Most businesses know about customer experience (CX) strategies. They know they should be doing something but don’t know what. They might have an annual CX strategy meeting to discuss how their brand could improve CX. But, unfortunately, there’s often little follow-through.
In reality, improving customer experience is not about creating a strategy or developing a list of actions to enhance mentioned experiences. Instead, it’s about creating an organizational culture where everyone in the company understands why customers are important and how we can cultivate relationships with them in every interaction.
You must remember that customer experience, or CX, according to Econsultancy, is the sum of all customer interactions with a brand. In other words, the relationship between a company and its customers. Leader CX brands keep their customer at the center of everything they do.
We live in a new digital age, and the NOW generation expects instant gratification and a great customer experience. Today’s consumers are looking for brands to connect with through various channels, is your brand searching for this connection?
Brands have focused on attracting mass traffic to their virtual storefront. In this technologically advanced era, there is nothing wrong with creating a great digital experience for your customers, but having a good relationship with them is also essential for your brand.
You may have some customers who love your company. Do you have a relationship with them? For a connection to be successful, both parties must be willing and able to work on building the bond.
According to QualtricsXM, customer experience isn’t something you can control entirely from your end because customer interactions define their experience. Then, we can optimize the parts of CX that we can handle by understanding your audience and their needs, values, and behaviors.
To create experiences that build relationships and inspire loyalty, companies must listen to and engage with their customers throughout the journey. The first step is listening to customers, not just at the beginning of their experience but throughout it.
In our last blog we mentioned: “When you have a consumer relationship, they’re more likely to stay with your brand and recommend it to others.” This is because connecting with them will make them feel part of your brand’s community and hence be loyal to your products/services.
Listening to your customers will make a difference in your brand’s growth because it will help you reach your audience better. Plus, listening to and taking customer feedback into account helps brands improve.
As HubSpot’s article: “What is Customer Experience?” mentions, the more contact with your customers, the more you will be able to give them an exceptional customer experience.
Another critical step is to remain consistent throughout channels. People like to connect with others through different media for different reasons. So, continue listening to your consumers and reach them through their preferred channels. This will make your brand go from being intrusive or annoying to meeting the customer where they feel most comfortable.
Customer experience goes beyond strategies, digital expertise, and customer service. Relationships with your customers will open a broader way to connect with them and could potentially transform your brand’s CX.
This series of actions have been gaining momentum in recent years, but there are still so many things companies can do to improve how they interact with their customers. If there’s one thing we know for sure, it’s that when companies get better at creating incredible experiences for their customers, they tend to see better results than their competitors who don’t focus on these areas as much or at all!