How to Enable Wonderful Customer Experiences

Traditional experiences no longer satisfy consumers. They expect the exceptional.

Customer experience, the perception consumers have of your brand, is based on their interactions across channels at different stages in their engagement journey. Customer perception is fragile, and it can make or break a brand.

It can have a significant impact on conversions and business revenue. For example, increasing customer retention rates by 5% can increase your profits by as much as 95% (Bain & Company).

A good customer experience can also improve customer satisfaction, build trust, increase customer advocacy, create personal relationships and help your business stand out. It requires:

• Customers to be prioritized and appreciated

• Personalized experiences

• Friendly, empathetic customer service

• Feedback to be addressed and improvements made

• Value adds, such as offers or discounts

• Data security

On the other hand, a bad customer experience can wreak havoc on your bottom line.

Factors that can lead to a bad customer experience include: poor tech support, subpar customer service, unclear website navigation or inaccurate pricing. All of these irk the customer and lead to a bad experience. Other key reasons that lead to a bad customer experience are:

• Poor tech support

• Subpar customer service

• Unclear website navigation

• Inaccurate pricing

• Poor social media management

• Ignoring customer feedback

• Compromising customers’ privacy

Customers expect to be heard. A bad customer experience can be addressed by listening to the customers’ needs, resolving their queries and providing them with any necessary assistance. Being empathetic and courteous goes a long way.

How to Deliver a Wonderful Customer Experience

Great customer service, an easily accessible website and intuitive processes make customers happy. You also need to give your workforce the right resources and empower them to do what is best for the customer.The most effective way to improve your customer experience is to be proactive and architect a holistic customer experience strategy:

• Create a customer journey map that encompasses every customer touchpoint

• Analyze and address the breaking points in customer engagement

• Streamline communication and keep customers informed

• Use customer information to provide personalized experiences

• Share customer experience data with your entire team

• Drive retention-focused customer interactions

• Provide multiple feedback channels

One way to address many of these is with the Adobe Experience Cloud, which is a combination of the following within a single easily accessible platform:

• Adobe Marketing Cloud

• Adobe Analytics

• Adobe Advertising Cloud

• Adobe Commerce Cloud

Adobe Experience Cloud enables amazing customer experiences by integrating the best solutions for personalization, marketing, commerce, advertising and analytics on a cloud platform. It also brings together service and support, and an open network that can help you deliver a wonderful customer experience.

Top 10 Customer Experience Books

1. Winning on Purpose: The Unbeatable Strategy of Loving Customers - Fred Reichheld

2. Leading the Customer Experie e: How to Chart a Course and Deliver Outstanding Results- Brad Cleveland

3. The Cult of the Customer: Create an Amazing Customer Experience that Turns Satisfied Customers into Customer Evangelists - Shep Hyken

4. What Customers Crave: How to Create Relevant and Memorable Experiences at Every Touchpoint - Nicholas J. Webb 

5. Winning Her Business: How to Transform the Customer Experience for the World’s Most Powerful Consumers – Bridget Brennan

6. Experience Design for Customer Service: How To Go From Mediocre To Great! – Mark Stanley PMP

7. Customer and User Experience Maps: Step-By-Step Guide 2nd Edition – Robert Curedale

8. Influencer Marketing Center of Excellence: Expanding the Purpose of Influencer Marketing in Customer Experience Strategy – Liz Gottbrecht

9. The Experience Maker: How to Create Remarkable Experiences That Your Customers Can’t Wait to Share - Dan Gingiss

10. Strategic Customer Service: Managing the Customer Experience to Increase Positive Word of Mouth, Build Loyalty, and Maximize Profits – John Goodman