Customers can engage with brands in more ways and places than ever before. As a result, customer expectations are higher than ever. We expect consistent and continuous products and services with instant access, always, on any device. If the 1990’s and 2000’s were about building strong brands; the 2010’s have been about delivering exceptional customer experiences. Working with clients, I consistently find branding and customer experience two conflicting organisational silos.  Branding, or the marketing department, is often focused on delivering messages about the brand proposition and empl ..read more

An Insurance policy should give us confidence that we and our possessions are taken care of at a time of need. If something does go wrong, and customers make a claim, our chosen insurance company be helping to get life back on track at difficult times – not making life harder. Our daughter, who passed her driving test 8 months ago, turned 18 in early February. Unfortunately, she was recently involved in a no-fault collision on her way to school. This first accident was stressful for all concerned. As if her life wasn’t busy and complicated enough, as she is nearing her A-levels and moving away ..read more

In the U.K, the number of Chief Customer Officers across all industries increased from 14 in 2014 to 90 in 2017; half of those roles were created in the last 15 months. The average tenure also lengthened from 23 months in 2009 to 34.5 months in 2013 but it still has the shortest lifespan among all C-suite executives, according to research conducted in 2010 by the Chief Customer Officer Council. Recently, I was talking to a client who had been approached about moving from one area of her business to another. The proposed role was as Head of CX. Although she came from a customer facing sales env ..read more

87% of organisations cite employee engagement as being one of their top priorities. However, in Gallup’s 2017 global study, they found that only 15% of employees are engaged at work and this figure is believed to be on the decline. One of the most tried and tested means employed by organisations to measure employee engagement is an employee survey. I have found different figures quoted by others as to the number of companies who run employee surveys. Survey usage ranges from a low of  66% of companies to a whopping 92% . Whatever figure is correct, a lot of organisations ar ..read more

We have all seen a range of articles talking about predictions for Customer Experience in 2018. I have waited until the dust has settled from 2017 before giving my views on what might lie ahead this year. Will we see something new in CX or will it be more of the same? If it is more of the same, then the experience gap that has opened will only get bigger. Forrester have called it ‘A year of Reckoning’; they state that there is “a burning platform mandating bold action” but also that 30% of companies will see further declines in CX quality in 2018. There are many things that we could see develo ..read more

This year, customer experience has broadly been recognised by the business community as a key imperative and growth driver. The ‘Experience Economy’ first conceptualised by Pine & Gilmore back in 1998 is here. This was the first time we heard of how experiences, rather than product or service, are a distinct economic offering. As I was considering ‘what to expect in 2018’, I took a step back and contemplated 2017. What did we hear, what did we see? We heard talk of Machine Marketers, Personas, Play Books, Influencer Marketing, Big Data/ Big Science, Webrooming & Showrooming and GDPR. B ..read more

Customer Experience improvements have stalled. This was confirmed by recent study findings issued by both KPMG Nunwood and Forrester.   The Forrester report confirms that not only has there been 0 improvement to overall customer experience in the UK but the number of brands in the excellent CX category has fallen to nil. Even ‘Elite’ brands (i.e. the top 5% in Forrester’s CX rankings) have shown no improvement so there are no organisations to provide best practice to customer experience laggards.  KPMG’s report comments that customer experience in the UK is worse than ever recorded i ..read more

Why is it then that seemingly every week there is news about another brand that is opening a physical brand experience space for its customers when many agree with Gartner’s belief that “By 2020, customers will manage 85% of their relationship with the enterprise without interacting with a human”? Every day we hear more about how technology is changing the world for customers and employees alike. We live in a rapidly developing world where virtual meets reality. Even brands are investing heavily in IT not only to be able to more deliver efficiently their customer experience but also to interac ..read more

Is Black Friday a wise and significant event for retailers? Are consumers still buying into it now that it has become a weekend-long event? Even though 21% of shoppers say they have never missed participating in Black Friday shopping, some retailers in the UK chose not to participate. Retailers vary in their appetite for Black Friday. Apple, not known for moving on price, traditionally hasn’t taken part. In the UK last year, they did offer a free gift card for 24 hours only with selected purchases rather than pure discounting on the day. In 2016, Ikea, Homebase and Asda also chose not to ..read more

I read a quote somewhere from Skip Prichard (CEO & Leadership speaker): “Clarity is the beginning of a good experience.” We see time and time again where a lack of clarity or expectation management, has led to pain points in the customer journey. One case in point where I have seen this recently is with Uber. Uber is publicly having a torrid time in the UK right now but it has deliberately set out to engage customers through this time of uncertainty. Uber is important to the population of London. There are 3.5 million customers who are ferried around by 40,000 drivers. Uber has made t ..read more