Are you optimizing the customer experience?
- 2. Using Online Communities to Optimize the Customer Experience The innovative and collaborative ways organization can leverage online communities to inform and enhance the customer experience.
- 3. PRESENTED BY Whitney Miller, Ph.D. Director, Insights at Passenger Whitney is a corporate anthropologist & digital strategist and applies her craft to help organizations obtain the community engagement necessary for generating actionable insights, accelerating innovation and inspiring advocacy from customers and employees. Since receiving her Ph.D. in cultural anthropology from Harvard, Miller has worked in the communications and insights space in various capacities – Communications Consultant at Hall & Partners, Senior Manager of Insights at Viacom, and most recently as a Brand Futurist and Senior Director of Consumer Insights at an agency focused on luxury brands including automotive clients Ford and Lincoln Mercury. At Passenger, Whitney is responsible for working with all teams to provide strategic insights to help address client’s business objectives. Michael Lowenstein, Ph.D., CMC Thought Leadership Principal for Beyond Philosophy Michael is Thought Leadership Principal for Beyond Philosophy, an international customer-centricity and customer experience training, planning and research consultancy, a member of the Advisory Council of Villanova University’s Center for Business Analytics, and Adjunct Marketing Instructor at Rutgers University School of Business’ Executive Education Program. He specializes in customer life cycle management, strategic/profitable customer relationships, customer behavior research, customer-centric enterprise design, and employee performance research, consulting, and training. He is the author of six customer-centric strategy books and over 200 white papers and articles.
- 4. USING ONLINE COMMUNITIES TO OPTIMIZE THE CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE why are we talking about the customer experience? what drives positive and negative customer experiences? what impact does the customer experience have on brands? how does it impact brands? how to create a more ‘human’ experience?
- 5. THERE IS A NEW NORMAL Customers are more empowered than ever before and they expect you to ask for their opinion … then, they expect you to listen and respond To adapt to these market changes, brands must adopt a collaborative approach where customers are integrated into every business unit from marketing to sales to innovation Online communities can help facilitate this new relationship between you and your customers
- 6. WHY ARE WE TALKING ABOUT THIS?
- 7. of buying experiences are based on how the customer feels they are being treated. (McKinsey) or sooner, customer experience will overtake price and product as the key brand differentiator. (Customers 2020 Report) of companies expect to increase their focus on customer experience measurements and metrics. (Temkin Group) reduction in your customer defection rate can increase your profitability by 25 to 125%. (Leading on the Edge of Chaos, Emmet Murphy and Mark Murphy)5% 70% 2020 84%
- 8. How Beyond Philosophy defines customer experience: A customer experience is an interaction between an organization and a customer as perceived through a customer’s conscious and subconscious mind. It is a blend of an organization’s rational performance, the senses stimulated and emotions evoked, and it is intuitively measured against customer expectations across all moments of contact.
- 9. ROLE OF ONLINE COMMUNITY Online communities allow companies to connect customers with employees and each other, provide customers with valuable content, insight and advice, and provide platforms for them to express their opinions and be heard Use qualitative tools such as live chats, surveys, login polls to ask your customers questions to find attributes that are associated with satisfaction or dissatisfaction. These hubs help companies improve the customer experience, increase sales, augment customer loyalty and generate increased company awareness HOW?
- 10. WHAT DRIVES POSITIVE AND NEGATIVE CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE?
- 11. CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE DRIVERS Keeping Promises Trend- Setting Overall Perceived Value Speed of Problem Resolution Clarity of Commun- ication Positive Reputation Products/ Services That Meet Needs Customer Care Simplicity Innovative Products Product/ Service Quality Product Reliability Treatment as a Valued Customer Honesty Multi Channel Authenticity & Transparency Time- liness Billing Accuracy Knowledge Of Staff Service Proaction
- 12. WHAT IMPACT DOES IT HAVE?
- 13. A DOMINO EFFECT 1 person will share a negative experience with between 10 and 20 people* * White House Office of Consumer Affairs The consumer shares their experiences to their networks, both online and offline, which shapes future customer behavior.
- 14. Corporate and brand image is as important as product and service performance. Communities offer the opportunity to understand and leverage what elements of the customer experience most contribute to brand image and reputation. All contribute to trust building, which is central to customer behavior. ON CORPORATE AND BRAND IMAGE
- 15. HOW?
- 16. ONLINE COMMUNITIES CAN… Build customer brand familiarity Enhance brand within the consideration set Understand customer experience and value delivery relative to promises and expectations Assess brand credibility, image, and reputation, expressed from an emotional/trust perspective Gauge customer likelihood to understand the brand message, and share it in a positive manner 1. 2. 3. 4. 5.
- 17. TO… Give your customer’s a personal investment in your brand and it’s success Become more transparent and open Connect with customers through branded emotional experiences Sustain value delivery in being seen as a conscious capitalist 1. 2. 3. 4.
- 18. CONNECT WITH CUSTOMERS The most valuable customers appreciate and want more personalization, a relationship, and an emotional connection. a) identify the strongest emotional drivers and b) effectively leverage them IT’S UP TO ORGANIZATIONS TO…
- 19. HOW TO CREATE A MORE “HUMAN” EXPERIENCE AND PERCEPTION
- 20. PROVIDE A TRUST-BASED CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE Branding, and connection to the organization, is always a personal response. Companies have begun to understand this on a more fundamental level. Especially in terms of how they need to become less institutional and more accessible and social, transparent, and trustworthy in the minds of customers. Community is a key way they can both understand this, and also explore concepts for making the enterprise more socially conscious. Online communities represent a tool and an environment for helping brands be more open, authentic, collaborative, transparent, and innovative. trust a firm belief in the reliability, truth, ability or strength of someone or something “ ”
- 21. BOTTOM-LINE BENEFITS 1. Lower customer service costs 2. Product/concept beta testing 3. Customer value research 4. Discovery, Innovation, and Advocacy
- 22. THANK YOU! Whitney Miller, Ph.D. Director, Insights at Passenger wmiller@thinkpassenger.com Michael Lowenstein, Ph.D., CMC Thought Leadership Principle for Beyond Philosophy mwlowenstein@gmail.com