CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE
An Open Letter To
Marketers: Customer
Experience Is The New
Marketing!
By Dr. Lucy Kiruthu
with unnecessary irrelevant marketing
messages unless they have signed up for
them. We consider it vital to understand
each customer’s needs.
Through the Customer Relationship
Management (CRM) system, we like to
capture individual customer preference
where possible so that we can offer
customized
experiences.
Listening
more to our customer helps us better
understand their needs.
Building Strong
Relationships
Dear Marketers,
We need not much of an introduction. As
customer experience practitioners, we have
sat across and besides you in open offices
and along the corridors we have been next
door. We have held numerous discussions
on what customer experience is and what it
is not. In most of the discussions, we have
come to a common understanding that our
roles are closely intertwined.
It is for this reason that we continue to beg
to have a say in what goes on in the world
of marketing. Already, you have allowed us
to take a leadership role in many aspects of
marketing. It has not been an easy journey
walking behind and besides you. However,
we are happy that we have made major
strides in making our companies more
focused on the customer.
We write to share some very good news.
Maybe there is not anything new about
the news but definitely there is something
exciting to us about the news. The best way
to share the news is to first of all be in
agreement that without the customer, our
businesses would not exist.
That said, we both work towards creating
a loyal customer base. While some of
the marketing efforts are focused on
attracting new customers, all of our
customer experience efforts are focused
on the existing customers. We strongly
believe that by focusing on the existing
customer, we easily attract new customers.
This is because our happy customers turn
into brand ambassadors. Not only do they
share a positive word with everyone who
cares to listen but they bring their friends,
relatives, neighbours, colleagues with them
While some of the marketing efforts are
focused on attracting new customers, all
of our customer experience efforts are
focused on the existing customers. We
strongly believe that by focusing on the
existing customer, we easily attract new
customers. This is because our happy cus-
tomers turn into brand ambassadors.
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to make use of our services and products.
This is at the core of our good
news; customer experience is the
new marketing. It is not enough for
companies to attract new customers,
they must put greater effort in retaining
their existing customers who in turn
bring in new customers.
Here are a few examples that make us
feel that unless we recognize customer
experience as the new marketing, we
will be steering our organizations in the
wrong direction:
Understanding Customer’s
Needs
The last time a customer received a
marketing message from you they might
have taken offense. They may have felt
that you did not know them or even
understand their needs. Why do you
choose to fill customer inboxes with
promotional messages for products they
do not need? A recent survey by blue
research shows that “94% of customers
discontinue communication with a
company because of irrelevant messages”.
In customer experience we like to
consider every customer as a segment
of one. This is because every customer
has unique needs. For example, we do
not advocate spamming of customers
We are aware that since time immemorial
marketing has focused on building
relationships. However, it is customer
experience that has taken those
relationships to the next level. This is
because relationships management is at
the centre of customer experience. We
are passionate about relationships and it
shows. As customer experience experts,
we advocate for a personal touch.
We are known to handle all types of
customer complains. Some of these
complaints result from promises made
through marketing messages but not kept.
The same teams have taken over social
media management. Initially considered
a marketing channel, today, social media
is a customer experience avenue. It is
our desire to have painless and seamless
experiences across all channels so that we
can build strong relationships based on
trust.
Finally, we are convinced that connecting
emotionally with our customers does
not merely result from an emotive
advertisement, it happens at every point
of interaction. It is through interactions
with our customers that we build strong
long lasting relationships.
Customer Feedback
Marketers have made reference to word
of mouth, to consumer insights, consumer
behaviour, market research and the like.
In customer experience we have chosen to
keep it simple and make reference to the
importance of customer feedback.
We take every customer’s feedback
seriously. Remember the 2017 Christmas
when you sent a gift that was rejected?
We doubt that you do because once
again last Christmas you made the same
blunder. Did you really capture and store
the customer’s feedback?
When we receive a complaint, we follow
through until it is resolved. If the feedback
is a compliment we pat our colleagues on
the back and build on it. The feedback we
receive from our customers is captured in
the CRM and pops up as needed.
In fact, since we had the conversation about
Christmas gifts we have created a new tab
to capture Christmas gift preference so we
do not make the same blunder this year.
We consider customer feedback to be the
best measure of customer satisfaction and
loyalty.
The Brand Promise
Every brand has a promise both internal
and external. As marketers you have
worked extra hard to create strong brands.
However, in most organizations, there
seems to be a disconnect between the
brand messaging and the end-to-end
customer experience. The marketplace
today is very competitive and brands can
no longer differentiate themselves through
price or product offerings alone.
As customer experience practitioners, we
believe that everybody in an organization
has a customer experience responsibility.
In addition, we believe that for us to
build strong brands that excel in external
customer experience we must start by
focusing internally on employee experience.
As such, focusing on employee experience
and external customer experience is an
important investment that every brand
needs to make to survive.
We have been rethinking about the
alignment between our brands’ promise,
employee experience and customer
experience and we believe that our
organizational culture is what drives this
alignment.
But What Exactly Is
Customer Experience?
There are many schools of thought
regarding what customer experience is.
Fortunately, these schools have some key
areas of agreement.
First customer experience is defined by
how our customers feel when they interact
with us before, during or after a sale.
When they feel great about the brand they
are interacting with then their experience
has been great and vice versa.
Secondly, customer experience does not
just happen, it has to be premeditated,
well defined and lived every day. As such,
it should not be left to chance.
A final area of agreement is the enormous
leadership responsibility in making great
customer experiences a way of life. This
is because leaders have a major influence
on the culture of an organization. There is
strong link between culture and customer
focus. When we drive a culture of service
excellence we make inroads to offering
great experiences across the organization.
Final Words
I believe that it is now crystal clear that
customer experience is the new marketing.
As such, as marketers we urge you to take
greater interest in customer experience.
We would like you to become the number
one customer experience advocates.
Your marketing budget is often easily
approved, we recommend your number
one consideration be not about advertising
spend but about customer experience
improvement. We promise that the return
on investment from customer experience
improvement initiatives will surpass return
from advertisements spend.
We therefore invite you to join us in
embracing the need for seamless and
painless end-to-end customer experiences.
The world has moved on and customer
experience is today the new marketing.
Let us together see our business scale new
heights because we can!
Yours Sincerely,
Customer Experience Practitioners
Dr. Lucy Kiruthu is a Customer
Experience Strategist and Trainer,
and
CEO
Evolve
Business
Consultants Limited. You can
commune with her on this or related
matters via email at: Lucy@evolve-
consultants.com, or Connect via
twitter @KiruthuLucy.