‘Make Shift Happen’ by Sharing Real-Time, Actionable CX Insights Across Your Organization

An organization that genuinely cares about the experience of its customers – as well as prospective customers – knows what dedication it takes to monitor, measure and act upon customer feedback. They also know how a vigorous CX culture will improve their bottom line, welcome news to C-suites everywhere.

Kirsti Laasio, Chief Customer Experience Officer at HappyOrNot Ltd., shared her insights this month during a keynote presentation at EuroShop 2020, a leading retail trade fair, on the value of integrating real-time reporting of customer insights into operational management. Speaking to an international audience of retail industry professionals in Dusseldorf, Germany, Kirsti said she advocates looking at customers through an omnichannel lens, paying attention to the many ways consumers engage your business – from the digital world to the physical world, referred to these days as the “phygital” world.

“Nothing is more frustrating as a customer than, for example, when you’re online for customer support and they tell you to call. Why isn’t there support where the customer is?” she asks. “Every single experience needs to be offered to the customer where the customer is at the time, not by sending the customer away to a different channel. That’s why an omnichannel approach and the merging of digital and physical is so important.”

“Good customer experience does not happen by accident,” Kirsti continued. To become a CX champion, “You must make everybody accountable. You want to empower everybody. You want to make customer insights visible. This helps take you from a ‘sh*t happens’ organization to a ‘shift happens’ one.” This is how you become a CX management champion.

Here are a few highlights of her talk, but for more details, and to enjoy Kirsti’s enthusiasm for the world of CX, watch the video here:

• Customer insights are best served warm. Learning on Friday that your customer was frustrated with your service on Monday denies you the opportunity to smooth out a friction point immediately and send them home happy.

• Customer insights are best shared broadly. It’s great for managers and executives to see the day’s or the week’s CX trends, but if the frontline teams don’t see them it’s a lost opportunity for internal collaboration and making meaningful improvements.

• Non-buyer insights are essential for growth. Gathering customer data is great, but if you want new customers you must understand the experience of those who don’t buy from you. You can only learn so much from sales activity. You want insights from people who walk into your store and leave empty handed, too.

• Crystal balls are real. Monitoring CX trends according to, for example, the time of day, seasonality, or geographical region, can help you make adjustments before a bad experience happens.

• Dividing is a recipe for failing. Do not make CX one department’s job. Do not separate CX data from operational data. Do not silo “new business” teams from “existing business” teams. For a 360-degree view of your customers you need, as the phrase suggests, perspectives from and attention to all the ways your entire organization influences how much customers love your brand.

• CX is good for the bottom line. CX insights have helped organizations across the globe improve their operational effectiveness (saving money) and identify new ways to delight customers (making money). A fully integrated, organization-wide, 360-degree CX program is not just nice to have. It can mean the difference between merely surviving and actively thriving as an organization.

We hope you enjoy Kirsti’s presentation as much as we did. You can also watch it on our YouTube channel here.

Want to learn more about how to positively impact the 360 customer experience in each department of your organization? Check our 6-part CX360 Leader Insights series:

Part 1: Are Your Customers Delighted? Would They Give You a Second Chance?

Part 2: Do you know what type of experience customers expect from your brand?

Part 3: Do you know what it’s like to be one of your company’s customers?

Part 4: Do you understand what your customers are trying to accomplish?

Part 5: Are You Taking Advantage of Every Opportunity to Satisfy, Impress, or Even Amaze Your Customers?

Part 6: Do you think of your employees as customers? Paying attention to a happy workplace pays dividends.