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. Brands Ignore Customer Feedback at Their Own Peril by Matt Vartabedian (CX Dive) Brands have a wealth of customer sentiment and behavior data […]
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.
(CX Dive) Brands have a wealth of customer sentiment and behavior data available to them but often can’t close the circuit between collection and action.
My Comment: We kick off this week’s Top Five with an article that reminds us that ignoring customer feedback can be costly. The article quotes a finding from Quantum Metric’s consumer study that 56% of customers have left brands that ignored their feedback. My customer experience research backs this up and includes another finding worth mentioning: 65% of customers say they never hear back from a company after completing a survey. A good start to fixing this problem is to thank customers for sharing their feedback. Then, do something with the feedback. Otherwise, it’s a waste of everyone’s time. See feedback as a gift. Consider a complaint as an opportunity not only to fix a problem, but also to restore a customer’s confidence in continuing to do business with you.
(Oracle) The relationship between utilities and their customers has evolved beyond that of provider and consumer. Interactions once centered on utilities sending bills and customers picking up the phone when something went wrong. While these interactions remain essential, utility customer engagement today encompasses much more, including initiatives that motivate and help customers take more control of their energy consumption and costs.
My Comment: While this article focuses on the utility industry, it offers plenty of takeaways for organizations in any industry. A utility company has limited competition, if any. However, they still want to provide a good CX. At the end of the article, there is a summary of the four types of customer engagement for utility companies: 1. Communicating with customers, 2. Serving them (good customer service), 3. Managing their energy use, and 4. Engaging them in new programs and services. If you change #3 to Managing/helping them get the most out of your products, these four ideas apply to just about any organization.
(CX Dive) More than 2 in 5 consumers say they have stopped doing business with a brand when its personalized marketing felt too repetitive, personal, or off-base, a Site Impact survey found.
My Comment: Personalization is an important part of marketing and CX. When done well, it brings customers closer to the company. But a stumble could cause a customer to walk. Just over 25% say the brands they do business with understand them. Over half say they don’t. With all the tools to analyze their customers’ data and behavior, there shouldn’t be many mistakes. Credibility is destroyed when a brand “offers inaccurate or invasive personalization.”
(Fast Company) Ask your department heads how things are going, and you’ll hear good news. Leads and engagement are up, sales hit quota, and customer service is chipping away at response time. Every dashboard is green. But ask your customer, the one that’s been passed along three times in five minutes between chatbots and agents and intervention specialists, and you’ll get a different report.
My Comment: I seldom write about an article that includes “breaking up silos” as a strategy. But it’s not just silos. It’s really a system. When a customer shares info with a chatbot, then gets passed to a live agent and has to start over, that’s a breakdown in the system. When that happens, the customer blames the agent who doesn’t have all the information. But it’s not their fault. Fix the system. Create fluid communication between channels and departments. That’s where you start fixing a broken system.
(LinkedIn Pulse) The advice that actually changes an organisation’s experience is rarely a secret. It is usually something leadership already knows and has been quietly avoiding.
My Comment: Let’s wrap up this week’s Top Five with another article from Andre Prins, who shares that good CX isn’t complicated. And regardless of how simple or uncomplicated it is, leadership often knows what to do but, for some reason, avoids doing what’s necessary. Prins took the ideas from eight experts and summarized them in a way that will get you thinking. Take two or three of these thoughts and have a discussion around them at your next leadership meeting.
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.
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