Customer experience: Welcome to the new playground of competition

Customer Experience is not just about how a customer feels when he/she receives a product or service. It is inclusive of the before and after of the product/ service purchase. It includes factors like:

• Planning – like thinking which product to avail
• Anticipation - the excitement for it
• Usage – what one does and how much well-being one experiences by actual use of the product or service itself
• Memories – what does one remember the experience to be like. It is difficult to remember the whole experience so mostly there are specific moments from the experience that come into focus.

CRM to Customer Experience

Long back my entry into the world of IT was by creating and succeeding at the CRM programme. As I reflect back, CRM has come a long way with the following changes:

1. CRM was about data management, CX is about a holistic understanding of customer behaviour.

2. CRM was about the platform to collect, manage data and customer processes. CX is about following the intuitive behaviours of the customer with many alternate journeys and connecting your processes to customer behaviours. 

3. CRM was about customers, markets and marketing with customer segments. CX is all about the segment of one - personalizing the experience for every customer, personalizing marketing to the customer. 

Let us look into what are the major changes that have driven the transformation of CRM to CX:

Cloud and big data: Our ability to gather data from various sources, integrate it to the cloud, and write big data analytics has completely changed our ability to understand the customer, her journeys, exploration process, etc. As IOT gets inside the products, the product usage data also flows into the mix giving richer insights on customers.  

Mobile Devices: Mobile devices generate so much more data on the apps. It drastically increases the number of touchpoints the customer potentially has with you and significantly improves your ability to understand customer behaviour. 

The prevalence of social media: Social Media has significantly increased the level of customer profile and has created a segment of one. The ability of your customer experience tools to connect with the users socially, empowers you to pinpoint your marketing efforts. You also can have a sustained engagement with your customer through social media.

Implications for you

1. CX has changed the game completely from products to a holistic customer experience i.e., products, services, usage experience, exception-handling. 
2. Empowering the front line dealing with the customers with powerful mobile apps to capture and deliver richer customer experience 

Technology and its ability to become intimate with the end customer has driven CX to the forefront. The competition is no longer about your product features or your service. The competition today is about the holistic user experience right from marketing to engaging with the customer, to the sales experience, service experience, exception handling and keeping connected even when nothing else is happening through social channels. 

Welcome to the new playground of competition: Customer Experience.

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The article has been written by Jagdish Belwal, Founder and CEO, Jagdish Belwal Advisory