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1、Walker is a technology partner of Qualtrics,who contributed to this series.CX NOW:EIGHT THEMES DRIVING CX EVOLUTIONWhen boiling CX down to the essentials,to frameworks,what are the kinds of core pillars we should be focusing on?This is the question we asked ourselves,and eight essential themes emerg
2、ed:Then we asked more than 50 CX leaders,and although they differed in their ranking of importance they agreed that the eight are vital for a robust,effective CX program.Just as CX is interrelated with other departments in an organization,the eight concepts are interrelated with one another and with
3、 the rest of the company.They dont stand alone,and they arent mutually exclusive,but they represent the real core of what companies need to be thinking about and addressing and putting plans around because theyre not going anywhere.But the way we address them is always changing.As a result,what we w
4、anted to do with the CX Now series is to look forward to what we think CX needs to be doing to address these themes as we move to-ward 2030.These themes may change and adapt as they go along,but they are the things that organizations and CX leaders need to embrace over the next six to seven years.1.
5、Digital interactions 2.Personalization 3.Predictive 4.Employee enablement 5.Seamless 6.Data integration7.Adaptability 8.SDIGITAL INTERACTIONS:Achieving the ideal human/digital balance for serving your customers .4PERSONALIZATION:Designing and delivering a holistic experience,tailored for each custom
6、er .7PREDICTIVE ANALYTICS:Your data-driven crystal ball .11EMPLOYEE ENABLEMENT:Providing the necessary ingredients to deliver ideal customer experiences .14SEAMLESS EXPERIENCES:Delivering intentional,unified experiences for customers .18DATA INTEGRATION:Integration and accessibility of all customer
7、data sources to understand their needs and guide company actions .22ADAPTABILITY:The ability to quickly adjust to shifting environments and customer needs .26SPEED:Increasing operational efficiency to deliver experiences at the pace customers demand .30ABOUT WALKER .35THE CX LEADER PODCAST .36TABLE
8、OF CONTENTSCX NOW:EIGHT THEMES DRIVING CX EVOLUTION4Copyright 2023 Walker Information,Inc.All rights reserved.Achieving the ideal human/digital balance for serving your customersHow individuals interact with your digital properties your websites,mobile websites,mobile applications is what we call di
9、gital experience.The objective of any digital strategy is to create cus-tomer interactions that adjust and adapt to customer needs and intent in real time they serve up the right content to the right customers at the right time to ensure they can effectively achieve their objec-tives.This leads to t
10、he greatest benefit of the digital space:being able to detect when a user is stuck or having a challenging experience and being able to intervene in the moment.What is digital customer experience?DCX involves listening to and analyzing customer perceptions about their digital experiences,under-stand
11、ing where they are broken and what customers are trying to accomplish in order to improve the way those channels function.It also includes leveraging digital intercepts and this digital customer experi-ence model to serve personalized content.Were engaging with the individual in real time.Were engag
12、ing with the user while theyre performing the actions that they came to get done.We have to be very careful in balancing our interest to generate insights with the user experience that the individual came to get done.We learn a lot about customers while they are inter-acting with our digital propert
13、ies.Zero party data is user-supplied data.Its basically a request that the individual is making.Its the data associated with that individual that they are freely offering to the business because theyre searching for a resolution or an outcome that they came to get done.The tradeoff is“You give us th
14、e information and we give you a better experience.”A changed worldIt doesnt take a rocket scientist to see or understand that the pandemic changed the world and really accelerated the digital transformation.Overnight,we learned how to work remotely through digital channels.We learned how to buy our
15、grocer-ies online.We learned how to do yoga courses.All of DIGITAL INTERACTIONSThree metrics have emerged as the primary Key Performance Indicators for digital interactions.SUCCESSEFFORTEMOTIONWas the customer able to accomplish what they came to do?How easy or difficult was it to accomplish their t
16、ask?How did it make them feel?DIGITAL KPIsthe things that we were doing in person before the pandemic now had a digital spin.Its something that is here and its not going away.Recent studies from the XM Institute indicate that people do not expect to do any less of what theyre doing online than they
17、are today.They actually expect in the future to be doing even more online.We call this digital momentum,and it ultimately is the idea that not only are we going to be doing stuff online,but were going to be doing more stuff online in the future.How to get that digital momentum going?You have to star
18、t with an objective in mind.What are you seeking to solve for?That answer is going to be different depending on who you speak to within the organization.Seek out your key users,think about how they understand the business,and talk to them in their language.You might talk to an IT director who just w
19、ants to understand what customers think about their page load speed so they know whether to budget more for server space.You might talk to a marketer who wants to know which buttons are actually creating enhanced calls to action.Working with a number of stakeholders at the organization will help you
20、 get a clear understanding of all the things you could learn through digital listening.And then whats the path to make that happen?At Walker,we use a three-phased approach.We typical-ly start with a“track and diagnose”phase where we stand up some intercepts on your website and de-termine the most co
21、mmon or problematic journeys.We essentially identify what we need to fix within this digital property.Then we pivot to something called a journey-based deep dive.Now that we understand which are the common and problematic journeys,how do we fix them?We send out very targeted,specific,quick-hit surve
22、ys with two to five questions to identify the action steps and how we actually go about fixing a certain digital journey.For example:Why did you abandon your cart?What was most difficult about signing up for our newsletter?CX NOW:EIGHT THEMES DRIVING CX EVOLUTION6Copyright 2023 Walker Information,In
23、c.All rights reserved.Listen Now at: WalkerChairman&CEOWalkerElliott MoranVice PresidentWalkerFinding the right balance of digital versus human interactions to provide the best possible experi-ence.Host Steve Walker welcomes Elliott Moran,vice president in our client services at Walker,for a discuss
24、ion on how digital interactions are driving CX evolution.Since the digital experience is monitored in real time,negative experiences can be stopped in their tracks.For example,we can look at dwell time and trigger an intercept after someones been looking for a long time at how to go about solving th
25、eir issue.And we can serve a piece of content that says,“Do you need more help?”Were taking an inferred signal to help support that experience in real time.That can be done in any number of different ways:product,prod-uct delivery,or service and support delivery.The third phase as an organization ma
26、tures is to move into what we call the activate and transform phase.Were already delivering the information we gather through our listening posts to our dev teams to improve the experience itself.But how can we take that a step deeper by integrating some of this zero-party data and actually help?Thi
27、s is where we start thinking about how to personalize this experi-ence and serve content that gets them to a service channel,support channel,a different kind of product,or a recommender.Its about creating a multi-path set of interactions that guides customers to where both parties(the customer and t
28、he company)want the journey to go.It really is the next step in the final evolution of the digital customer experience journey.ROI of digital interactions Self service is key to cost reduction,and digital chan-nels are oftentimes highly optimized for it.So we can leverage listening posts to understa
29、nd what people want self-service for and build experiences and jour-neys to match that.Also,optimizing based on zero-party data helps web-site visitors move further down the conversion funnel to purchase your products.Conclusion The value of digital customer experience listening is that it allows us
30、 to capture massive sums of data while the interaction is happening.Youre not just asking how a transaction went.You also have all of the connected information,the oper-ational data thats occurring in real time.This allows us to connect this information across the enterprise and personalize the expe
31、rience,creating those pos-itive and emotive experiences that produce loyalty outcomes and ultimately drive revenue and business objectives as well.6Copyright 2023 Walker Information,Inc.All rights Its been said that the best gifts are those made especially for you.This bit of wisdom is excellent adv
32、ice for todays leaders of experience manage-ment.Customers are tired of being treated as one of a mass of consumers,and companies that treat all their customers the same are losing out to the those who have developed methods to make experiences more personal.In 2013 Walker published Customers 2020,a
33、 re-search report that identified emerging trends for customer experience(CX)leaders.Personalization was at the top of the list.The year 2020 has come and gone,but personalization remains a top priority for CX leaders and the companies they serve.What do we mean by personalization?When you hear the
34、word personalization,its easy to gravitate toward examples designed to sell addition-al products.We have all experienced online shop-ping where were presented with similar products to the one we viewed,or a social media feed that features advertising based on our activity.While marketing has become
35、the most common way to personalize the customer experience,many companies are realizing that personalization is much broader.This introduces some really exciting possi-bilities.In fact,the most innovative companies have intentionally considered ways to personalize prod-ucts,service,availability,and
36、many other aspects of their business.Three levels of personalizationA framework for personalization may help dig deep-er on this topic.Consider three levels of experience personalization reactive,customer-selected,and proactive.Reactive personalizationIf a company has not done so already,they should
37、 be sure to implement a reactive method of person-alization.Reactive personalization means that you establish mechanisms for listening to customers to better understand where they have issues or com-plaints so that you can fix their issues or provide the experience they want.While its not ideal to p
38、rovide non-personalized experiences,at least you can Designing and delivering a holistic experience,tailored for each customerPERSONALIZATIONCX NOW:EIGHT THEMES DRIVING CX EVOLUTION8Copyright 2023 Walker Information,Inc.All rights reserved.respond to customer needs and issues in a personal manner.Wh
39、ats more,its important to collect learn-ings from these interactions to design better experi-ences in the future.Even at this level of personalization,the ability to re-spond using all the right contextual information about the customers enables you to provide targeted out-reach.That means ensuring
40、you are capturing all the relevant signals about your users in a single profile.This also enables you to create rich segments based on shared characteristics.Specific steps include:Make sure you have a way to segment those customers and look at their responses by seg-ment.Go beyond basic segmentatio
41、n to bring in rich signals on demographics,transactional data,and experiential data to identify meaningful segments.This allows you to get line of sight to whether an opportunity in the experience jour-ney is affecting all customers or just a specific segment.When you segment,you will want to do so
42、with a goal of being able to group customers into distinct cohorts based on unique needs,gaps,and opportunities.Make sure you are looking beyond the opportu-nities to fix.When creating a personalized expe-rience it is just as important,or more important,to understand what the customer liked about th
43、e interaction.This allows you to better understand their preferences and deliver them consistently.The pet food retailer Chewy provides a great ex-ample of reactive personalization that goes beyond fixing a problem.For a segment of their customers,they noticed their reason for canceling a subscripti
44、on was because their pet recently passed away.Their contact center employees were then trained on how to respond with empathy and had mechanisms not only to efficiently cancel their subscription and refund charges for unused food,but also to send flowers with a note of condolence.Customer-selected p
45、ersonalizationThe next level of personalization occurs when com-panies provide a variety of options so that customers can select what works best for them.The COVID-19 pandemic sparked incredible innovation as grocery stores,restaurants,and retail outlets offered expand-ed services for ordering,picku
46、p,delivery,and safe on-site shopping.Companies can take advantage of the learnings from the reactive stage to create the options or paths that customers are asking for.At this level of personaliza-tion,the customer is presented with all the options and can choose their own path.We must continue moni
47、toring behaviors and feedback to ensure we continue offering the choices or paths customers desire as needs and markets change.This can be a good level of personalization for both customers and the company,but as the number and complexity of paths increase,it becomes difficult for customers to under
48、stand and choose the right path.As we listen to customers and capture how custom-ers choose to move through their digital interaction,we can use these insights to advance to the next level where we know the path that will work best for each customer.Proactive personalizationThe third level of experi
49、ence personalization is proactive personalization.This is where our systems understand what experiences meet a specific cus-tomers needs and then deliver the ideal experience at the right time.Once you reach the level of proac-tive personalization,the approach can begin to shift from just offering a
50、 set of paths to instead offering the best path that delivers the optimal outcome based on things we know about the customer and their previous behaviors.For instance,feedback from a new customer at a bank could reveal specific interests such as buying a home,saving for college,or planning a renovat
51、ion.This information can pro-vide opportunities to design personalized plans for individual customers.Proactive personalization can also identify less-than-ideal experiences and intervene to produce a good outcome for the customer.For example,when a customer orders food through a drive-thru but is r
52、e-quired to park and wait for their order,a gift card may be provided with an apology.Or consider an airline customer missing their connecting flight because of a delay.The right systems can automatically book them on the next flight out and authorize a flight attendant to offer extra points on thei
53、r frequent flyer account.Proactive personalization can also identify interac-tions where the objective facts of what is happening signals the experience is going down a poor path and set in motion workflows to proactively intervene to be a step ahead of a potential problem.Pharma-cies that issue not
54、ifications when a patient is about to run out of their medication is just one example.The purest form of proactive personalization is when a company identifies patterns based on custom-er issues and recovers before a customer is even aware.For instance,a bank observes an odd string of credit card ch
55、arges and proactively reaches out to see if the charges are legitimate.Or a contact center identifies a quality issue based on call volume and proactively contacts customers to let them know the situation others have experienced and asks,“Are you having the same issue?”Emotional ConnectionsThe most
56、personalized experiences evoke a positive emotional connection between the customer and the company they work with.They sense the com-pany cares about them and that can make a big difference in whether they return for more business and recommend the company to their friends or colleagues.Companies t
57、hat achieve proactive personalization are better able to check all the boxes:They evoke positive emotions from customers who feel known and understood because the company has made it easy to interact in a way where they have success in meeting their goals for the interaction.Whats more,they capture
58、signals related to sentiment,effort,emotion,and intent that can reveal low satisfaction and high frustration,triggering the need for personal-ized outreach.This doesnt happen on its own.Companies need to establish the right culture,and employees need to be engaged and empowered to care about the cus
59、tomers they serve and deliver experiences that make an emotional connection.Technology accelerates personalizationWhile the benefits of personalization may be clear,few companies can deliver on such a promise due CX NOW:EIGHT THEMES DRIVING CX EVOLUTION10Copyright 2023 Walker Information,Inc.All rig
60、hts reserved.Listen Now at: WalkerChairman&CEOWalkerSaari GardnerVice PresidentWalkerDesigning ways to personalize the customer expe-rience is essential.Host Steve Walker welcomes Saari Gardner,vice president of client services at Walker for a discussion on ways companies can take their personalizat
61、ion efforts to the next level.to the number of customers and complexity of their operations.To deliver personalization at scale,it is essential to use technology to facilitate a companys ability to capture and process customer data so they can proactively deliver ideal experiences.A leading example
62、of such technology is provided by our partners at Qualtrics.Their latest platform features a system to capture and store experience data from surveys,social media,reviews,and other sources to provide a 360-degree view of a custom-ers experience.This approach allows companies to build in-depth profil
63、es of customers which is the foundation for making experiences more rich,more personal,and more meaningful.Effectively leveraging a technology platform en-ables an organization to do more than respond to sub-standard experiences or even alert customers to problem situations.It strives to provide nex
64、t-best-action recommendations.In other words,the system facilitates the consideration of various actions that can be taken for a specific customer and identifies the best one delivering a more personalized experience.Where should CX leaders get started in personalizing customer experiences?CX leader
65、s can be the champion for casting a vision for a personalized customer experience across their organization.They have a unique perspective and are deeply entrenched in understanding whats working or not working for customers.Here are a few ways to get started.First,think beyond marketing.Personalizi
66、ng the experience is much more than just offering rec-ommendations on more purchases to make.Take the entire customer journey into account when considering personalization.Next,seek emotional connections.Consider how customers are feeling throughout the customer journey and identify touchpoints wher
67、e true emo-tional connections can be made.Finally,promote personalization.CX leaders can tell customer stories that shine a light on the difference that personalization can make.Whats more,need to make sure their colleagues have the tools and insight needed to deliver personal-ized experiences in th
68、eir work every day.10Copyright 2023 Walker Information,Inc.All rights Wouldnt it be awesome if we had a crystal ball to look into the future and know what we need to do to be successful?Well,its not magic,but customer experience leaders do have some pretty cool tools to do some“fortune telling.”What
69、 is predictive analytics?The foundation of predictive analytics has been around since the late 2000s in the form of data min-ing.Now,Artificial Intelligence(AI),machine learning,and prescriptive analytics have taken over.At the root of it,all these topics are focused on the same thing:How do we make
70、 use of our abundance of data to understand either the future or what we dont currently know about customers?In CX,predictive analytics is the process of using data to help utilize current and historical information to estimate a probability that customers will either behave in a certain way or that
71、 they will hold a spe-cific opinion about your company.The value of predictive analytics As we all know,only a small percentage of custom-ers provide feedback through solicited sources like surveys.Mature CX organizations should be further supplementing survey feedback with customer emo-tions,effort
72、 and intent data from unstructured and unsolicited sources like social,chat,support calls,etc.But all these sources will still cover a minority of your customer base,so what are the majority of your customers thinking and feeling?We tend to think predictive analytics is always about the future,but a
73、 lot of times its about filling in missing data.So,for the majority of customers who didnt tell us what they think about their support experience or about the product,how can we use data about the minority we do hear from to project out to the ma-jority?Where are the groups that we should get in tou
74、ch with because they might have very negative perceptions about something?Thinking about it that way can be a big boon for a program and a way to provide extra value.Your data-driven crystal ballPREDICTIVE ANALYTICS“Humans are obsessed with predicting the future and we are absolutely horrible at it.
75、”Troy Powell,Ph.D.CX NOW:EIGHT THEMES DRIVING CX EVOLUTION12Copyright 2023 Walker Information,Inc.All rights reserved.Profiling customers and projecting the missing data across them can also inform proactive business activities.For customer support,analyzing transac-tion surveys can help predict oth
76、er customers who might have the same problem and then proactively go out to them.Also,iterating on interventions used with customers and their outcomes turns into a“next best action”model,where possible actions an agent could take with a customer are automatically con-sidered and the one most likely
77、 to be successful is suggested to the agent.Another popular application of predictive analytics is in cross-selling or promoting new products to exist-ing customers.You have data on your customers that nobody can touch.By analyzing who has already bought the product,what those customers liked about
78、it,and the value they found in the product,you can provide your sales and account management teams with a rank-ordered list of their customers based on propensities to purchase the product.Certain behaviors can give clues as to how likely customers are to renew.For example,one company might find tha
79、t decreased product use three months before renewal is an indicator that the customer is likely to leave.Alerts can be set up to warn when product usage drops off so account reps can follow up.As a CX professional,you can bring a huge informa-tion advantage to your sales leadership.Predictive analyt
80、ics can help to make decisions faster,to make them more accurate,or to make them apply to more customers.How can you get started with predictive analytics?Start by thinking about what you want predictive ana-lytics to do for you.What questions do you want it to answer?What decisions do you want to i
81、mprove?Ask department leaders:“If you could predict one thing about what the customer is going to do or think,what would that be?”And then dig deeper:What usually leads to positive or negative behavior for their customers?You can start by finding some big things that keep coming up and predicting se
82、n-timent with your customers.Zooming in on 10 or 20 metrics that lead to predictable behavior is a great Continually have these discussions:Where are leaders being asked to make continu-al decisions over and over?How are those decisions managed?What systems are in place?Where are they not feeling gr
83、eat about that decision,not feeling as confident as maybe they would like to?What information are they missing that would help to make a decision?Where does data currently reside,and how can we get it?Then you can work to create that data or create predictions.To be able to make predictions,you need
84、 data.How-ever,you dont need ALL the data to get started.You dont need access to every metric in your service cloud instance to predict whether somebodys happy with a service event.Ask a small set of your best service employees for the internal metrics that drive service satisfaction.Then gather a d
85、ataset of those metrics for modeling.While you may miss a few contributing factors,in our experience,you will get a very useful model and wont spend months trying to acquire a comprehensive dataset.In other words,dont let analysis paralysis keep you from improving the experience!Avoiding pitfalls It
86、s important not to fall into the trap of thinking predictive analytics or AI is a kind of a push-button magic solution.Simply throwing data together and running an algorithm isnt going to lay out a magi-cal path to success.Analysis is only as good as the questions you ask,the data you have,and how y
87、our results will be used.Also,dont start with what you want the prediction to be!Let conclusions arise from the data.When approached with discipline,predictive analyt-ics is a great tool for anticipating customers needs and actions and taking your customer experience to the next level.You still may
88、not have a crystal ball to see the future,but you might get a little closer.Listen Now at: WalkerChairman&CEOWalkerTroy Powell,Ph.D.Vice PresidentWalkerHost Steve Walker welcomes Dr.Troy Powell for a discussion on how companies can use their cus-tomer data to perform predictive analysis using A.I.,n
89、atural language processing,and other tools to anticipate customer needs and CX NOW:EIGHT THEMES DRIVING CX EVOLUTION14Copyright 2023 Walker Information,Inc.All rights reserved.Providing the necessary ingredients to deliver ideal customer experiencesEMPLOYEE ENABLEMENTIt may be a broad generalization
90、,but its probably fair to say that most employees want to do a good job.This is particularly true if they are hired to regularly interact with customers.Typically someone in such a role likes to interact with people and wants to help.They enjoy solving customer problems and they want to help them su
91、cceed.And yet,if you are a cus-tomer experience(CX)leader,the leader of a contact center,or anyone who has a hand in customer rela-tionships you can likely cite a number of obstacles that make it difficult for frontline employees to feel fully enabled to do their best work.And of course,if they dont
92、 feel good about their work,you can be sure the customers they serve are not receiving an ideal experience.Thats why we chose this topic as one of the themes driving CX evolution.We know that happy,engaged employees will be more attentive to customer needs,care more about how customers feel,and will
93、 go above and beyond to deliver exceptional customer experiences.And CX leaders realize that if they want customers to have a great experience it starts with their employees.What do we mean by employee enablement?Employee enablement is about providing the train-ing,the resources,and the systems nece
94、ssary for employees to deliver ideal customer experiences.Employees have limited visibility to really under-standing how customers feel about their experience,so they need to be equipped with the information and support to understand each customers journey,interactions,and attitudes to be able to ef
95、fectively meet and exceed expectations.While this topic could be applied to all employees in every company,this article will focus on frontline employees the people who interact with customers every single day.And the best application for this is the corporate frontline contact center profession-als
96、,account managers,customer success managers,and others who manage ongoing relationships and are the first to be involved when customers have a question or Overcoming key obstacles to employee enablement The list of obstacles on this the topic could be ex-haustive.To make this a little more manageabl
97、e,well narrow the obstacles to three broad categories training,resources,and systems.These three areas represent the most challenging obstacles but also present the greatest opportunities for companies to excel and differentiate themselves from competitors by delivering a significantly better experi
98、ence.TrainingWhen new employees are hired,their manager wants to get them onboarded quickly so they can be productive as fast as possible.Naturally,this makes sense.Companies want their employees at full speed closing deals,taking calls,addressing issues.And yet,it becomes counterproductive if they
99、are not adequately informed about the needs of their customers.Of course,before training even begins companies must find the right candidates.That alone is a signif-icant challenge.In todays environment its difficult to find the right people to fill critical customer-facing roles.Once they are disco
100、vered,its tempting to get them up and running as fast as possible with a pre-sumption that theyll figure things out along the way.And they likely will.But how many customer experi-ences have been sacrificed along the way?Whats more,how many employees become distraught in their role and decide there
101、just may be better op-tions that they should consider?Companies also must be mindful of how they mea-sure the performance of their customer-facing employees.Most companies are highly focused on internal metrics such as closed deals,renewals,up-sell,and the time it takes to handle a customer call.Whi
102、le all are important metrics to track,surprisingly few are focused on measuring how customers feel.For example,a recent study showed that customer satisfaction ranked fifth on a list of the most common-ly measured performance metrics in contact centers.It was outranked by these internally-focused me
103、t-rics:average handling time,adherence to process,accuracy/error rate,and volume of calls and emails.Whats more,metrics on issue resolution and hold time(both important topics to customers)were 10th and 12th on the list.Again,all metrics are important,but too often the metrics that matter the most t
104、o cus-tomers are easily overlooked.Companies that truly see their people as their com-petitive advantage will provide the investment of time and resources for training and carefully consid-er the metrics they use to evaluate the performance of their frontline employees.Resources Many organizations d
105、o not dedicate the necessary resources to meet customer expectations.Simply reach out to a contact center to experience this being stuck on hold and slow chat responses are all too common.Customers expect(or should expect)CX NOW:EIGHT THEMES DRIVING CX EVOLUTION16Copyright 2023 Walker Information,In
106、c.All rights reserved.that they can easily get help.Instead it can be a pain-ful,inefficient experience.It goes beyond the contact center.Account managers and customer success managers are often spread too thin but are still ex-pected to be one of the key ingredients to delivering an exceptional cus
107、tomer experiences.Many companies have addressed this by opening up a variety of channels for communication with a companys front line.Online options,chatbots,online communities,and social media are all being leveraged to provide more options for customers.Top organizations recognize that customers s
108、eek a balance of human and digital options and track their interactions to determine their preferences and deliv-er personalized experiences.Whats more,the most innovative companies dont just look at frontline employees from the cost side of the financial equation.Instead,they have joined a growing
109、trend of companies making more use of rich customer insights delivered through frontline employees to produce revenue,improve quality,and accelerate innovation.Closed-loop feedback programs help account managers and customer success managers salvage at-risk customers and reveal potential upsell oppo
110、rtunities.Sophisticated tools(discussed in the next section)can interpret call center transcripts and other unstructured data to uncover product quality issues and innovative new solutions.Systems While all of us have been customers in many differ-ent ways,few have been on the other side fielding ca
111、lls,responding to requests,and addressing prob-lems.This makes it difficult to understand the myriad of systems behind the scenes intended to help track customer information and help provide a seamless customer experience.Unfortunately,these systems are often the source of frustration for frontline
112、em-ployees and can cause the customer experience to feel disjointed.Frontline employees often must deal with multiple applications to get the information they need.To make matters worse,these systems dont always talk to each other.For employees,its frustrating.For customers,it takes longer than nece
113、ssary to get the answers they need.Ultimately,companies must strive to make it easy for their frontline employees to quickly locate informa-tion and efficiently respond.We owe it to them and to our customers.Fortunately,technology is quickly advancing to meet this need.Many companies are developing
114、end-to-end systems that can not only manage large volumes of customer data but also help customer-facing employees deliver personal-ized experiences based on customer preference.This not only provides a better experience for customers,but also eases operational overhead and provides a more consisten
115、t experience for frontline Among those companies is our partner in develop-ing this series of articles.Qualtrics leading platform is a unified system for all customer data.It monitors customer journeys to identify experience gaps and guide employees on the right actions to take.Effectively leveragin
116、g the right system enables em-ployees to do more than simply respond to customer issues.It makes things easier and that makes for more engaged employees who deliver great cus-tomer experiences.Where should CX leaders get started in employee enablement?CX leaders need to ensure that employees have th
117、e necessary training,resources,and systems to deliver ideal customer experiences.Here are a few ways to get started.Listen to the frontline.Employees on the front-line know whats going on.Theyre connected to customers every day and have an excellent perspective on whats working and whats not.Having
118、methods,whether formal or informal,for listening to the thoughts,opinions,and sugges-tions of frontline employees can go a long way to building an ongoing employee listening program that captures structured and unstructured feed-back all aimed at delivering the best possible experience for customers
119、.Get involved in training.CX leaders need to carefully consider how employees are trained to serve customers.They should ensure enough time is spent to understand the perspective of customers and the best way they can deliver value.Determine the right metrics.CX leaders should assess the metrics tha
120、t are used to measure the performance of frontline employees.Specifically,they need to ensure that customer-focused met-rics are prioritized and are aligned with internal-ly-focused measures.They can take it to the next level by benchmarking against similar organiza-tions to see how you stack up.Mak
121、e it easy.Finally,CX leaders should be an advocate for frontline employees to make is as easy as possible for them to access the right customer information and know the best steps to take to meet and exceed customer expectations.Listen Now at: WalkerChairman&CEOWalkerGeorgetta Parisi,Ph.D.Vice Presi
122、dentWalkerProviding the tools and resources for employee success seems like a“no-brainer,”but companies often overlook the systems and processes that can create friction in the customer experience.Host Steve Walker welcomes expert Georgetta Parisi,Ph.D.,for a discussion on employee CX NOW:EIGHT THEM
123、ES DRIVING CX EVOLUTION18Copyright 2023 Walker Information,Inc.All rights reserved.Delivering intentional,unified experiences for customersSEAMLESS EXPERIENCES“All our operators are busy;please hold for the next available agent.”These words are sometimes just the beginning of a long and frustrating
124、experience.Sometimes it leads to other painful comments such as“Please hold while I check with my supervisor,”or“Ill transfer you to that department.”And too often,after transferring you may be asked for information that you already provided.We have all experienced disjointed customer expe-riences,w
125、hether they have been on the phone,in person,or online.They involve extra steps,handoffs,and transitions that take too long,require too much effort,and result in frustration.Because of the negative impact such experiences can have on an organizations brand and reputation,its clear that creating seam
126、less experiences for cus-tomers is more important than ever,which is why we consider this topic to be one of the themes driving the evolution of CX.What do we mean by seamless experiences?Seamless experiences occur when an organization makes everything as easy,efficient,and relevant as possible for
127、their customers.This includes minimizing the steps necessary to do business so the custom-er journey is a unified experience aligned with the expectations of the customer.Every organization has valid business reasons why handoffs and transitions occur.However,customers want to accomplish tasks and g
128、et answers to their questions as quickly and easily as possible.They arent concerned with the internal operations that make that happen.To meet todays rising expec-tations,organizations must put themselves in the shoes of the customer to make their experiences as seamless as possible regardless of h
129、ow they interact with the organization.Customers seek a consistent experience whether they buy online and return in the store,browse online and purchase through a con-tact,or research online,but call to resolve an Accomplishing this requires a clear vision of the ideal customer journey,engaged emplo
130、yees who are committed to delivering it,and the tools and process-es to listen,monitor,measure,and understand every detail of the entire customer experience.Understanding the customer journeyThe first step in designing seamless experiences is to truly understand the current journey customers take in
131、 working with your organization.This involves mapping out the customers journey,documenting all relevant touchpoints,and highlighting the key“mo-ments of truth,”or significant interactions that matter most.Journey mapping programs involve cross-functional groups from within the organization to accur
132、ately document each interaction with the customer.By having representation from various departments,those involved learn and share with one another to gain a solid understanding of what customers need and what they expect.Typically,these projects will result in a flurry of“ah-ha!”moments,identifying
133、 things that need to be fixed immediately as well as igniting ideas for completely reimagining a more intentional and unified experience for customers.Journey mapping projects serve as the foundational first step by giving a big-picture view of the overall experience,which is essential in determinin
134、g ways to make each experience more seamless.Envisioning the ideal journey If journey mapping can be considered the“what,”then the next step must be the“how.”While journey mapping is a valuable first step,its essential that an effective process follows to activate everything that was learned.Service
135、 blueprinting is a common method used to take all those insights and consider how to inten-tionally design a better experience for customers.It seeks to take everything into consideration the right people,systems,technology,policies,and training all to work together in a way that follows the custome
136、r through the end-to-end journey and ensures the best possible experience.Its important to mention that service blueprinting and similar methods are deliberately aspirational.While experiences may never be perfect for every customer every time in every situation,it is important to set aside how thin
137、gs have been done in the past to consider an ideal future state.It is an“outside-in”approach to deliver an experience that is defined by your customers rather than the functional groups within your company.The result of a service blueprinting program is a col-lection of redesigned processes that are
138、 intentionally developed with the perspective of the customer in mind.CX NOW:EIGHT THEMES DRIVING CX EVOLUTION20Copyright 2023 Walker Information,Inc.All rights reserved.Developing a culture focused on easeAny new process or workflow requires buy-in,train-ing,and resources within the organization.In
139、 other words,the most intentional process wont work if em-ployees are not engaged and provided with the tools they need.Fortunately,more and more organizations are recognizing that a frictionless experience is critical to their success,and they have built a culture focused on making everything as ea
140、sy as possible for customers.To stress this importance,leading companies have adopted principles,platforms,mission statements,and initiatives around the topic of ease.These send an important message to every employee,encour-aging them to consider each process and each interaction by asking,“How can
141、I make this easier?”In doing so,each employee translates this principle into their own situation to improve every customer journey.Employees are also being given more tools and au-thority to make decisions at the front line.This form of enablement allows employees to expedite re-turns,correct mistak
142、es,and reduce frustration in the moment without seeking approvals or checking with a colleague.No two customer journeys are alike,so employees need to be guided by the organizations vision,but also enabled with the training,resources,and authority to deliver seamless experiences on the spot.Capturin
143、g signals to make seamless experiences a realityArguably the most important elements of seamless experiences is the ability to capture signals across channels and unify this information for each custom-er.In essence youre creating a memory based on their behaviors and their input.Fortunately,one of
144、the biggest developments in CX is the evolution of the tools available to listen,monitor,and measure every customers interaction.Single platforms have emerged with an array of new features.They include the ability to construct rich profiles for every customer,capture various forms of customer feedba
145、ck,document every custom-er interaction,and even guide employees on the next best action.Such systems deliver one-on-one experiences to customers and identify friction in the journey.Whats more,users can also create dynamic customer segments based a wide array of feedback and experiences.Our partner
146、s in the CX Now series are one of the leaders behind these innovative solutions.Qualtrics has developed a scalable system to monitor individ-ual customer journeys and understand the thoughts,actions,and feelings of each customer so a highly personalized experience is possible.Todays latest tools pro
147、vide CX leaders with capabili-ties like never before to understand what customers are saying,doing,and feeling throughout their cus-tomer journey.Not only do they enable organizations to be more responsive,but they also provide the information needed to constantly refine customers experiences to be
148、more seamless.Where should CX leaders get started?You may have sensed the irony in this article cre-ating a seamless,easy experience isnt easy at all!Regardless of all the complexity involved in mapping,envisioning,and monitoring the customer journey,there are some logical steps to get started.Revie
149、w your customer profiles.Delivering seamless experiences starts with developing rich profiles that give you a complete understanding of your customers and entire segments of your customer base.Determine what seamless means to your cus-tomers.Conduct a journey mapping exercise,and then think from the
150、 outside in to envision the experience from the customers perspective.Identify stages of the customer journey that are too complex.Look for ways to begin reducing steps and handoffs to make it more seamless.Develop a set of statements or principles fo-cused on customer ease.Use these as a North Star
151、 vision within your organization.Evaluate how your organization monitors the actions and feedback of your customers.Con-sider a review of emerging CX technology to provide better line of sight to customer activity.Listen Now at: WalkerChairman&CEOWalkerDiane SkirvinVice PresidentWalkerMany have expe
152、rienced the dreaded“handoff”that experience where someone calls into support and gets transferred multiple times,to the point where frustration compels them to simply hang up.Host Steve Walker welcomes Diane Skirvin,vice president at Walker,to discuss the importance of making customer experiences CX
153、 NOW:EIGHT THEMES DRIVING CX EVOLUTION22Copyright 2023 Walker Information,Inc.All rights reserved.Integration and accessibility of all customer data sources to understand their needs and guide company actionsDATA INTEGRATIONAs a CX professional,one way you can improve your program is by making certa
154、in you can access,inte-grate,analyze and use all your data to make better informed decisions about how you deliver experienc-es to customers and employees.Sounds easy,right?But with silos and tech platforms that dont connect,accessing and using all your data can be tougher than youd expect.What do w
155、e mean by data integration?Most people think about data integration as more of an I.T.function,connecting data systems so they can interact with one another or creating a data lake con-taining information from multiple sources.In the con-text of experience management,its an enablement tool with a sp
156、ecific focus,combining experiential data from various listening posts with the operational data that an organization needs to drive intelligent decisions and actions.Different departments have different data,per-spective,and needs.For example,a contact center manager will need different customer fee
157、dback and operational metrics than someone in account man-agement or someone whos involved in the supply chain.But all of them have legitimate needs that can be uniquely met by the combination of experiential feedback and operation metrics,and the CX profes-sionals job is to coordinate,strategize,an
158、d deliver those metrics in a timely and digestible manner.Whats the value of data integration?Data integration is more than how an organization slices and dices information from an operational component:its finding the contributing factors and details about an experience that allow for better decisi
159、on making.Connecting operational data and transactional data to customer profiles allows for deeper understanding of experience opportunities by individual or segment.Combining experience data and operational data allows you to be more strategic about:Creating personas Segmenting your audience Analy
160、zing your data Personalizing your customers experiences Orchestrating specific journeys for customers Examples When it comes to data integration,the skys the limit.With nearly infinite possibilities for collecting,com-bining,and analyzing data,data integration can seem overwhelming.Here are several
161、common uses for consideration.How does the customer journey play into the con-cept of data integration?Within the context of a lis-tening post,we need to understand the experience that were looking to impact or improve and identify an opportunity.The customer journey will help dic-tate what some of
162、those objectives may be.Many CX programs are tasked with helping a mar-keting or sales team increase conversions taking a customer from an early awareness or research stage to making a purchase.We first need to understand the various ways that customers navigate this jour-ney:Where along that journe
163、y do we capture internal or operational data about the customers behav-iors?Where do we have or need experiential data to understand their intentions,effort,emotions,and success?Once we have identified,and,in some cas-es,created the listening posts to gather these data,then we need to work with the
164、involved stakeholders to integrate those metrics into a tool or dashboard for analysis,decision management,and monitoring.But it all starts with a foundational understanding or awareness of the customer journey.Account management is a common area where data integration provides value.One simple but
165、powerful used case is around assigning account resources.Not all customers want the same type of resourcing or interactions,and not all account managers have the same skills and experience.By integrating three sets of metrics the resources and interactions cur-rently provided to customers,customer d
166、emograph-ics/firmographics,and customer feedback about needs and current perceptions you can provide your account management team with a couple of valuable tools.First,an understanding of the resourc-es that yield the most customer success for different types of customers.This leads to providing the
167、 right level of resourcing for the customer to optimize cus-tomer success and your profitability.Second,you can provide training and process improvements to level the playing field and ensure all account reps are providing optimal services to customers.Data integration can also help improve customer
168、 retention.Frequently,the first thought is to acquire and integrate lifetime value and financial metrics that are associated with retention:Most organizations are looking to have an upward tick in financial perfor-mance associated with retaining a customer.While integrating these financial metrics w
169、ith experience data is valuable for making important ROI state-ments about your CX program,they often end up flagging risky customers when there is little time to save them.However,understanding the full custom-er journey that leads to that renewal risk,how each step of that journey either increases
170、 or decreases that risk,can allow a company to make changes that keep customers from becoming a risk at the renewal stage.By identifying those points of inflection,and then providing the right employees with critical inte-grated experience and operational metrics,you can provide more customers with
171、the right experience to avoid the accumulation of risk.When you start looking at a customers relationship with an organization,you can start tying together differentiating factors within their relationship and CX NOW:EIGHT THEMES DRIVING CX EVOLUTION24Copyright 2023 Walker Information,Inc.All rights
172、 reserved.their experience that help identify whether one type of experience or another drives some level of loyalty.The questions for the CX leader become:What departments do we need to work with?What data/metrics do we need,and where do those reside?How do we provide an integrated view of those me
173、trics to the right associates at the right time so they can make better decisions about serving customers.How to get started Data integration doesnt happen automatically;it must be designed.When getting ready to start a new program or proj-ect,take the time early on to think about the end game.Think
174、 through your program objectives,and work backward to design how to get there.Ques-tions to ask include:What is the objective for our CX program?What do we want to achieve in six months,a year,three years?What is the goal of our survey project?What are the pieces of the journey that we know have an
175、impact on that goal?What indicators of customer success/failure should we have along the way?What types of data do we have about customers,and where is it stored?Having that long-term vision from the beginning supports designing a data integration program that allows those objectives to be met.Break
176、 down the silos!Go talk to the owners of the data,the people who are using the data,and get familiar with it,because you need a little bit of the contextual reference to be able to bring it in and use it accurately and smartly.This communication with client-facing departments is critical.The stakeho
177、lders and those running the program must have an understanding and outline of the standard categorization and data they want to be looking at their customers in.If you can start leverag-ing that information at certain touch points along the way,you can start to identify the differences in the sentim
178、ent and what they relate to.You can start iden-tifying characteristics and attributes associated with a specific segment of people.Once that happens,youre able to orchestrate different types of actions based on that segmentation.One area of data integration that is easy to start is combining CX and
179、EX results.If you have different locations where you can identify the employees and the customers who operate at that location and com-pare those to others,thats a rich data set and a rich way to integrate your data to try to find new insights.Avoiding pitfalls Integrating data brings a lot of advan
180、tages.But,of course,some pitfalls exist.Security,privacy,and gov-ernance controls on the systems and data NEED to be considered.Does everyone who can access your system have clearance to access the data and know how to protect it?Sometimes help from your IT department is neces-sary for data integrat
181、ion and you end up at the bottom of a long list of requests.In that case,working directly with the departments that serve clients can be your best bet.The opposite problem can also happen!Organiza-tions that are data rich can suddenly end up with a directory that is 100 data points deep per custom-e
182、r.That can get overwhelming.The point of data integration for CX leaders is to create a system of insight.Culling it down to whats important,whats rel-evant to your objectives can keep everyone focused.What are you trying to change,and what information would help to do that?Documentation is a key co
183、mponent for the longevity of your program.As you create data connections and integrations,document them!If youre pulling five pieces of data into your contact list for utiliza-tion and analysis or segmentation,have a place of reference that says what each is,where it came from,when was it last updat
184、ed a data dictionary.That way youll always have a record.Five years down the road,after your program has matured and morphed over time,youll still know where that data is coming from.Conclusion Customer experience pros rely on data.Lots and lots and lots of data.And its important that data can be ac
185、cessed constructively so we can understand our customers needs and make better business decisions.Thinking through your objectives and your journeys and being intentional about data integration can take your CX program to the next level.Listen Now at: WalkerChairman&CEOWalkerAshley HicksAssociate Vi
186、ce PresidentWalkerSome organizations collect very little data and some collect a ton of data.CX pros should be thinking of the end goal when designing programs and integrating their data.Host Steve Walker wel-comes Ashley Hicks for a discussion on how CX pros can organize,integrate,and constructivel
187、y ac-cess their data to make better business CX NOW:EIGHT THEMES DRIVING CX EVOLUTION26Copyright 2023 Walker Information,Inc.All rights reserved.The ability to quickly adjust to shifting environments and customer needsADAPTABILITYHistory attributes this famous quote to Henry Ford referring to the pr
188、oduction of his famous Model T automobile.While there is skepticism regarding whether he actually said this,it serves as an interest-ing contrast to todays customers.Its clear the days of“build it and they will come”are long gone.Today the customer is in charge.Companies spend significant resources
189、to understand their needs,de-sires,wants,and preferences.We have transitioned from a“make-and-sell”model to a highly sophis-ticated“sense-and-respond”model.Whats more,customers expect companies to keep up with their shifting demands month by month,day by day,and minute by minute.This is why we consi
190、der adaptability to be one of the trends driving CX evolution.Whether it may be changing economic trends,social climates,or shifts in customer opinion,responding to the changing demands of customers has become increasingly important to achieve success in todays competitive business environment.What
191、do we mean by adaptability?Companies that are adaptable are skilled at quick-ly adjusting to shifting environments and customer needs.Not only are they fast to react,but the best are accepting of,and even eager for,change.We dont need to look far to find an extreme exam-ple of adaptability.The recen
192、t pandemic forced or-ganizations to adapt in ways they never had before.Grocery stores suddenly offered pickup and delivery services.Contact centers quickly transformed to enable employees to work from home.The use of virtual meetings exploded.It was a test of adaptabil-ity for every organization.So
193、me passed the test and are better for it today.Others were not so fortunate.While the influence of the pandemic is a glaring example,there are countless other less obvious instances that demonstrate how quickly customer “You can have any color you want as long as it is black”Henry Fneeds and prefere
194、nces shift.Its clear that companies can gain a competitive edge when they are highly adaptable and skilled at responding to the changing needs of their customers.Think about your organization.Is there resistance to change?If your organization is like most,change is not something you welcome with ope
195、n arms.After all,we put a lot of time and energy into developing efficient processes.We dont want to keep changing.But we are not the ones that matter.The customer is in charge and we need to be keenly attentive to their demands.If we agree there are big benefits for an organi-zation to be adaptable
196、,then its fair to say the CX team should be adaptable in the way they work.This means they cant be stuck in a routine of simply conducting the same surveys and using the same methods to understand the pulse of the customer.They must constantly adjust and consider new ways of leading the organization
197、.Adopting the right mindsetThe first step in becoming a more adaptable orga-nization may be to reject or modify a time-honored standard.The Golden Rule states“Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.”This standard has guided many organizations for years.But todays customers demand a higher
198、 standard.Lets call it the Platinum Rule:Do unto others as they want.One size does not fit all.Todays customers want a personalized experience tailored to their specific needs and preferences.Having a mindset eager for change and ready to adapt to the constantly chang-ing needs and preferences of cu
199、stomers is important not just for the CX team,but the entire organization.Building a framework for adaptability With the right mindset of embracing change,organi-zations can set their sights on creating an effective framework to better understand their customers.Leading organizations are becoming in
200、creasingly sophisticated at constantly monitoring behaviors and insights of customers so they can respond efficiently and effectively.The framework starts with a complete knowledge of the customer journey.This includes a breakdown of customer personas and so you can monitor and interpret behaviors a
201、nd feelings of each customer or customer segment.With this information you can gain a comprehensive understanding of customers throughout every interaction.Organizations need effective methods to monitor customer insights and behaviors along every stage of the journey.While this is different for eve
202、ry or-ganization,they should not be limited to traditional methods such as routine surveys.CX NOW:EIGHT THEMES DRIVING CX EVOLUTION28Copyright 2023 Walker Information,Inc.All rights reserved.Consider other listening methods to enable organi-zational adaptability including:Call center logs Social med
203、ia Location-based input Text-based feedback Website intercepts In-app feedback Social media In-depth interviewsIts important to capture the entire spectrum,both structured and unstructured data.For the greatest impact,combine these customer insights with cus-tomer data that exists in your companyfin
204、ancial data,operational data,behavioral datato provide a full picture of customers at the most granular level.But having rich customer data isnt enough.It must be put to use by making the right information avail-able to the right people at the right time.By setting up closed-loop processes,organizat
205、ions can effec-tively understand and respond to momentary expe-riences of individual customers.This also can help identify ineffective processes that affect all custom-ers.The bigger-picture view allows organizations to learn from the momentary experiences,analyze root causes,and refine or correct p
206、rocess-level issues.Yes,this can be a little overwhelming,particularly for complex organizations with multiple locations,delivery channels,or extensive product lines.The right technology can make the concept of adaptabili-ty a reality,capturing important customer information across channels and enab
207、ling the organization to act quickly.To avoid the need to combine various tools,look for a unified system that can capture all the right data to provide a 360-view of each customer.Ulti-mately,you are seeking to track customers across the customer journey,monitor their behaviors and feelings,and mak
208、e this information easily accessible to the right people throughout your organization.Given the necessary range of capabilities required,few companies offer such a complete system today.However,you can expect many new offerings to fulfill this demand in the coming years.Our partners at Qualtrics are
209、 among the leaders recognizing the need for companies to be more adaptable.Their existing tools help companies effectively monitor relationships to identify and close experience gaps throughout the customer journey.Where should CX leaders begin?Like many large undertakings,getting started is the mos
210、t important step.This article outlines the value of having the right mindset for adaptability and devel-oping a solid framework with tools that will help you implement these programs at scale.However,aspir-ing to implement such initiatives across an organiza-tion is intimidating.Narrow your sights o
211、n a particular function or department to begin.One approach is looking for sectors of the organi-zation having an abundance of data that could be leveraged further.The contact center is a great place to start for many companies.The contact center is a treasure trove of customer data that commonly in
212、cludes feedback from surveys,performance data,and phone and chat logs.Add in feedback from the contact center representatives themselves and you have a robust view of your customers that can be effectively monitored and evaluated for timely deci-sions.The contact center is just one example.Look at y
213、our organization and consider all data-rich areas as a starting point for developing a more adaptable cul-ture.By developing a framework for monitoring the changing needs and preferences of customers,your company will gain a clear competitive advantage.Listen Now at: WalkerChairman&CEOWalkerDrew Hal
214、lVice PresidentWalkerHost Steve Walker welcomes Drew Hall,a vice president and team lead from Walker,to discuss why companies need to move away from the old-world model of“make and sell”model and adopt a more“sense and respond”CX NOW:EIGHT THEMES DRIVING CX EVOLUTION30Copyright 2023 Walker Informati
215、on,Inc.All rights reserved.Increasing operational efficiency to deliver experiences at the pace customers demandSPEEDMore than half of all customers will hire the first busi-ness to respond,even if theyre not the least expen-sive in a competitive scenario.Speed was found to be an essential factor of
216、 CX in Walkers 2013 report,Customers 2020 and its only become more important since.The seven themes weve discussed in our CX Now series so far have all been building up to this critical aspect of customer experience.What do we mean by speed?When we talk about speed in the sense of customer experienc
217、e,its about how a customer is expecting an experience to be delivered when it comes to the timeliness,the proactiveness,and the sheer speed of that delivery.And its how a company is delivering against those expectations.Speed is measured on a continuum from reactive to proactive.“We must be able to
218、predict what the customer wants next.Today it is reactionary,after the fact.In 2020,customers will expect firms to be ahead of them,knowing what they need before they them-selves have shown the need.”Customers 2020 Whats the value of speed?Being speedy can help companies win business.Making interact
219、ions seamless,plus using data,ana-lytics,and technology,can make interactions more rapid.Pit stops during car races have changed from taking 67 seconds in 1950 to taking merely 3 sec-onds today.When each member of the team knows their role and place,and supporting technology is brought in,amazing ad
220、vances happen.Fast pit stops are now table stakes,and the difference between winning and losing an F1 race can come down to an extra second or two in the pit lane.Nearly 70%of consumers say a websites loading time affects their willingness to One of the reasons Amazon became such a big re-tailer is
221、because they disrupted how long customers thought they should have to wait between ordering an item and having it in their hand.Previously,on-line orders took about a week to get to consumers which usually wasnt fast enough to compete with going to a retail store to buy the item.Amazons two-day ship
222、ping was revolutionary it was enough for consumers to decide they could wait for their purchase rather than making the trip to a store.And Amazon has only increased its delivery speed since.This“Amazon-ification”effect has changed the ex-pectations across different industries and segments consumer,B
223、2B,patient experience,and more.And as the technology has evolved to support that faster infrastructure,expectations have adjusted along with it.Now,consumers are always on.They want instant gratification.This means that the speed of an experi-ence has become table stakes.Building blocks of speedAs m
224、entioned in the intro,organizations that con-sistently meet or exceed customer expectations for speed need a proactive mindset,and that mindset requires prioritization and innovation.The company that is quickest to resolve product failures will always lose to the company that doesnt have the failure
225、s.While we appreciate companies that have polite and competent customer service agents to fix our prob-lems,wed rather not have the problem in the first place.If we think back to the remarkable decrease in pit stop times over the last 70 years,that decrease didnt happen just by making the people or
226、tools faster or better.There is limited improvement to how fast a human can move a tire.Racing teams are ruth-lessly devoted to proactively addressing the needs of the car and driver.The approach that led to these improvements in pit stops is the same that we can use in our organizations:1.Map out a
227、ll the things the car and driver would or could need during a pit stop the jobs to be done.2.Align those jobs to the people,tools,and pro-cesses involved in each one,3.Prioritize the areas with high impact on speed and high feasibility that they can be improved,4.And then start innovating the select
228、ed processes and tools to get faster.It doesnt happen all at once.Priorities are set and advancements are made when and where they can be.This is a continual process a discipline that organizations must remain dedicated to.The advantage of speed is often short-lived.Just like racing teams,companies
229、need to continually focus on innovative ways to add speed in the right parts of their business if they expect to remain competitive in todays markets.CX NOW:EIGHT THEMES DRIVING CX EVOLUTION32Copyright 2023 Walker Information,Inc.All rights reserved.The right speed in the right placesUltimately,spee
230、d needs to align with customer expectations and needs.Customers want certain things as fast as possible,but the companies that will succeed in the longer run are those who under-stand their customers.For speed to be effective in providing a competitive advantage,it must be aware of what customers ne
231、ed and want at every point of interaction with company products,services,and people.In the words of Jay Baer,companies need to understand what is the right“now.”When eating at a fine dining establishment,you dont want your food to appear immediately after you order it.The pacing of a meal should be
232、unhurried so food and conversation can be enjoyed.Knowing what your customers expect is key to determining how fast the experience should be.When we go to the doctors office,we dont want to sit in the waiting room forever,but we also dont want our doctor to rush through the visit.And sometimes the w
233、aiting is part of the experience it enhances the exclusivity of the limited-edition sneakers or the sought-after concert ticket.The crucial role for CX leaders is to provide cus-tomer insights that identify the right areas of focus.Where is a faster experience going to have the biggest impact?What c
234、ustomer segments are asking for it?Without these insights,companies will have a much lower hit rate on successfully creating faster experiences that impact their customers and provide a competitive advantage.How to get started making customer experiences faster Just to be able to compete,you have to
235、 constantly rethink how you deliver the experience.Every indus-try is ripe for disruption because of technology,data,and analytics.You also need to consider how you can use technology to really improve and optimize the experiences youre delivering today.Customers want companies who can resolve their
236、 is-sues and anticipate future challenges quickly.The other aspects of CX discussed in our CX Now series are necessary to optimize the time and effectiveness of experience delivery.How can you measure whether youre improving your speed if you dont have a baseline?Start by gathering data.How quickly
237、are we able to help customers do what they want to do?Are we clear with what theyre supposed to do?Do we have the right systems to support those elements?How do customers perceive the speed of our service too fast,too slow,or just right?How do they feel about how long it took?Speed is necessary thro
238、ughout the customer jour-ney even when asking for feedback.Customers memories of their interactions fade with time.Asking for feedback as soon as possible even during an interaction is critical to gaining the clearest Understanding whether or not your customers are happy with how fast the speed of t
239、heir experience is and why can help you personalize to their pref-erences and provide the right experience for each customer.In sales,this involves knowing which accounts value speed the most and need products NOW,as opposed to customers who want guidance in choosing which products and services fit
240、their needs,even if that takes a little longer.In service,self-serve options can help customers who dont want to wait.Communication and setting expectations are always important,and customers can be very understanding when they know whats going on.Fast is relative;customers usually know when a probl
241、em is complex and likely to take time and maybe a couple steps to fix.Advanced digital capabilities are essential to en-abling more rapid experiences.In many interactions,a digital experience will be faster and more effective than relying on a human.However,that assumes you are picking the right int
242、eractions with the right customers.The importance of understanding the right balance between digital and human services for different interactions and different customers cant be understated.Its also critical to ensure digital tools are designed correctly to meet your customers unique needs.Technolo
243、gy is already available to help frontline em-ployees deliver a better and faster-experience:Improved routing:Getting the customer to the right person who can fix an issue improves effi-ciency by creating fewer transitions.Callback service:Calling customers back within a designated time frame keeps t
244、hem from being frustrated by being on hold for long periods.Seamless transactions:Having customers personal information follow them through the website and to different agents saves time(and frustration!)by not making the customer repeat-edly provide identifying information.CX NOW:EIGHT THEMES DRIVI
245、NG CX EVOLUTION34Copyright 2023 Walker Information,Inc.All rights reserved.Listen Now at: WalkerChairman&CEOWalkerSean ClaytonVice PresidentWalkerHost Steve Walker welcomes Sean Clayton for a discussion on why customer experience profes-sionals should keep speed at the top of their list when optimiz
246、ing their CX programs.34Copyright 2023 Walker Information,Inc.All rights reserved.One major step is moving from being reactive to proactive.Proactive monitoring:Some products inform their manufacturer when theyre broken and call for service for themselves.In some cases,the com-pany can push a patch
247、digitally and resolve the issue before the customer knows anything was wrong.Issues analysis:One IT company has put effort into the types of cases that are typically problem-atic.They analyze when problems are likely to occur and push fixes out before something goes wrong.The best way to have great
248、support is to never have a case!Avoiding pitfalls As mentioned earlier,speed has become table stakes for customer experience.But what if an agent gives you advice very quickly but its bad advice?Or even though you receive a product overnight,what if its damaged?Or the wrong product?Focusing on speed
249、 alone isnt the way to go.Speed of experience comes from everything else working as it should.When service is seamless,personalized,and adapting to each customers needs and support-ed by integrated technology and enabled employ-ees,attaining the right speed without sacrificing the quality of the exp
250、erience becomes manageable.Conclusion The pace of business is accelerating rapidly.Time is of the essence.Customers cant afford to wait around while their business issues are being consid-ered.They value companies that provide real-time response and proactively anticipate their future needs.Companie
251、s need to anticipate needs and be pro-active in delivering new solutions and solving prob-lems before they ever really surface.To do this they need to leverage predictive analytics and implement decision support systems based on customer intelli-gence,analytics,and subject matter ABOUT WALKERCustome
252、r ExperienceProven practices,and extensive experience serving hundreds of global brandsWalker is an experience management(XM)services firm.Our experts provide wide range of flexible solutions to maximize technology investments and support customer and employee experience initiatives for a wide range
253、 of organizations.Digital Customer ExperienceThe digital options to deliver effective and efficient customer experiencesEmployee ExperienceExpert measurement and stra-tegic consulting for best-in-class employee experiencesPatient ExperienceA modern approach focused on patients,family members,and hea
254、lthcare providersOur solutions span four general areas:Learn more about Walker at Qualtrics has been an important contributor to this report and were grateful for their advice and insights.Walker teamed up with Qualtrics in 2017 when we became one of the first members of the Qualtrics Partner networ
255、k.We considered it to be an unbeatable combination world-class professional services and an industry-leading experience management platform to deliver better,faster results.And it has worked!Together we have helped more than 2,000 organi-zations develop their experience management programs.Qualtrics
256、 is the leader and creator of the experience management category.They provide a cloud-native software platform that helps organizations quickly identify and resolve points of friction across all digital and human touch-points in their business so they can retain their best customers and employees,pr
257、otect their revenue,and drive profitability.ABOUT WALKERABOUT QUALTRICSCX NOW:EIGHT THEMES DRIVING CX EVOLUTION36Copyright 2023 Walker Information,Inc.All rights reserved.THE CX LEADER PODCASTABOUT THE HOST Steve Walker applies more than 30 years of CX experience in hosting of the CX Leader Podcast.
258、His discussions with guests are enlightening,informative and insightful!The CX Leader Podcast with host Steve Walker provides weekly insights for business leaders to improve results by unlocking the potential of their customer experience.More than a discussion of CX topics,the podcast focuses on way
259、s CX professionals can develop the right skills and ideas to be effective leaders in their organizations.SUBSCRIBE TODAY!B2B versus B2C CX Luminaries of CX Intersections with CX The Influence of technology CX Best Practices CX Users CX Horror Stories Change Management Journey Mapping Customer Listen
260、ing Architecture Traits of Effective CX Leaders The Future of CX and much more!The CX Leader Podcast explores a wide range of customer-focused business topics.Here are just a few:1.DIGITAL INTERACTIONS:The Human/Digital Balance2.PERSONALIZATION:The Three Levels of Personalization3.PREDICTIVE ANALYTICS:Predicting the Future4.EMPLOYEE ENABLEMENT:Enable Your Employees5.SEAMLESS EXPERIENCE:Its Gotta Be Seamless6.DATA INTEGRATION:The Data Endgame7.ADAPTABILITY:Sense and Respond8.SPEED:Life in the Fast L