“Our customer experience is so poor that we lost the 10% growth we achieved last year. What happened?”
“How are we going to increase our sales by 15%?”
“We need more customers! How are we going to market to them?”
Have any of these questions been asked out loud within your organization? I’m sure they have. Genuine customer loyalty is defined by delivering an amazing customer experience which builds consumer confidence, word of mouth marketing and repeat purchases. The organizations that have designed and successfully deployed their customer experience are reaping the financial benefits. Let’s follow their lead.
What will an improved customer experience do for your business?
We are all loyal to an organization for one reason or another. I’m loyal to Starwood hotel group for their customer experience and because they offer me peace of mind. Since they take care of me as a customer, I take care of them financially by spending with them frequently. I have many options when choosing hotels when I travel for work but because of their consistent customer experience I willingly spend more to stay with them and I encourage my friends and family to do the same.
We don’t admire and respect organizations because of their newly designed logos or high earnings. Companies become admired when they have a defined organizational understanding that their mission is to deliver service that is predictable and memorable. We didn’t begin to admire Zappos because they had 10,000′s of products within their online store. Westjet Airlines didn’t become a case study for customer centricity because they offered competitive rates. Disney doesn’t become the company that we know without their level of service. Without customer experience these companies aren’t the names we now respect.
Your bottom line loves customer experience
CFO’s and small business owners love customer experience because it offers a low cost of customer acquisition. When I emphatically promote a business that I am loyal to because of their customer experience it encourages my friends and family to do business with this company too. When they do, the cost of acquiring this customer is very low, or nothing, because of the power of word of mouth and customer loyalty. Of course, earning genuine customer loyalty doesn’t come easy.
If we know this to be true then why do we still lack the investment to improve the customer experience? Well, I have some thoughts on that, too. The alternative is paying for traditional media that can cost an arm and a leg without any definite proof that it will help us acquire new customers.
I’m sure Blockbuster and Circuit City never thought they would one day shut their doors but it happened. Many reasons go into filing for bankruptcy but one thing I know very well is that if you lose focus on your customer experience it gives your competitors an opportunity to steal your customers. Small businesses are threatened by the Amazon’s of the world but if you ensure you are consistently delivering exceptional service to your existing customers it will give you a fighting chance to survive.
There are two type of organizations.
#1: This organization is constantly trying to fill their sales funnel because none of their customers will repeatedly do business with them because of their poor customer experience.
#2: This organization is admired, often in the media and grow quarter over quarter. This company is devoted to service and find that their sales funnel is always full. They don’t stress about sales targets, they build strategies to leverage their success into even greater accomplishments.
Why do you believe that some organizations move like snails to investment in improving their customer experience?
Read more: The Cost of Poor Customer Experience