Top 5 Customer Service & CX Articles for Week of August 24, 2026

Every week, I read dozens of articles on customer service and customer experience from a wide range of sources. Below are my top five picks from last week, along with my takeaways.

Failure Didn’t Lose Your Customers, Mediocrity Did by Pasquale DeMaio

(Amazon Web Services) The issue is resolved, but the customer won’t remember your company until the next time you give them a reason to leave. And when a competitor offers them a better deal next quarter, the customer will take it without hesitation. Because nothing in their interaction with your brand was so exceptional that it gave them a reason to stay.

My Comment: We kick off this week’s Top Five roundup with an excellent article by Pasquale DeMayo, VP of Amazon Connect Customer, who writes that average or mediocrity is what really causes customer churn. Let’s take a lesson from Amazon’s playbook. Pasquale says, “Your biggest threat is not failure. It is the issue you could have prevented, the friction you could have removed, the moment you could have made personal, all sitting unused in your data while your customer quietly moves on.”

What is Customer Feedback and How to Collect It by Priyanka Malik and Jayadeep Subhashis

(Sprinklr) Customer feedback is one of the fastest ways to understand whether your customer experience is improving or creating risk in real use. It shows what customers expect, where service or product friction is building, and which issues are strong enough to affect loyalty, retention and growth.

My Comment: Here’s an important article about customer feedback, and the top “key takeaway” is simple: “Customer feedback only creates value when it is consistently translated into action.” If you ask for feedback and don’t use it, you shouldn’t have asked for it in the first place. If the customer is willing to take the time to give you the feedback, not using it is not only a waste of time for both you and your customer, it’s also a sign of disrespecting the customer.

What Does Customer Centric Mean? by Kenzie Levy

(Salesforce) Customer centric is a strategic approach where an organization places customer needs, goals, and experiences at the center of every decision, from product development to service delivery.

My Comment: Many years ago, I came up with the idea that companies need to be customer-focused. Not long after that, the term “customer centricity” started being used to describe the same thing. This short order goes into a little more detail about the meaning behind being customer-centric (or customer-focused). In short, it means making decisions with the customer in mind. Start with what the customer should experience and build from there. Even internal decisions, which may never directly impact the customer, are considered as part a customer-focused strategy.

Customer Experience (CX) Design: From Strategy to Implementation by Celia Cerdeira

(Talkdesk) Customer experience design shapes how every interaction feels, from first touchpoint to post-purchase relationships. Learn what it is, why it matters, and how to design a strategy that delivers high-quality experiences.

My Comment: Today, how a customer is treated (as in the customer experience) is just as important as how good the products and services the company sells. This is how the author sums it up, and I couldn’t agree more: “70% of customers choose brands expecting a positive experience, and organizations that lead in CX achieve more than double the revenue growth of those that don’t. Organizations that don’t prioritize customer experience design are putting themselves at a huge disadvantage.”

Why the Premium Experience of the Future is a Person Who Answers by Andre Prins

(LinkedIn Pulse) The organisations that will win the next few years are not choosing between AI and people. They are using automation to clear the routine work that has exhausted service teams for years, and reinvesting the capacity it releases into the handful of moments where a person changes the outcome. Onboarding. Escalation. The first sign of trouble. The renewal conversation. The moment a customer is about to give up. Those are not the moments to optimise out. Those are the moments worth putting your best people into.

My Comment: Who would ever have thought that calling a company and talking to a human (rather than AI) would be considered a premium experience? That’s exactly what this article is about, and if you think about it, having a live support agent can become a competitive differentiator. I love this line from the article: “The premium experience is not a person who answers eventually. It is a person who answers at the moment that matters, without the customer having to earn it through persistence.”

Shep Hyken is a customer service/CX expert, award-winning keynote speaker, and New York Times bestselling author. Learn more about Shep’s customer service and customer experience keynote speeches and his customer service training workshops. Connect with Shep on LinkedIn.