest confidence).

The research indicates a growing adoption of new chan-nels for different customer ser-vice interactions with business. Take Facebook, for example: 81.7% of survey respondents said that they offer Facebook as a channel for customer inquiries and providing infor-mation. (See sidebar The Social Experience) Mobile self-service applications are offered for the same type of transactions at 87.8% of busi-nesses represented.

There’s a sharp difference, however, between the num-ber of organizations offering mobile self-service for inquiries and those that offer it for pur-chases (29.3%) and renewals (19.5%). (See figure 27)

The multi-channel environ-ment requires allowing the cus-tomer to access the company through the channel of their choice — right-channeling — as well as ensuring that the channel can meet the require-ments of the transaction type. (See sidebar Adopting New Channels)

Let’s say that an organiza-tion has conquered right-channeling and ensuring a

consistent and reliable experi-ence across multiple channels. Channels like email, chat, Web self-service and even social media have opened up a world of opportunity in

The Social ExperienceOur research showed that social media has a role that is certain, though var-ied, in the customer experience.

“The use of social media is becoming a hot topic,” says SPI Global’s Ian Zafra, “and businesses finding ways for a positive experience to go viral and to respond to negative sentiments as quickly as possible.”

At AAA, for example, social media is on the radar but the organization hasn’t taken an aggressive approach to piling onto the bandwagon, says Dann Allen. “We’ve experimented a little with social media — monitoring and some response, but our national organization is holding for the development of a broader strategy.”

For Teleflora, social media is a channel that certainly plays a role in the cus-tomer experience, says Amas Tenumah. “If somebody doesn’t get their flow-ers right on time, it’s likely to wind up on Twitter or Facebook,” he says. While it’s not a service channel, per se, like the phone or email — through which Teleflora takes orders and manages other customer transactions — social media is a voice of the customer channel. And it’s certainly a customer expe-rience opportunity when a customer expresses a complaint and Teleflora can identify a bad experience and begin to address it. But, adds Tenumah, “Social media patrons and evangelists tend to overstate the potential for change. It’s really going to be just another channel that needs to be incorpo-rated into the call center.”

A Closer Circle of Friends than Facebook and TwitterIt’s important to keep in mind that Facebook and Twitter, while they are the most popular and well-known social media channels, are not the be-all for customer management. For heavily regulated and restricted industries, for example, such as healthcare and finance, it is difficult to balance protecting customer information with the public forum of popular social media channels. Several businesses have pioneered closed communities, or user groups, whose members share common goals and challenges. Humana is building such communities and has seen success in connecting its members with each other — and with the organization, which deepens the opportunities for hearing the voice of the customer. But designing such communities that might feel more like the familiar and popular networks will likely have to focus on the value of the connection rather than the look and feel of the forum. “Just because Facebook can do it, that doesn’t mean that we can,” says Humana’s Erik Eaker. “And that’s important for everyone to remember when it comes to the customer experience in general.

deflecting the number of costly telephone transac-tions and the time it took to serve them. Email evens out the random arrival of work by stretching out the amount of

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Figure 27: Channels Offered by Touchpoint

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time the contact center has to respond to it. Chat allows an agent to serve multiple customers simultaneously — an agent can locate account information for one customer while another customer they’re serving looks through their wallet for their account

number. Web self-service (and to some extent, social media) takes costly simple and repetitive calls out of the contact center.

Such strides have led many to predict the death of the contact center, but that’s far from being the case. What

Adopting New Channels

The research indicates a growing adoption of new channels for different customer service interactions with business.

IntelliResponse’s Mike Hennessey says channels are not being exploited to their fullest capabilities or to realistic customer demand. “Businesses are under-estimating their customers’ comfort with and desire to use the consumer technology they use every day — smartphones, websites, Facebook, etc. — to get customer service information. Because of the Siri effect, customers are becoming accustomed to using technology to get information; they expect this from their customer service interactions. The iPhone has nine communication channels. Only one is the phone.”

But right-channeling isn’t just about allowing the cus-tomer to access the company through the channel of their choice. It’s also about ensuring that the channel can meet the requirements of the transaction type. “I think of ATMs [automated teller machines] as a sort of litmus test,” says Teleflora’s Amas Tenumah. When a customer uses an ATM, it’s very clear to the cus-tomer what types of transactions can be completed through the channel, and the channel performs those transactions consistently and reliably.

New Channels and the Contact CenterThe multi-channel environment and right-channeling forces a shift in the type of work the contact center is now responsible for and freed up to perform.

“With more and more interactions beginning online, the modern contact center must be able to track and integrate these interactions to truly right-channel the

customer experience,” say Mike Hennessy of Intel-liResponse. “With self-service taking care of more and more interactions, agent support must move from a “bums in seats” mentality to a “quality over quantity” mentality. Agents now must spend more time per interaction as the majority become more value-added in nature. So the agent profile must change: AHT actually goes up, but new metrics like customer effort score go up as well. Companies who get self-service right invariably make it easier for consumers to do business with them.”

Teleflora’s Amas Tenumah agrees: “Automation opens the need for emotional intelligence, which cre-ates complexity and requires empowered agents.”

And while businesses often see automation and non-agent-assisted channels as a direct boon to the bottom line, it would be a mistake to think that every dollar saved goes straight back to the coffers in one piece. “Self-service yields savings, but some of that should be invested into the customer experience and back into the agent pool,” says Tenumah, echoing Hennessy’s assertion that although self-service can help cut the number of agents required, cost savings will be diminished in the form of wages for a smaller number of agents that are commensurate with the new type of work that will be demanded of them. But there’s another reason not to start counting the money from self-serve savings yet, Tenumah says: “You should only expect to book about 10% of those savings and, after reinvesting in the customer experi-ence and agent pool, you need to put aside another 5% for driving customer adoption and accounting for customer rejection of these channels.”

actually happens is a shift in the type of work the contact center is now responsible for and freed up to perform.

Another type of disconnect that is evident is between how the organization believes it is performing against customer experience standards and

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how well that belief is informed by actual customer feedback.

Identifying customer experi-ence disconnects — whether they occur in the areas of peo-ple, process or technology — is the first step to design and

execution improvement. This inventory of defects must also be undertaken on an ongo-ing basis — calibrated and recalibrated, as it were, to make continuous adjustments and improvements. Revisit-

CAlIBRATINg ThE CUSTOmER ExpERIENCE

The Multi-Channel Experience

“Firms are really embracing the multi-channel cus-tomer engagement philosophy,” says LogMeIn’s John Purcell. “As we deal with a greater number of demographics than ever before, it will be criti-cal to engage with customers on the subjects they choose, over the channels they choose, and when they choose. Customer experience and customer engagement are, therefore, inextricably linked.”

Mike Hennessy at IntelliResponse takes multi-chan-nel a bit farther, calling them “omni-channel” interac-tions. And, he says, because customers have never been as powerful as they are now — or as con-nected to technology — business is going to have to meet their needs. “The customer desires the ability to self-serve at the first point of interaction (Web/mobile/social) and to escalate to live help when and how they want to.”

But with some 40% of our survey respondents saying that they don’t have true integration across chan-nels and touchpoints, driving a positive customer experience in the multi-channel environment will be a challenge for many. “This is probably the biggest headache we need to deal with in the industry,” says Purcell. “There are several systems on the market today that perform interesting tasks, but we need them to work together better. There is no ‘uber- system’ to manage customer experience, so we need all relevant systems to interoperate and share data far more effectively.”

Part of the integration puzzle, and a growing trend in customer management, is being able to truly marry the existing customer relationship management (CRM) data with a real, live flow of voice of the cus-tomer data, according to QuestBack’s Ivar Kroghrud.

“There is a definitive need for new technology that can help enterprises manage people data — think master data management for people data. That’s going to be absolutely essential and the only way to become a ‘real-time enterprise’,” he adds.

Purcell says that multi-channel engagement is simple today, with several very viable systems on the market that are simple to deploy and manage. “Many of these are truly SaaS-based, and come with all the benefits the cloud provides. The best systems allow flexibility with respect to defining channels and customer engagement groups, and allow the agents to focus on helping customers.”

Businesses still have to get the right customers connected with and through the best channels, matching customer preferences with needs for a given contact or transaction type and related circum-stances. “While we’re seeing an increasing commit-ment to online service,” says Hennessy, “we’ve got to right-channel the omni-channel customer. I think we’re seeing an increasing understanding of that need, which is positive.”

In addition to integrating channels and right- channeling customers for an improved customer experience — and resulting cost and/or revenue benefits — the best designs and deployments require business to have an accurate understand-ing of who their customers are and how they act, regardless of channel. “We always have to adapt our tools to our senior (55+) customers,” says Humana’s Erik Eaker. While seniors are a growing demographic in technology use, they may use these tools differently and have different expectations compared with younger users.

ing customer satisfaction surveys and feedback forms to ensure that new programs, processes and technologies are working as they should is a fundamental part of suc-cess. (Note that 43.6% of

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Figure 28: Use of Interval Workload Forecasting by Channel

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respondents said they have a formal process for tracking the impact of customer experience improvement initiatives on other processes and metrics, whether negative or positive.)

Think of it in terms of the relatively straightforward operation of workload and traffic forecasting. The work-force-heavy (and therefore cost-heavy) telephone channel is subject to interval workload forecasting in 68.4% of con-tact centers reported on in the survey. But while other chan-nels may not have the same high traffic loads, customers who use them expect a similar service level or service level

Processes for Sharing — and Fixing — Customer Experience Failures

Fewer than half of the respondents in our survey said their organizations have a formal process for track-ing and sharing customer experience failures and for planning remediation and improvement. Businesses that want to see customer experience success are going to have to do better on this front, and they can. In fact, based on these examples, it’s quite an intui-tive process.

AAA NCNU has developed a closed-loop complaint system that charts customer relationships, trans-actions and roadside service delivery by brand, channel and the contact center. Then they watch trends for complaints and detractors. “Structural and process issues are reviewed by a cross-functional team, and we brainstorm with the customer to solve the issue,” says Dann Allen. “There’s lots of internal communication, too. And, just as important, we make time to celebrate wins and to praise those involved, like our Member Experience Hero award, which has a $5,000 cash prize.”

Humana’s Customer Experience Center of Excel-lence focuses not only on designing the customer experience, but on making sure it’s working and

improving. The firm monitors customer satisfaction measurements on a monthly basis to capture the end-to-end experience and to look for improvement opportunities. For example, state law requires a monthly statement from the insurer to its members with information about member benefits — what’s been billed and what’s been paid. The monthly state-ment, required of all insurers, is often confusing to members. “It’s not a bill, but it looks like a bill, so they call us to ask questions — or complain,” says Erik Eaker. In tracking the frequency of those calls, the Humana team was able to see that the statements were creating a problem for both the customers and the contact center and begin to do something to cor-rect it. “We created a ‘smart statement’ that makes it clear why the member is receiving it and what — if anything — they should do with the information.” The formal process of reviewing and analyzing a com-mon customer experience failure yielded additional benefits, Eaker adds: “In sitting down to look at this, we also realized that we could make an even more personalized connection by including reminders for flu shots, mammograms and other important health-care events.”

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68.8%13.6%

17.6%

21.6%61.6%

16.8%

72.6%11.3%

16.1%

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equivalent for their channel of choice. (See figure 28)

Even where interval fore-casting occurs, only 33.3% of respondents said their contact centers break forecasting out by contact type, and just 29.1% said they do the same for customer segments.

Where it looks like customer management can be optimis-tic about improvements to the customer experience is in the fact that 51.9% of respon-dents said their organizations compare customer ratings/feedback across customer touchpoints. So, although the research identified that customers are not having a consistent experience across all customer touchpoints, at least a few organizations are beginning to take steps to understand where and why the inconsistency exists.

One of the chief principles of both improvement and continuous improvement — delivering on the customer experience brand promise and calibrating it — is ensuring that the organization establishes a formal process for sharing customer experience failures and for planning remediation and improvement: 38.8% have done so; 4.9% have not. (See sidebar Processes for Shar-ing — and Fixing — Customer Experience Failures)

Yet another point of opti-mism in the research data is that there is high involve-ment from a variety of inter-

nal departments (from the executive suite to the call center) as well as custom-ers in determining whether customer experience initia-tives have been successful. The contact center still bears a great load of responsibility, with 72.1% of respondents reporting its involvement, but it is joined here most closely by the executive suite (61.5%) and customers (51.6%). (See figure 29)

Figure 29: Departments/Personnel Involved in Determining If Customer Experience Initiatives Are Successful

0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80%

0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50%

Executive suite

Marketing

Sales

R&D

Manufacturing

Service

Customer service/contact center directors/managers

Quality assurance

Workforce management

Call center agents information specialists/onsite representatives

Customers

Information technology

51.9%Organizations that compare customer ratings/feedback across customer touchpoints

61.5%

50.8%

41.8%

10.7%

8.2%

41.0%

72.1%

39.3%

17.2%

42.6%

51.6%

12.3%

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CONClUSIONS

In summary, this research initiative reveals that aware-ness of the value of a strong and distinctive customer expe-rience is growing. However, it also reveals a concerning amount of unevenness in the

definition, design, delivery and calibration of the cus-tomer experience across participating organizations. The research also shows that there are entities that are emerging as strong perform-

Customer Experience SuccessThis research initiative reveals distinct awareness of the value placed on a strong and distinctive cus-tomer experience is growing. To overcome the evi-dent unevenness in the definition, design, delivery and calibration of the customer experience across participating organizations, our contributors offer their and their organizations’ perspectives on what it will take to succeed — and what pitfalls to avoid.

“Success in implementing customer experience programs and solutions should not just be rooted on the gathering and analysis of customer feedback or having a feedback mechanism, but on what/how/how quickly a business’s response is to each piece of feedback they gather,” says SPi Global’s Ian Zafra. “Customer experience isn’t just about listening and measuring; it’s also about — and more importantly connected to — engaging, which is the ‘full circle’ or closed loop on customer experience.”

AAA’s Dann Allen calls that emotional intelligence. “You have to have a vision. Ours is to create fanati-cally loyal lifetime members by delivering outstand-ing customer experience.”

Such feedback — along with solid research — will help you. Know your customer base and build your customer experience around it, which is a must for customer experience success, says Teleflora’s Amas Tenumah. He adds to Zafra’s position that every piece of data must have context. “One of our goals is to move from data to context, from output to outcome. To do that, you’ve got to ask yourself ‘What are you trying to solve for?’ and then get everyone in a room to solve the customer’s problem.” And to accomplish those tasks, you’ve got to know who

your organization is. Don’t just follow a competitor or another organization blindly: Know what you’re built to do and do it.

But once you’ve decided to undertake understand-ing their true customer preferences — and deliv-ering against them, you’ve got to commit, says IntelliResponse’s Mike Hennessy. For example, moving into an omni-channel world, the organiza-tion must absolutely commit to providing the ability for the customer to choose the time/place/channel for interaction. “Above all else, make it easy for the customer to do business with you.”

“If you get your internal focus right first,” says Erik Eaker of Humana, “that bleeds into your cus-tomer experience. Focus on what you want to be known for.”

LogMeIn’s John Purcell agrees. “Although we look for owners of the customer experience in the respondents’ companies, [the data shows] that there are several departments responsible. It’s extremely important that we recognize that there are several functional areas that contribute to customer experi-ence. If we start with raising awareness of that basic tenet, we put our organizations in a significantly stronger position to improve customer experience holistically.”

Indeed, says QuestBack’s Ivar Kroghrud, but those functional areas and the people who man-age them need a strong guiding presence. “A very important success factor is to have clear and strong top-level commitment and backing to give necessary ability to cut through internal issues and hurdles,” he says.

ers in the area of customer experience.

Based upon these find-ings, it is apparent that for an organization to successfully define, design, deliver and calibrate customer experience,

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it will need strong executive leadership that can coordinate cross-departmental collabora-tion and co-creation with its customers. Such leadership must be supported by strong divisional leadership that can understand the needs and goals of partner divisions and work seamlessly with them.

Executives and divisional teams will require close part-nerships with both internal and external technology partners to understand customer expe-rience best practices and to ensure that technology is truly enabling and enhancing the brand promise.

The customer experience age is still relatively nascent. Business cannot rely on fol-lowing its competitors; rather, each organization must determine what is important to its customers and to itself and where common priorities can be exploited for success.

Customer Experience Success

Pitfalls to AvoidPitfalls to rolling out and maintaining your customer experience? Humana’s Erik Eaker can rattle off a few easily.• Not focusing on the underlying infrastructure and focusing only on the first impression. IT, for example, is a critical area that demands consistency in availability and usability (think page load times, etc.);

• Failing to communicate within and without;

• Lacking proactive focus;

• Failing to maintain listening processes;

• Being unprepared.

Tagging onto Eaker’s last note, most companies often place action plans and strategies on customer experience without having a cam-paign or direction to start with. Companies need to “define” what expe-rience they want their customers to have before they start surveying or get feedback, says Ian Zafra of SPi Global.

As businesses shift their focus, it may be easy to get overwhelmed by the customer experience or to be bogged down in the big picture of customer experience performance. Tenumah says business must be careful there: “Forget about the overall customer experience score and focus on individual metrics and tactics. Let’s choose something to be great at, such as on-time delivery.”

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logmeIn

Five Steps to Improving the Customer Service Experience (whitepaper)

Five Tips for Improving Customer Experi-ence … Starting with the Support Desk (whitepaper)

InfoWorld custom research report — Service and Support as a Strategic Imperative (whitepaper)

intelliresponse

Achieving Excellence in Online Customer Service (whitepaper)

Online Self-Service (online quiz)

Death of the Contact Center (whitepaper)

Virtual Assistants Best Practices (interactive webpage)

Choosing the Right Cloud Contact Center Solution (whitepaper)

QuestBack

The Future of Employee Research (whitepaper)

The Path to Purchase (whitepaper)

Customer Experience in the Banking Sector (whitepaper)

Creating Winners (video)

Spi global

Journey to Process Excellence: The Need for a Quality Model — and How to Get Started (whitepaper)

Listen, Measure, and Engage Is Social Media part of your CRM strategy? (whitepaper)

How Social Media Can Negatively Impact Retention and What to Do About It (whitepaper)

KNOWlEdgE CENTER

The following resources are provided by our sponsors to assist in your planning, evaluation and decision making.

Page 30: CMIQ - 2013 Customer Experience Report

ABOUT OUR SpONSORS

IntelliResponse is the world’s leading provider of virtual agent technology solutions for the enterprise. We create profitable online conversations for our private and public sector customers around the world. IntelliResponse is a true multi-channel virtual agent solution, with customers deploying our EVA solution simultaneously across multiple customer engagement touchpoints including: the Web, social, mobile and agent channels. Our more than 360 live customer-facing implementations answer 100 million+ questions annually. www.intelliresponse.com

LogMeIn (Nasdaq:LOGM) provides essential cloud services to individuals, businesses, and IT organizations for remote access, collaboration, customer care, and remote IT management. These services are used by more than 15 million people to quickly, simply and securely connect over 150 million Internet-enabled devices across the globe — comput-ers, smartphones, iPad™ and Android™ tablets, and digital displays. LogMeIn is based in Woburn, Massachusetts, USA, with offices in Australia, Hungary, India, Japan, the Netherlands, and the UK. www.logmein.com

QuestBack is a global leader in enterprise feedback management, customer experience management, Social CRM, and market research solutions. The company’s SaaS-based feedback and dialogue solutions enable organizations to gain actionable insights and build stronger relationships with customers and employees. More than 5,000 global cus-tomers — including Volvo, Ernst & Young, Coca-Cola, Microsoft and Bosch - rely on QuestBack to increase customer and employee satisfaction through real-time feedback. Founded in 2000, QuestBack is headquartered in Oslo, Norway, and privately held with 19 offices worldwide. For more information, visit www.questback.com and Twitter | Facebook | Friends of Feedback Blog.

SPi Global is one of the world’s largest and most diversified Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) service providers in terms of clients, geographic presence, and capabilities. We have defined the highest standards of excellence together with our clients for Knowledge Process Outsourcing (KPO) and Customer Relationship Management (CRM). Our global team of over 18,000 dedicated BPO professionals makes this possible. www.spi-global.com

ABOUT CmIQ

Customer Management IQ, a division of IQPC, is a forum for sharing ideas, best practices and solutions within the business community. Simply put, you can interact and share solutions to your business problems with an incredible network of authoritative sources and practicing professionals.

Customer Management IQ enables you to find from your peers a method, a solution, a proven best practice that solves your specific problems when you need it solved. We offer a steady stream of front-line content that is timely, relevant, practical and has been validated by practitioners.

Customer Management IQ resources keep you at the forefront of industry change through educational con-ferences, training courses and expositions for Customer Management executives to network and learn the latest Customer Management developments and trends occurring in organizations today. Customer Man-agement IQ concentrates on creating an interactive experience featuring practical, objective and up-to-date insight from leading practitioners.

Annual events include: Call Center Week, Call Center Summit, Customer Experience Summit and the Big Data Business Forum.

www.customermanagementiq.com