Showing posts with label beyond philosophy. Show all posts
Showing posts with label beyond philosophy. Show all posts

Saturday, September 15, 2012

Its all about Emotions – Highest level of Customer (Human) Experience


Emotional Intelligence – one of the best selling books by Danial Goleman, Emotional Campaigns like McDonald’s campaign says I am loving it (not about rational need of taste, delivery, ambiance or people) . Zappos .com slogan is Delivering Happiness (what shoe retailer has to do with customer happiness? Ask Tony CEO of Zapoos.com or read his book Delivering Happiness. Happiness is the highest form of emotions, check pyramid below.) , KBC previous and present versions are based on emotional stories of the participants. Its now less on prize money and more focus on human emotional stories.  Author of the book The New Leaders Says  
” Acknowledge Emotions, Hire for Emotions, Evaluate for Emotions, Promote for Emotions, Lead by Emotions, Follow by Emotions, Sell Emotions ” .
Emotions are most important factor in every human being. French thinker had said ” Our rational decisions are driven by our emotions. ”  
Elite companies have started using emotions in their campaigns. But is it enough? Unless customers see similar signs in the offerings they will neither become loyal nor advocates of the brand. Where do we put our loyalty in our personal life?  Of-course with family and friends with whom we have emotional associations and not just rational. 
Therefore when we talk about customer experience, unless we focus and map emotions of customers at every touch points , we are failing in true measurement of customer experience. This is the reason perhaps we have experience of commoditsation of most of the products and services. Every companies are focused on efficiency of processes, cost cutting, call centers outsourcing , appointment of Customer Service people and many such things. Every companies are doing the same level of improvement and end result is commodity product for customers. But now what next?
How about changing company culture ?  How about  measuring customer emotions and mapping it for desired outcome?  
When we are dealing with any aspects of human being we have to consider human being as a whole i.e rational, emotional and subconscious. Present system of customer service or very little experience measures rational aspects of customer service or experience. However customer always experience company offerings and moments of contacts with emotional and subconscious mind also. 
How to go about this ?
(Pyramid developed by Beyond Philosophy-  Which emotions creates value and which ones destroy )
Put your organisation on NPS driven performance measurement. Business growth is limited part of the story  , NPS lead growth is what companies must aim for sustenance.  NPS will only grow reasonably if customer experience is bettered on every given day with holistic approach of mapping emotional behavior of the customers. It enables the organisation to become sensitive and designing emotion altering customer experience for desired end results. Measuring & Mapping emotions is the new regular.  
Its a win win win for all the stake holders i.e.  company , customer and society at large. Emotions are contagious. Happy and pleased customers will spread the feelings and emotions along with company brand.   How are you feeling today? 
Share your stories and emotions with brands you have encountered. Brands could be company or individual. 

Friday, July 27, 2012

Are you mapping WOW!! on your Customer’s Face?


Customer Experience is the next new and now management practice. NEXT has quickly become NEW and NOW.
Commodity, Product, Services, Experience , this is the hierarchy of business offerings as defined by father of customer experience Pine & Gilmore in their famous book The Experience Economy. Most Companies struggle in 1st two categories , some reach to third level and very few reaches the 4th level. 
Companies like Starbucks , Virgin , Apple, Zappos, Amazon, Flipkart, Commerce Bank thrives on superior customer experience. There are unfortunately hardly any Indian brands which can be classified in the 4th category. 
Reasons may be that Indian Customers are either not demanding or there is no culture at the top of offering wow !! CUSTOMER Experience. Most management are so tied up in day to day affairs in managing quarterly results, no one in the organisation thinks long term brand building interest of the company.  As steroids they take shelter under extravagant advertising and media campaigns. Hardly anything changes however at ground level.  Everyone’s performance bonus is linked with quick results and not with sustainable results.
It requires culture of WOW !!! at the top , thinking on HOW ?  and  action plan (which may take longer time) to change the organisation culture.  Performance parameters MUST change and should be linked to increase of Net Promoter Scorecard (NPS) and not only financial performance. Financial performance today which is not guaranteed tomorrow is hardly of much use.  Linking it with NPS will ensure that long term interest of the company is also taken care of.
If your existing customers are promoters of your brand half the battle is won. Today hardly any Indian brands know what is their NPS , forget about action to improve the same.   Some customer sensitive companies have customer feedback system but either they do not know what to ask as their questions are irrelevant or do not know what to do after the data is collected.
However off late very very few companies have started appointing Chief Experience Officers (CExO).  It’s just a very tiny beginning. Still we have to see how they are able to improve their customer experience. One such company I know is Club Mahindra. However if you look at customer reviews on the Google/mouthshut.com it’s horrible. Customers are happy with their locations but not the way pre sales to post sales and actual stays are handled. Hope CExO will address especially pre sales ways, posts sales booking & at stay customer care issues asap.
Now when we are going to buy most of our products after reviewing online review, how important it is to offer amazing customer experience? Isn’t it critical?  No amount of smart advertising & smart sales person can replace culture of offering wow !! customer experience.   Are we working to see following expression on your customer’s face?
 If yes, its your market or work hard to transform Commoditised offerings into Experiential offerings. 
In order to bring wow !! culture in Indian Companies I have tied up with UK based Consulting firm Beyond Philosophy , customer experience focus consulting firm, as their India Associate.