We live in the period of options. Today there are more options for customers than at any point in history. For executives who understand today's business reality of customer options customer experience is an emergency, not an afterthought. However today this is predominantly not the case.
In fact most of us see examples of terrible customer experience every week. It's likely you've had the experience of calling your bank and being asked for your account number five times by five people. Let's hope they don't ask you for your secure pin or random security "word" you created three years ago. How about a company that doesn't provide support on
Not only do companies today need to exceed customer expectations but they need to make it easy for the customer to do business with the company. Technology can either make life much easier for the customer or much harder. Not having a seamless multi-channel experience is the equivalent of going to a DMV in 1940. Today's modern company is always one step ahead of the multichannel customer.
The companies that value customer experience go above and beyond to make themselves easily accessible to the customer on the customer's preferred channel. Your customers work hard in their daily lives. They have complicated family situations and jobs and a lot of balls they are perpetually juggling. Are you throwing another ball in the air for them?
Want a powerful customer experience? Simply ask yourself how easy you can make life easier for your customers.
The Customer Experience Board surveyed 97,000 customers and found that meeting and even exceeding customer expectations is not even enough. What impacts customer loyalty numbers is minimal customer effort. But today's companies aren't moving fast enough toward multichannel experiences that are very low effort for the customer.
A recent McKinsey customer experience survey of 27,000 US consumers across 44 industries found that companies that focus on providing a superior and low effort experience across their customer journeys – such as customer onboarding, account changes and problem resolution – realized positive business results, including a 10-15 percent increase in revenue growth and a 20 percent increase in customer satisfaction.
The less effort it takes for consumers to accomplish their goal when they contact you, the more loyal they become. The reality is all the tools are there for the executive team's use. The customer focused attitude is free. While the integration of your many tools might cost you some investment and time, creating seamless customer service pathways for the customer is absolutely critical. You can't afford to wait another day.
In a Customers 2020 report it was predicted that by 2020, customer experience will overtake price and product as the key brand differentiator so let's not wait til 2020. Why not start today?
For more customer strategy content follow Blake on Twitter @BlakeMichelleM.
