Customer Experiance

7/30/2019 Customer Experiance

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NORTH-EASTERN HILL UNIVERSITY

Umshing Mawkynroh, Shillong 793022, Meghalaya

METAS OF SEVENTH DAY ADVENTIST

P.O. Box No. 24, Athwa Gate, Surat-1

SPECIALIZATION:

MARKETING

TOPIC OF THE PROJECT

CONSUMER EXPERIENCE:

CENTRAL MALL, SURAT

STUDENT NAME

SHIVANGI RANKA

I.D. NO.

R079

FACULTY NAME

Mr. ZACK SIR

DATE OF SUBMISSION

16TH

April , 2012


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ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

It gives me immense pleasure in acknowledging the valuable assistance and co-operation

I received from the people around me for the successful completion of my internship.

I would like to express my sincere thanks to Project Guide, MANAGER, CENTRAL

MALL, SURAT for providing me opportunity to work with him. I feel indebted to him for his

constant support, encouragement, guidance and inspiration all through my association with him.

I would also be greatful to him for his co-operation and providing me various facilities to work

with him.

I earnestly express my gratitude to our able and competent faculty guide Mr. ZACK SIR

Faculty, Seventh Day Adventist College, Surat. His support and full-fledged guidance,

encouragement and valuable suggestion were instrumental in making this project.

Completing this project would not have been possible without active assistance of mutual fund

team with whom I was working despite their busy schedule. All of them were quite generous to

devote time and energy in answering my queries, solving my problems and passing me valuable

amount of Knowledge towards my study of CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE AT CENTRAL

MALL, SURAT. My association with them and the short stint at CENTRAL MALL. will

always be of a fond memory.Thanks are also to my family, friends, and colleagues who were with me through all

times ad egged me on towards accomplishing this project objective.

SHIVANGI RANKA Date: - APRIL 16TH 2012

(R079)


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TABLE OF CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION ............................................................................................................................................ 4

ABOUT THE COMPANY ......................................................................................................................... 8

OBJECTIVES ........................................................................................................................................... 18

REASERCH METHODOLOGY ............................................................................................................ 20

SCOPE OF THE STUDY......................................................................................................................... 23

CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE .................................................................................................................. 25

Customer Experience Strategies for 2011 ................................................................................ 65

ANALYSIS ................................................................................................................................................ 70

LIMITATIONS OF THE PROJECT ..................................................................................................... 82

LIMITATIONS OF THE PROJECT ..................................................................................................... 83SUGGESION............................................................................................................................................. 84

& ................................................................................................................................................................. 84

CONCLUSION ......................................................................................................................................... 84

BIBLOGRAPHY....................................................................................................................................... 87

ANNEXTURE ........................................................................................................................................... 89


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INTRODUCTION


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INTRODUCTION

A customer (also known as a client, buyer, orpurchaser) is the recipient of

a good, service, product, or idea, obtained from a seller, vendor, or supplierfor a monetary or

other valuable consideration. Customers are generally categorized into two types:

An intermediate customer ortrade customer (more informally: "the trade") who is a dealer

that purchases goods for re-sale.

An ultimate customer who does not in turn re-sell the things bought but either passes

them to the consumer or actually is the consumer.

A customer may or may not also be a consumer, but the two notions are distinct, even though the

terms are commonly confused. A customerpurchases goods; a consumeruses them. An ultimate

customermay be a consumer as well, but just as equally may have purchased items for someone

else to consume. An intermediate customer is not a consumer at all. The situation is somewhat

complicated in that ultimate customers of so-called industrialgoods and services (who are

entities such as government bodies, manufacturers, and educational and medical institutions)

either themselves use up the goods and services that they buy, or incorporate them into other

finished products, and so are technically consumers, too. However, they are rarely called that,

but are rather called industrial customers orbusiness-to-business customers. Similarly,

customers who buy services rather than goods are rarely called consumers.

Six Sigma doctrine places (active) customers in opposition to two other classes of

people: not-customers and non-customers. Whilst customers have actively dealt with a business

within a particular recent period that depends from the product sold, not-customers are either

past customers who are no longer customers or potential customers who choose to do business

with the competition, and non-customers are people who are active in a different market segment

entirely. Geoff Tennant, a Six Sigma consultant from the United Kingdom, uses the following

analogy to explain the difference: A supermarket's customer is the person buying milk at that

supermarket; a not-customer is buying milk from a competing supermarket, whereas a non-

customer doesn't buy milk from supermarkets at all but rather "has milk delivered to the door in

the traditional British way".

Tennant also categorizes customers another way, that is employed outwith the fields

ofmarketing. Whilst the intermediate/ultimate categorization is used by marketers, market
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Service_(economics)http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sellerhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vendorhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Distribution_(business)http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Consumerhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Six_Sigmahttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marketinghttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marketinghttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Six_Sigmahttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Consumerhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Distribution_(business)http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vendorhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sellerhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Service_(economics)


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regulation, and economists, in the world ofcustomer service customers are categorized more

often into two classes:

An external customer of an organization is a customer who is not directly connected to that

organization.

An internal customer is a customer who is directly connected to an organization, and is usually

(but not necessarily) internal to the organization. Internal customers are usually

stakeholders, employees, orshareholders, but the definition also

encompasses creditors and external regulators.

The notion of an internal customerbefore the introduction of which external customers were,

simply, customers was popularized by quality management writerJoseph M. Juran, who

introduced it in the fourth edition of hisHandbook(Juran 1988). It has since gained wide

acceptance in the literature on total quality management and service marketing;[10]and

the customer satisfaction of internal customers is nowadays recognized by many organizations as

a precursor to, and prerequisite for, external customer satisfaction, with authors such

as Tansuhaj, Randall & McCullough 1991 arguing that service organizations that design

products for internal customer satisfaction are better able to satisfy the needs of external

customers.

Customer satisfaction, a business term, is a measure of how products and services

supplied by a company meet or surpass customer expectation. It is seen as a key performance

indicator within business and is part of the four of a Balanced Scorecard.

In a competitive marketplace where businesses compete for customers, customer

satisfaction is seen as a key differentiator and increasingly has become a key element of business

strategy.

However, the importance of customer satisfaction diminishes when a firm has

increased bargaining power. For example, cell phoneplan providers, such

as AT&T and Verizon, participate in an industry that is an oligopoly, where only a few suppliers

of a certain product or service exist. As such, many cell phone plan contracts have a lot offine

print with provisions that they would never get away if there were, say, a hundred cell phone

plan providers, because customer satisfaction would be way too low, and customers would easily

have the option of leaving for a better contract offer.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Customer_servicehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stakeholder_(corporate)http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Employeehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shareholderhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Creditorhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regulator_(economics)http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_M._Juranhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Customer#CITEREFJuran1988http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Total_quality_managementhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Customer#cite_note-FOOTNOTEKelemen200328-9http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Customer#cite_note-FOOTNOTEKelemen200328-9http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Customer_satisfactionhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Customer#CITEREFTansuhajRandallMcCullough1991http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Businesshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Technical_termhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Balanced_Scorecardhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bargaining_powerhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cell_phonehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AT%26Thttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Verizonhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oligopolyhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fine_printhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fine_printhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fine_printhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fine_printhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oligopolyhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Verizonhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AT%26Thttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cell_phonehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bargaining_powerhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Balanced_Scorecardhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Technical_termhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Businesshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Customer#CITEREFTansuhajRandallMcCullough1991http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Customer_satisfactionhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Customer#cite_note-FOOTNOTEKelemen200328-9http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Total_quality_managementhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Customer#CITEREFJuran1988http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_M._Juranhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regulator_(economics)http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Creditorhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shareholderhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Employeehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stakeholder_(corporate)http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Customer_service


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There is a substantial body of empirical literature that establishes the benefits of customer

satisfaction for firms.

Measuring customer satisfaction

Organizations need to retain existing customers while targeting non-customers.

Measuring customer satisfaction provides an indication of how successful the organization is at

providing products and/or services to the marketplace.

Customer satisfaction is an abstract concept and the actual manifestation of the state of

satisfaction will vary from person to person and product/service to product/service. The state of

satisfaction depends on a number of both psychological and physical variables which correlate

with satisfaction behaviors such as return and recommend rate. The level of satisfaction can also

vary depending on other factors the customer, such as other products against which the customer

can compare the organization's products.

Work done by Parasuraman, Zeithaml and Berry (Leonard L) between 1985 and 1988

delivered SERVQUAL which provides the basis for the measurement of customer satisfaction

with a service by using the gap between the customer's expectation of performance and their

perceived experience of performance. This provides the researcher with a satisfaction "gap"

which is semi-quantitative in nature. Cronin and Taylor extended the disconfirmation theory by

combining the "gap" described by Parasuraman, Zeithaml and Berry as two different measures

(perception and expectation) into a single measurement of performance relative to expectation.

The usual measures of customer satisfaction involve a survey with a set of statements

using a Likert Technique or scale. The customer is asked to evaluate each statement in terms of

their perception and expectation of performance of the service being measured. Arguably,

consumers are less complex than some of these surveys tend to portend. They are basically in

two simple states; satisfied or not satisfied. On or off, just like a switch. A business can measure

its customer satisfaction index by relating the aggregates of satisfied customers versus

dissatisfied customers.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SERVQUALhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sample_surveyhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Likert_scalehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Likert_scalehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sample_surveyhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SERVQUAL


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ABOUT THE COMPANY


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ABOUT THE COMPANY

CENTRAL MALL:SHOP, EAT, CELEBRATE

Launched in May 2004 at Bangalore, Central is a showcase, seamless mall and the first of

its kind in India. The thought behind this pioneering concept was to give customers an

unobstructed, pure shopping experience by ensuring the best brands in the Indian market are

available to the discerning Indian customer.

Central offers everything to the urban aspirational shopper. Located in the heart of the

city, Central believes its customers should not travel long distances to reach us. Instead, we must

be present in popular customer destinations.

Central houses over 300 brands across categories such as apparel, footwear and

accessories for women, men, children and infants apart from a whole range of Music, Books,

Coffee Shops, Food Courts, Super Markets (Food Bazaar), Fine Dining Restaurants, Pubs and

Discotheques. The mall also has a separate section for services such as Travel, Finance,

Investment, Insurance, Concert/Cinema Ticket Booking, Bill Payments and other services. In

addition, Central houses Central Square, a dedicated space for product launches, impromptu

events, daring displays, exciting shows, and art exhibitions.

Central is a format of Pantaloon Retail (India) Limited (PRIL), Indias leading retailer

that operates multiple retail formats in both the value and lifestyle segment of the Indian

consumer market. Headquartered in Mumbai, the company operates over 16 million square feet

of retail space, having over 1,000 outlets (including shop-in-shops) across 73 cities in India and

employs over 30,000 people. The companys leading formats include Pantaloons, a chain; of

fashion outlets, Big Bazaar, a unique Indian hypermarket chain; Food Bazaar, a supermarket

chain, and Central. Some of its other formats include Depot, Brand Factory, Blue Sky, Star and

Sitara.

Pantaloon Retail is part of the Future Group which has presence in multiple businesses in

the consumption space including consumer finance, capital, insurance, retail media, mall

development, logistics and brand development.


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CENTRAL: SHOP, EAT, CELEBRATE: SURAT

Origin

The need to create destination malls in India and the vision to become the leading

lifestyle retail store in the country led to the birth of the very first Central in 2004. Located in the

heart of Bangalore: M.G. Road, the first Central stood as the focal point of the city. The name

Central was chosen to suggest that it is a hub for every celebration, a place where people from

all walks of life first think of heading to, when it comes to shopping, eating and having a great

time. The name is styled to suggest exuberance, optimism and an exciting celebration.

Conclusion Central has broken the conventional norm of what shopping meant to the average

Indian shopper and introduced India to the concept of seamless shopping. This provided

shoppers with the ease of not having to step in and out of different outlets, with a wide range of

brands available all in one place. Central caters to a kaleidoscope of people from all walks of life

and all ages, giving them newer and more exciting reasons to celebrate the small and big

moments of life.

Central stands for the exuberant, the vibrant, the exciting. With a lively combination of a

whole lot to shop from, an array of treats to eat and never-ending reasons to celebrate, a trip to

Central turns shopping into ONE BIG CELEBRATION!

Corporate Office:

Jayanagar, 9th Block: 26593099

Registered Office:

Pantaloon Retail (India) Limited Knowledge House, Shyam Nagar,, Jogeshwari (East)

Mumbai, Maharashtra, 400060

MISSION STATEMENT:

"OUR MISSION IS TO PROVIDE ASEAMLESS SHOPPING EXPERIENCE TOCUSTOMERS ACROSS INDIA WITH SHOP,

EAT, CELEBRATE ALL UNDER ONE ROOF.ALL THIS, WHILE REAL WEALTH FOR ALL

STAKEHOLDER."

MISSION


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TIME LINE

Bangalore CentralMay 2004

Hyderabad CentralNovember 2004

Pune CentralApril 2005

Vadodara CentralJanuary 2007

Pune Central2October 2007

Gurgaon CentralApril 2008

Goregaon CentralMay 2008

Vashi CentralSeptember 2008

Indore CentralMay 2009

SoBo CentralJuly 2009

Ahmedabad CentralNovember 2009

Bangalore Central 2December 2009

Vishakhapatnam CentralAugust 2010

surat centralJanuary 2011


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SHOP, EAT, CELEBRATE!

Our Baseline is the very essence on which Central is designed. Enriching the experiences of its

customers and being a part of their celebrations, by giving them everything thats fun to do,

under one roof. SHOP: from over 500 national and international brands spread across different

categories like Menswear, Womenswear, Youthwear, Kidswear, Footwear, Eyewear,

Sportswear, Watches, Cosmetics, Fragrances, Jewellery, Accessories, Toys and much

more.

o MENS WEAR:Formal wear to make a statement in the board room, party wearto shine in style, casual wear that helps you relax and accessories that complete

your look; Central has everything for the men of style.

Formals Casuals Ethnic Party

o WOMENS WEAR: From the hippest apparel, to the trendiest accessories, themost fashionable footwear to stylish partywear; Central offers all for the most

stylish divas in town.

Formals Casuals Ethnic Party Western


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Lingerieo KIDS WEAR: Grow up in style and have all the fun with the widest range of

apparel, footwear, accessories and toys

EAT: the very best in fine dining and the very best in snacking. The food court at Centraloffers customers scrumptious delights across numerous cuisines under a single roof.

CATEGORIES

o Cafo Foodcourto Fine diningo Loungeo QSR

CELEBRATE: every moment of shopping with value added services such as BeautyCentral, Flower Central, Wi-Fi Central, DJ Central, Radio Central and Gift Central.

Customers can take part in innovative and fun activities during the Weekend Celebrations

at Central.

OUR BRAND VALUES:

Great experience

For the many, not the few Relentless innovation Making shopping a celebration Honest, open, caring and fun


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FUTURE GROUP:

Future Group is one of Indias leading business houses with multiple businesses spanning

across the consumption space. While retail forms the core business activity of Future Group,

group subsidiaries are present in consumer finance, insurance, brand development, retail real

estate development, retail media, logistics and information technology. The groups retail

businesses operate around 16 million square feet of retail space in 75 cities and towns and 65

rural locations across India. As on June, 2010, the group operated, 133 Big Bazaar stores, 184

Food Bazaar stores, 48 Pantaloons Fresh Fashion stores and 12 Central stores. The groups

specialty retail formats include, sportswear retailer Planet Sports; electronics retailer eZone;

home improvement chain Home Town and rural retail chain Aadhaar, among others. It also

operates popular shopping portal www.futurebazaar.com.

Future Group believes in developing strong insights on Indian consumers and building

businesses based on Indian ideas, as espoused in the Groups core value of Indianness. The

Groups corporate credo is, Rewrite rules, Retain values.
http://www.futurebazaar.com/http://www.futurebazaar.com/


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CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE IN CENTRAL MALL

WI-FI CENTRAL:

Help the customer stay connected even while they are shopping at the store.

GIFT CENTRAL:

Create enhanced shopping experience for consumer by providing them with innovative gift

wrapping options leading to greater job of shopping and gifting.


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DJ CENTRAL:

Make the shopping experience entertainig by playing the latest hits and consumers request

FLOWER CENTRAL

Create value for consumers by providing them an option to buy a wide range of seasonal flowers

and other floral treats.

RADIO CENTRAL

Update consumers on the latest promotions, events, activity, services and offers in- store.


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BEAUTY CENTRAL

Create an opportunity for consumers to experice beauty product first hand and thereby promote

cosmetic brands.


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OBJECTIVES


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OBJECTIVES:-

To identify the target market. To classify the shoppers on the basis of buying behavior. To know how the shoppers perceive the merchandise and stores brand image. To create a 'customer-pull' environment that increases the amount of impulse

shopping.

To understand customers experience while buying a product at central mall. To study how retailers position the product as a lifestyle product rather than a

traditional product.

To create synergy between product, store and advertisement To know whether the customers perception about the display and layout of various

products at central mall.


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REASERCH

METHODOLOGY


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REASERCH METHODOLOGY

In everyday life human being has to face many problems viz. social, economical,

financial problems. These problems in life call for acceptable and effective solutions and for this

purpose, research is required and a methodology applied for the solutions can be found out.

DATA COLLECTION

Primary Data:

Primary data was collected through survey method by distributing questionnaires to

branch manager and other sales manager. The questionnaires were carefully designed by taking

into account the parameters of my study.

Secondary Data:

Data was collected from books, magazines, web sites, going through the records of the

organisation, etc. It is the data which has been collected by individual or someone else for the

purpose of other than those of our particular research study. Or in other words we can say that

secondary data is the data used previously for the analysis and the results are undertaken for the

next process.

METHODOLOGY

Exploratory Research:

On the basis of the objective shown above , a methodology has been designed to center

the study in and around method.

This project is an exploratory research as it is dependent on both primary data which

would be collected through a questionnaire which had been prepared as per the field survey and

discussion with the concerned individual. The secondary data which has been collected from

various sources.

The project here is based on primary data which would be collected with the help of a

questionnaire. This primary data collection would be done.

The secondary data has also been collected from various literature survey done through

material available in books, internet and journal Different statistical tools and techniques like

SPSS and Microsoft excel have been used for the study.


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Sampling Detail

The sample size taken for the study consist of 100 individual respondent

The sampling technique used would be stratified random sampling, where the sampling

frame has been divided into non- overlapping group or strata. The data obtained has been

analysed with the help of statistical tool.

RESEARCH DESIGN

Data is collected through:

Personal interview with retailers and shoppers. Doing survey with the help of questionnaire among customers at central mall.We have tried to investigate the target consumer through qualitative questions and

quantitative questions.

SAMPLE SPREAD AND SIZE

The study was done only in Surat. Sample of around 100 customers was taken.


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SCOPE OF THE STUDY


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SCOPE OF THE STUDY

The benefit of the study for the research is that it helped to gain knowledge and

experience and also provide the opportunity to study and understand the prevelent CONSUMER

EXPERIENCE PROCESS.

The key point of the research is:

1. To study the fact about the company2. To understand and analyze various consumer experiencee factors followed

in the com-pany

3. To suggest any measure and recommendation for improvement


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CUSTOMER

EXPERIENCE


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CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE

A customer experience definition to guide organizations.

As pioneers in the field of customer experience we have conducted a great deal of

research into what constitutes a customer experience. Much of this research was focused

development of ourfour bestselling books on the subject. As we continue to better understand it,

we also continue to refine our definition.

A customer experience is an interaction between an organization and a customer as

perceived through a customers conscious and subconscious mind. It is a blend of an

organizations rational performance, the senses stimulated and the emotions evoked and

intuitively measured against customer expectations across all moments of contact.

Importantly:

A customer experience is not just about a rational experience (e.g. how quickly a phone is

answered, what hours youre open, delivery time scales, etc.).

More than 50 percent of a customer experience is subconscious, or how a customer feels.

A customer experience is not just about the what, but also about the how.

A customer experience is about how a customer consciously and subconsciously sees his or her

experience.

A brand begins and ends with the customer, and most important to the customer's

perception is the customer experience. Customers will believe their own experience

before they believe advertising...and strong brands are built one customer

experience at a time.

Customer experience (CX) is the sum of all experiences a customer has with a supplier

of goods or services, over the duration of their relationship with that supplier. From awareness,

discovery, attraction, interaction, purchase, use, cultivation and advocacy. It can also be used to

mean an individual experience over one transaction; the distinction is usually clear in context.

Growing recognition

Analysts and commentators who write about customer experience (CX) and customer

relationship management have increasingly recognized the importance of managing the

customer's experience.[1]Customers receive some kind of experience, ranging from positive to

negative, during the course of buying goods and services. Brad Daniels (Business Development
http://www.beyondphilosophy.com/thought-leadership/bookshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Customer_relationship_managementhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Customer_relationship_managementhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Customer_experience#cite_note-0http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Customer_experience#cite_note-0http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Customer_experience#cite_note-0http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Good_(economics)http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Service_(economics)http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Service_(economics)http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Good_(economics)http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Customer_experience#cite_note-0http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Customer_relationship_managementhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Customer_relationship_managementhttp://www.beyondphilosophy.com/thought-leadership/books


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Manager) says that an experience is defined as the sum total of conscious and unconscious

events. As such, a suppliercannot avoid creating an experience every time it interacts with a

customer (2011). Furthermore, it has been shown that a customers perception of an

organisation is built as a result of their interaction across multiple-channels, not through one

channel, and that a positive customer experience can result in increased share of wallet and

repeat business.

A company's ability to deliver an experience that sets it apart in the eyes of its customers

serves to increase their spend with the company and, optimally, inspire loyalty to its brand.

"Loyalty," says Jessica Debor, "is now driven primarily by a company's interaction with its

customers and how well it delivers on their wants and needs." (2008)

To create a superior customer experience requires understanding the customer's point of

view, say Don Peppers and Martha Rogers, Ph.D inRules to Break and Laws to Follow. "What's

it really like to be your customer? What is the day-in, day-out 'customer experience' your

company is delivering? How does it feel to wait on hold on the phone? To open a package and

not be certain how to follow the poorly translated instructions? To stand in line, be charged a fee,

wait for a service call that was promised two hours ago, come back to an online shopping cart

that's no longer there an hour later? Or what's it like to be remembered? To receive helpful

suggestions? To get everything exactly as it was promised? To be confident that the answers you

get are the best ones for you?" (Peppers and Rogers 2008)

In short, customer experience meaning a customer journey which makes the customer

feel happy, satisfy, justify, with a sense of being respected, served and cared, according to his/her

expectation or standard, start from first contact and through the whole relationship.

Emerging Business Requirement

With products becoming commoditized, price differentiation no longer sustainable and

customers demanding more, companies and communication service providers

(wireline, wireless,broadband cable, satellite) in particularare focusing on delivering superior

customer experiences. A 2009 study of over 860 corporate executives revealed that companies

that have increased their investment in customer experience management over the past three

years report higher customer referral rates and customer satisfaction (Strativity Group, 2009).

This finding is also supported by research completed by software company Chordiant in 2008

into the customer experience management performance of large organisations across Europe.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Distributor_(business)http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brandhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interactionhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Differentiation_(economics)http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wireline_(cabling)http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wirelesshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Broadbandhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cablehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Satellitehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chordianthttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chordianthttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Satellitehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cablehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Broadbandhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wirelesshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wireline_(cabling)http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Differentiation_(economics)http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interactionhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brandhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Distributor_(business)


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The research surveyed 450 large organisations to create a maturity model and the results showed

that over of the organisations surveyed achieved level 3 (of 5) or less for CEM performance (5

being best possible result). The results also showed that performance in four key business areas

(market share, retention, profitability, and customer satisfaction) was directly related to CEM

performance.

The customer experience has emerged as the single most important aspect in achieving

success for companies across all industries (Peppers and Rogers 2005).[7]For example, Starbucks

spent less than $10MM on advertising from 1987 to 1998 yet added over 2,000 new stores to

accommodate growing sales. Starbuckspopularity is based on the experience that drove its

customers to highly recommend their store to friends and family.

Customer Experience Management

The goal of customer experience management (CEM) is to move customers from

satisfied to loyal and then from loyal to advocate. Traditionally, managing the customer

relationship has been the domain of Customer Relationship Management (CRM). However,

CRM strategies and solutions are designed to focus on product, price and enterprise process, with

minimal or no focus on customer need and desire. The result is a sharp mismatch between the

organisations approach to customer expectations and what customers actually want, resulting in

the failure of many CRM implementations.

Where CRM is enterprise-focused and designed to manage customers for maximum

efficiency, CEM is a strategy that focuses the operations and processes of a business around the

needs of the individual customer. Companies are focusing on the importance of the experience

and, as Jeananne Rae notes, realizing that building great consumer experiences is a complex

enterprise, involving strategy, integration oftechnology, orchestrating business models, brand

management and CEO commitment. (2006)[9]

According to Bernd Schmitt, "the term 'Customer Experience Management' represents

the discipline, methodology and/or process used to comprehensively manage a customer's cross-

channel exposure, interaction and transaction with a company, product, brand or

service."[10]Customer experience solutions provide strategies, process models, and information

technology to design, manage and optimize the end-to-end customer experience process.

CEM systems
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One of the key features of successful CEM implementations is their ability to manage

multi-channel interactions. Customer experience solutions address the cross-channel (contact

center, Internet, self service, mobile devices, brick and mortar stores), cross-touchpoint (phone,

chat, email, Web, in-person), and cross-lifecycle (ordering, fulfillment, billing, support, etc.)

nature of the customer experience process. By contrast, CRM solutions tend to offer point

solutions for specific customer-facing functions such as, but not limited to, sales force

automation, customer analytics, and campaign management.

Experience-based providers also integrate both internal and external innovations to create

end-to-end customer experiences. They evaluate their business models as well as business

support systems and operational support systems (BSS/OSS) from the customers point of view

to achieve the level of customer-centricity necessary to improve customer loyalty, churn

and revenue (Lopez, 2007).
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The Importance Of Great Customer Experiences...

And The Best Ways To Deliver Them

Customer experience is one of the great frontiers for innovation. Although the concept

was first invented by Joe Pine and Jim Gilmore in their 1998 HARVARD BUSINESS

REVIEWarticle, most companies have been slow to grasp it. Yet I predict that customer

experience will decide the winners and losers in the years ahead. Here's why:

RAVING FANS

Excellent customer experiences are still so novel that, when we have one, we talk about it. Ask

anyone who has bought a Mini Cooper. This kind of viral phenomenon creates buzz in the

marketplace and generates more revenue than traditional marketing.

LOYALTY

A stable base of existing customers makes it easier to boost both top and bottom line growth.

Some 80% of Starbucks' (SBUX) revenues come from customers who visit their stores an

average of 18 times a month.

PREMIUM PRICING

Customers will gladly pay more for an experience that is not only functionally but emotionally

rewarding. Companies skilled at unlocking emotional issues and building products and services

around them can widen their profit margins.

DIFFERENTIATION

The degree of choice in goods and services is bewildering. A history of sustained positive

customer experiences increases the chance that a new product gets chosen over its competitors.

COMPANIES THAT DELIVER EXEMPLARY CUSTOMER EXPERIENCES SHARE A

SET OF INTEGRATED BUSINESS DISCIPLINES THAT DRIVE THEIR SUCCESS.

CONSIDER THESE:

MOMENTS OF TRUTH

Great customer experiences are full of surprising "wow" moments. For customers of Starwood

Hotels & Resorts (HOT), owner of the "W" and Westin chains, the moment of truth comes

when they walk through the door of their hotel room and see the bed. Starwood execs believe

that clean, sumptuous linens strike an emotional chord with their clientele, put off by seeing
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dark-colored, dirty-looking bedspreads. It didn't make financial sense initially to go with fancy

bed linens, but the loyalty and buzz they've generated more than justify the expense.

BRAND VALUES

Well-articulated brands are the lodestar of customer experience. In a world of competing

alternatives, they provide guidance for customers and managers. Witness Whole Foods Market

(WFMI). Everywhere you look in its stores, the company's brand values are evident: Sell the

highest-quality foods, satisfy and delight customers, support communities, promote

environmental stewardship, etc. Everything in Whole Foods reflects the brand, leading to a

satisfying interaction for each of the chain's customers.

TECHNOLOGY AND PEOPLE

Link information-technology strategy with human resources management. Bottom-line magic

can happen when technology is deployed to keep customers happy and coming back. IT can

profile the most profitable customers and help managers focus their human resources on keeping

them happy. Ritz-Carlton, Progressive Insurance (PGR), and Harrah's Entertainment do this.

CO-CREATION

Allow your customers to help create their own experience. You know this phenomenon is at

work when people say, "TiVo (TIVO) has changed my life!" Enter a machine that allows you to

see what you want when you want it, and bingo! TV is a whole new game wherein the viewer

makes the rules. This creates value for discerning people who want television to work for them

instead of against them. To cope with the modern world, people want more control.

AN ECOSYSTEM APPROACH

Focus on a constellation of products and services that deliver a seamless, wonderful

experience to people. The iPod, of course, is the best example of this approach. The iPod

ecosystem includes hardware, software, the iTunes site -- first with songs, now with video and

accessories -- to manage your music or videos.

Building great consumer experiences is a complex enterprise, involving strategy,

integration of technology, orchestrating business models, brand management, and CEO

commitment. It's harder than you think.
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THE THREE "DS" OF CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE

Call it the dominance trap: The larger a company's market share, the greater the risk it

will take its customers for granted. As the money flows in, management begins confusing

customer profitability with customer loyalty, never realizing that the most lucrative buyers may

also be the angriest and most alienated. Worse, traditional market research may lead the firm to

view customers as statistics. Managers can become so focused on the data that they stop hearing

the real voices of their customers.

Financial software powerhouse Intuit briefly fell into this trap, despite a history of

excellent customer service. In 2001, its Turbo Tax program commanded 70 percent of the retail

market for tax-preparation software and 83 percent of the online market. But then it began doing

things that annoyed customers, such as upping the price of tech-support calls and limiting

software licenses to one computer. Store-based retail growth flattened, and as Web-based tax

preparation sites sprang up, online buyers started jumping ship. In 2003, Turbo Tax's share of the

online market plummeted.

A recent Bain & Company survey reveals just how commonly companies misread the

market. We surveyed 362 firms and found that 80 percent believed they delivered a "superior

experience" to their customers. But when we asked customers about their own perceptions, we

found that they rated only 8 percent of companies as truly delivering a superior experience.

Clearly, it's easy for leading companies to assume they're keeping customers happy; it's quite

another thing to achieve that kind of customer devotion.

So what sets the elite 8 percent apart? We found that they take a distinctively broad view

of the customer experience. Unlike most companies, which reflexively turn to product or service

design to improve customer satisfaction, the leaders pursue three imperatives simultaneously:

They design the right offers and experiences for the right customers. They deliver these propositions by focusing the entire company on them with an

emphasis on cross-functional collaboration.

They develop their capabilities to please customers again and againby such means asrevamping the planning process, training people in how to create new customer

propositions, and establishing direct accountability for the customer experience.


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Each of these "Three Ds" draws on and reinforces the others. Together, they transform

the company into one that is continually led and informed by its customers' voices.

Designing the right propositionsMost large companies are adept at dividing customers into segments and designing value

propositions for each one. But those that deliver a truly outstanding customer experience

go about the design business in a unique way. In defining segments, they look not only at

customers' relative probability but also at their tendency to act as advocates for the

companyto sing its praises to friends.

Customer advocacy can be summarized as a net

promoter score, calculated as the percentage of

customers who would recommend a company (the

promoters) minus the percentage that would urge

friends to stay away (the detractors). Because such a

simple measure is understandable to all parts of a company, it can serve to rally and coordinate

the entire organization. As described in the sidebar "Thinking Clearly About Customers," the

ultimate goal is to shift ever more customers into the high-profit, high-advocacy area.

Of course, the experiences that turn passive buyers into active promoters will vary by customer

segment. What captivates one group may turn off another. In formulating segments, therefore,

it's important to look beyond basic demographic and purchasing data to discern customers'attitudes and even personalities.

Vodafone offers a good example. The U.K.-based mobile phone company grew rapidly through

acquisitions in the 1990s, becoming one of the leading mobile providers in the world. To ensure

that its offerings could be effectively delivered to target customers in any country, it stopped

categorizing its customers simply according to where they live, as most cellular providers do.

Instead, it divided its immense marketplace into just a few, high-priority global segments:

"young, active, fun" users, occasional users, and a handful of others.

It then developed targeted, experience-focused value propositions. The "young, active, fun"

group was offered Vodafone live!, a state-of-the-art service that provides everything from games

and pop-song ring tones to news, sports, and information. Occasional users were offered

Vodafone Simply, which, as noted in the Vodafone Group's 2005 annual report, provided an

"uncomplicated and straightforward mobile experience." Such clearly delineated service

Theultimate goalis to shift ever

more customers into the high-

profit, high-advocacy area.


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platforms allowed everyone in the organization to understand strategic priorities and focus on

innovations that would better serve the segments.

In designing propositions for specific segments, leaders focus on the entire customer experience.

They recognize that customers interact with different parts of the organization across a number

of touchpoints, including purchase, service and support, upgrades, billing, and so on. A company

can't turn its customers into satisfied, loyal advocates unless it takes their experiences at all these

touchpoints into account. Design is thus closely tied to the delivery from the very beginning.

Planning focuses not only on the value propositions themselves but on all the steps that will be

required to deliver the propositions to the appropriate segments.

Delivering value to the customerThe most brilliantly designed and insightful customer offerings can be rendered impotent

by poor execution. To ensure effective delivery, the leaders must first create and motivate

cross-functional teamsfrom marketing to supply chain managementto deliver their

value proposition across the entire customer experience. Second, they must treat

customer interaction as a precious resource. Data mining and customer relationship

management (CRM) systems can be valuable for creating hypotheses, but the ultimate

test of any company's delivery lies in what customers tell others. The best companies find

ways to tune in to customers' voices every day.

One company that's particularly adept at listening to its customers and delivering whatthey want is Superquinn, the Irish grocery chain. Founder and President Feargal Quinn walks

each of his stores' aisles every month, talking to consumers. Twice monthly, he invites twelve

customers to join him for a two-hour roundtable discussion. He asks them about service levels,

pricing, cleanliness, product quality, new product lines, recent displays and advertising

promotions, and so on; he also asks what items they still buy from his competitors and why.

Quinn uses what he learns to evaluate store managers and continually improve the company's

strategy and its execution of that strategy.

For example, Quinn once learned that 25 percent of Superquinn shoppers were not

buying from the stores' bakeries. When he made bakery managers and employees aware of this

statistic and began tracking it, they came up with scores of creative ideas to build traffic.

Customers soon were enticed to visit the bakery by the aroma of freshly made doughnuts; once


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there, they found baskets of warm wedges to sample. Today, more than 90 percent of customers

buy at least one item from the bakery every week.

As Superquinn's experience suggests, people staffing the front lines need to be well hired,

well trained, and well treated if a company is going to deliver on its propositions.

Customer metrics serve an equally critical function: They allow companies to be sure

their delivery continues to meet the needs of the target segments. But traditional metrics, focused

on the performance of individual functions, aren't enough; measures have to be crafted to inspire

cross-functional collaboration.

One example is net promoter scores: Improving them requires a concerted effort from the

front line to the back office. Precise customer service objectives for specific customer

interactions can also help to rally the troops. A bank might create a goal of phoning each new

customer within one week of opening a checking account; a cable company, within a week of

installing a line. Hitting such targets requires specific, coordinated contributions from customer

support, marketing, channel management, and finance.

Leaders also find other, informal ways to let customers tell them whether they're

succeeding. Superquinn awards its customers "goof points" for pointing out anomalies such as an

out-of-stock item, a dirty floor, or a checkout line longer than three people. The goof points

provide discounts off future purchases.

Developing the capabilities to do it again and again

Customer value propositions can never be static; they must be subject to regular

innovation. It's the same with deliveryevery company must improve its performance

quarter after quarter, year after year. Leaders in crafting the customer experience have

established a number of capabilities to achieve this kind of systematic innovation and

improvement. They include:

Tools that aid customer-focused planning and execution. The integrated

marketing plan developed by Vodafone, for instance, unambiguously puts customers at

the top of the company's strategic priorities.

Customer-based metrics and closed feedback loops that establish accountability.

Enterprise Rent-A-Car tracks customer satisfaction with its rental experience on a five-point

scale for every branch, and employees of branches that fall below the corporate averagegetting

top-box scores 80 percent of the timeare ineligible for promotion.


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Customer-focused management incentives. Net promoter scores, for example, are increasingly

used in performance reviews.

Top-performing companies also create processes that seek direct, immediate customer

feedbacknot simply to ensure that things are going well but also to build in methods of

systematic innovation and improvement. SAS Institute, the Cary, North Carolina-based software

company, creates a "SASware Ballot" every year, giving customers a chance to vote on a list of

potential software improvements. EBay employees known as "pinks" monitor the company's

message boards, quickly learning which issues, complaints, and concerns may need attention.

American Express calls customers who don't quickly activate their new cards to find out if

they're having problems.

Intuit turned around TurboTax's online market-share slide by, in part, institutionalizing its

ability to constantly improve its offerings. The company's Consumer Tax Group, which had seen

the biggest share decline, created a 6,000-member "Inner Circle" of customers who agreed to

serve as a kind of ongoing, Web-based focus group.

They supplied basic demographic information, along

with their response to the all-important question "How

likely are you to recommend TurboTax to friends or

colleagues?" They were then asked to explain their No.

1 priority for enhancing service in any aspect of the

customer experience, including shopping, buying, installing, and using tech support.

A follow-up question let them prioritize a list of ten suggestions made by other customers.

The Internet software that collects these ideas allows Intuit to segment customers into groups,

such as promoters and detractors, according to their priorities and issues. Detractors wanted a

new approach to tech support and customer service. Promoters ranked rebate programs as their

top priority for improvement. Intuit probed for details: Where rebates were concerned, was it

awkward proof-of-purchase requirements, slow turnaround times, or the amount of the rebate

that most needed attention?

Thanks to these moves, the Consumer Tax Group was able to redesign its core TurboTax

product, deliver it to the customer more effectively than ever, and maintain a mechanism for

continually developing its related capabilities. Net promoter scores among both first-time users

People staffing thefront linesneed

to be well hired, well trained, and

ell treated.


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and veterans rose dramatically, and the company regained market share in Web-based channels

and renewed share growth in stores.

7As APPROACH TO CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE MANAGEMENT AT STORE LEVEL

Some of the most memorable quotes on Customers are:

"It is not the employer who pays the wages. Employers only handle the money. It is the

customer who pays the wages" - Henry Ford

There is only one boss. The customer. And he can fire everybody in the company from

the chairman on down, simply by spending his money somewhere else"- Sam Walton

In a recent HBR article ("LET EMERGING MARKET CUSTOMERS BE YOUR

TEACHERS",HBR, December 2010), the authors gave out an interesting insight quoting

McKinsey studies. "In developing economies, the retail aisle is where the marketing action is -

it's where the customers make purchasing decisions. McKinsey studies show that in China, for

example, as many as 45% of customers make those decisions inside stores, compared with 24%

in the United States."

Although their study did not include India (the authors conducted a study in 2009 in China,

Poland, Turkey, Brazil, South Africa and Peru), I am sure the results would apply equally well to

Indian retail landscape as well. How to engage the customers at the store level? What kind of

experience should stores offer to the customers that would increase their customer life time

value? How to improve the customer experience at the store level?

To answer these questions, I have developed a model titled - 7 As Approach to Customer

Experience Management at Store Level - that would help retailers orchestrate a better and

delightful customer experience management at the store level. Remember however: It is only

when all these 7As are used simultaneously that the stores can expect better delivered customer

experience and not in isolation.


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CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE MANAGEMENT BEST PRACTICES

Customer experience management is a dedication to serving customer needs

from theirperspective. Customers make paychecks possible, and shareholders leave when

customers leave ... not the other way around. So businesses exist to serve a customer needthat

results in a profitable revenue stream. Customer experience is defined entirely by customers, but

the solution provider defines customer experience management (CEM). The customer is the

judge of whether the experience was acceptable or stellar, or not; CEM seeks to understand the

gap between desired and current experience as seen from the customer's viewpoint, segmented

by the customer's circumstances. Then CEM solves the gap holistically and anticipates the

evolving needs of the customer topreventfuture gaps. 81% OF COMPANIES WITH STRONG

CAPABILITIES AND COMPETENCIES FOR DELIVERING CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE

EXCELLENCE ARE OUTPERFORMING THEIR COMPETITION.(1)

10 Characteristics of Customer Experience

Ten characteristics differentiate CEM from the common knowledge of former initiatives such as

customer satisfaction, loyalty or customer relationship management. The level of understanding

of these characteristics among executives company-wide was assessed in the 2010 ClearAction

B2B CEM Benchmarking Study. The best understood tenets of CEM (top half of graph below)

reflect aspects of customer perception measurement. The lesser known tenets describe the

customer's high degree of control in characterizing customer experience, and the need for

organizations to maintain insatiable curiosity and uncanny adaptability for delivering superior

customer experiences.

Here are the ten ways that customer experience is unique from customer satisfaction:

Perspective: customer experience is defined entirely by the customer, not the solutionprovider.

Preventive: customer experience gravitates toward the easiest and nicest methods to getand use solutions that address customers' needs.

Duration: customer experience encompasses the point from which customers becomeaware they have a need until they say that need is extinct.

Dynamic: customer experience evolves with the customer's context the purpose andcircumstances of their need, and overall experience reference points.
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Choice: customer experience is built on trust and mutual respect for variety; share ofbudget is more important than loyalty.

Multi-faceted: customer experience is measured by functional and emotional (social andpersonal) judgments related to the customers' expectations.

Operational: customer experience is shaped by all the contributors to an organization'sprocesses, policies and culture, in addition to the physical product or service associated

with the customer's need.

Integrative: customer experience is impacted by the degree of alignment amongdepartments, technologies, channels, etc.

Anticipatory: customer experience is ongoing, where the present and future are equally ormore important than the past.

Transparent: customer experience sees through the solution providers motives andintentions, and favors genuine sincerity for the customer's well-being.


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CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE MANAGEMENT SUCCESS FACTORS

CEM has evolved to a more mature, customer centric field with roots in total quality

management and customer satisfaction, and metamorphisis through customer loyalty, customer

relationship management (CRM), experiential marketing, and word-of-mouth marketing. CEM

encompasses all of the above, with an operational emphasis on enterprise-wide engagement

foralignmnent of what you do to your customer's priorities.

Formal business process for CEMo Employee empowerment & engagemento Organizational learning (knowledge management)o Quality tools (Pareto, fishbone, etc.)o Systems thinking\o Change managemento Internal brandingo Recognition and awardso Incentive payo Balanced scorecardso Relationship skills trainingo Benchmarking

Customer Voice:Best practices in customer sentiment monitoring differentiate between enablers of customer

experience (the firm's solution) and customer's desired outcomes, focusing feedback mechanisms

on the customer's world rather than the company's world. Best practics also include:

Identify all the influencers on the buying decision (initiators, approvers, users, buyers,

influencers, gatekeepers, decision-makers)

Collect voice of the customer from all of the influencers on the buying decision Monitor customer perceptions of business transactions Monitor customer perceptions of overall business relationship Involve executives in objective listening sessions with customers Analyze lost sales Track positive and negative word-of-mouth Resolve customer complaints systematically
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Integrate customer feedback sources Analyze integrated customer data Communicate resolution of customer complaints Communicate improvements spurred by poor survey ratings

Customer View:

Best practices create company-wide understanding of customers' priorities and value, including:

Establish a single view of each customer across divisions and regions Stream relevant customer feedback to all parties in the company Calculate customer lifetime value Segment customers based on lifetime value or customer experience parameters Use customer metrics to evaluate organizational performance Include customer metrics in balanced scorecard

Customer Centricity:

Best practices in customer centricity help keep customers' well-being at the center of everyone's

thinking, decisions and behaviors:

Use customer feedback to guide annual operating plan Review business processes from customer perspective Use customer metrics in performance reviews Reward customer experience improvement in team recognition Align incentive pay to customer experience metrics Create department-level action plans to improve customer experience Listen to customer needs prior to product development efforts Base strategic decision-making on customer experience or lifetime value segmentation Base front-line employees decision-making on customer experience or lifetime value

segmentation

View customer experience management as an ongoing journey
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As the dynamics in the customer's world are constantly evolving, an insatiable curiosity

about customers is a key to success. Company-wide alignment with customers prevents waste

(improves profit) and prevents customer hassles (improves organic revenue growth).

ClearAction has personal experience implementing these best practices in large, fast-

paced organizations that emphasized acheiving strong business results. Let us share practical

methodologies and solutions to aid you in your customer experience management journey.

Customer Experience Management:


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CUSTOMEREXPERIENCE MANAGEMENT

What is CEM?

Customer experience is the sum of all experiences a customer has with a supplier of goods or

services, over the duration of their relationship with that supplier. It is believed that successful

businesses influence people through engaging, authentic experiences that render personal value

(HBRPine and Gilmore 1998). A 2009 study of over 860 corporate executives revealed that

companies that have increased their investment in customer experience management over the

past three years reported higher market share, retention, profitability, and customer satisfaction

(Chordiant, 2008, Strativity Group, 2009).

Why is CEM valuable?

Acquiring new customers can cost five times more than satisfying and retaining current

customers.

A 2% increase in customer retention has the same effect on profits as cutting costs by10%.

The average company loses 10% of its customers each year. A 5% reduction in customer defection rate can increase profits by 25-125%, depending

on the industry.

The customer profitability rate tends to increase over the life of a retained customer.

Core Tenants of CEM

CEM is a strategy that focuses the operations and processes of a business around the needs of the

individual customer.

Focus on the importance of the experience.

Disciplined methodology and/or process used to comprehensively manage a customers cross-

channel exposure, interaction and transaction with a company, product, brand or service.

Weaves together strategies, departments, process models, and information technology to design,

manage and optimize the end-to-end customer experience process


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Decooda Goal

The goal of Decooda is to monitor and analyze all multi-channel interactions. We work cross-

channel (contact center, Internet, self service, mobile devices, brick and mortar stores), cross-

touchpoint (phone, chat, email, Web, in-person), and cross-lifecycle (learn, shop, order,

fulfillment, billing, support, loyalty, advocacy, etc.) of the customer experience. We integrate

and analyze all unstructured and structured content from the social sphere, enterprise or from any

other 3rd party to extract meaningful insights from end-to-end customer experiences. Decooda

enables:

Accurate measurement sentiment over any time horizon and at virtually any level,including the individual

Identification of hot topics, emerging trends, and key influencers, and scores them basedon their ability to move the market.

Viewing the communication string between people to identify what drives the greatestmeasurable impact in shaping sentiment and reputation across the competitive social

landscape.


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Quantification of the value of social conversations, brand investments, and market-driven

events that have the greatest impact on the brand, providing valuable insights into the

engagement design and investment reallocation decision process.

Constraint based scenario simulations in a market sand-box to test and validate social

media strategies and engagements prior to making any investments, insuring risk is mitigated and

a clear Return On Marketing Investment is achieved.


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CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE MANAGEMENT PROCESS

"CEM is both Analytical and Creative

CEM is both Strategy and Implementation

CEM's Focus is External and Internal"

As we enter the second half of the first decade of this new millennium, 24/7 Internet

access reaches well over 1 billion people around the globe. Millions perform B2B, B2C or X2X

transactions with millions of suppliers eager to attract their business. In the digital world as well

as in the physical one, buying decisions depend on an immense variety of factors, some of them

rational such as price, features, availability, etc. and many others -perhaps the most important

ones- related to feelings and emotions a particular brand conveys to the buyer. Most companies

in the manufacturing and services industries fight their way through the troubled waters of "red

oceans" as their products and services become more and more commoditized and watch with a

sense of impotency how profits and ROI decrease.

Many CxOs continue doing business as usual, trying to outsmart their competitors and

win their customers' loyalty by means of the oldest and often quite effective - but always short

lived- tactic of price reductions. Others have decided to set distance apart and sail the winds of"blue oceans" creating new markets, innovating their products and services, and crafting

unparalleled and enduring experiences for their customers. We immediately recognize successes

like iPod, YouTube, SecondLife, Palm Island, Burj Tower in Dubai, Google Earth, Mandarin

Oriental Hotel, Nike, Cirque du Soleil, Starbucks and hundreds of other products and services,

as being unique and different We become aware that captivating customers is not a matter of

price anymore, but a matter of well-thought, well-designed and well-executed customer

experiences.

Today we all are talking about a new paradigm - CEM - that emphasizes emotions,

feelings, sentiments, passions and experiences that we hardly heard of when we used to work

around CRM principles. The community is coming to terms and beginning to differentiate

between CRM as being mainly transaction oriented, and CEM as being process oriented. CRM

focuses on knowing the consumer to suit the seller needs, CEM on understanding the consumer


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to suit her needs, acquire foresight and maintain an emotional relationship. The bottom line is

that no matter which business you are in, the only way to climb to the top of the mountain - and

stay there - is by having a customer-centric strategy the results of which are customers fascinated

by the experience you provide them with -to the extend that that they will keep coming and

coming for more and more of it. Did I say loyalty?

This strategy should use some levers to facilitate the climbing. One of these levers is

without any doubt, the adoption of a process approach that will enable us to manage the

customer experience: to monitor, control and measure what really matters to her and at the end,

to respond quickly to her varying demands and expectations. Designing, implementing and

managing a CEM program requires some basic concepts which in essence are no different from

those in other programs targeted at obtaining the results our customers and stakeholders expect,

namely value and a unique and memorable experience on the one hand; and revenue, profits and

cash flow on the other.

It requires a disciplined approach that begins with a strong "raison d'??tre", high level

sponsorship, a mature customer centric culture, fully committed personnel with the right skills, a

qualified team able to work smarter - not harder - to get it right and a strong champion. Piece of

cake huh?

First the pants, then the shoes

Process methodology is there to help us bridge the gaps created by organizational silos

(marketing, manufacturing, billing, etc.) that prevent a seamless execution of our customer

experience strategy and restrain our customers from desiringour products and services and

becoming truly advocates. Implementing the right experiential processes certainly will deliver

value to your customers.

However, prior to getting into a thorough process implementation, one must think about

the cultural issues that lie at the foundation of our company. Yes, you can modify some or many

of your processes and optimize them to be truly customer-centric, but unless everyone in our

company is vibrating at the same wavelength - it is difficult to convey great experiences to our

customers. We must begin by building respect for our customers, gaining their trust by making

them rely on the quality of our products/services and on the honesty of our relationship.

Processes that are implemented lacking a true compromise from most of our employees normally

end up making things easier for management but not for the customer. One must have a vision,


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focus on the customer, the right people (Virgin Atlantic's "brilliant basics"), and then we are set

to foster a more creative and innovative approach aimed at influencing and modifying the

rational and emotional elements of your customers' experience. We are now prepared for

delivering those "magical touches" that will make a dramatic difference and win you "raving

fans".

Step by Step into CEM

In his acclaimed opus "Customer Experience Management", Bernd Schmitt introduces a

straightforward-five-step CEM process (See Figure 1) that we will hitherto refer in this article.

"All ways lead to Rome": As long as you keep in mind the basics, one can modify his approach

to CEM. I happen to like Bernd Schmitt's approach and I advocate for it.

Adapted from: "Customer Experience Management" by Bernd H. Schmitt

I have tried it with a number of customers and have obtained good results. I should pointout that the outcome has nothing to do with the process itself but with the bottlenecks one faces

when trying to change a 20 or 50 years-old culture which has proven to be successful. Every

industry, company, market and customer segment has its own peculiarities and we should be

careful when taking them into consideration and making the appropriate modifications,

especially after several rounds of trial and error iterations. You may also find CEOs or CMOs


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reluctant to follow advice and preferring to either skip a step (thinking her company has already

mastered it) or cutting the required resources short.

Schmitt's five steps are quite comprehensive

Analyze the experiential world of the customer.Get to know the environment your B2B or B2C customers operate in. Understand

their world and yours. What the future looks like as far as your industry is concerned and

as far as the sociocultural environment your customers are in is concerned. What are your

competitors doing? What type of experiences are they providing to the customers? Obtain

an insight of your customers as deep as possible. Know "not assume" what your

customer's needs and expectations are; how, when and why your customers use/consume

or not use/consume your products. Understand your customers' buying decision making

process. Are your customers collaborating in the design of your products? Revise, in as

much detail as possible, Jan Carlzon's moments of truth (MOTs). To begin, select the few

critical ones (save the others for later) and bring them into what now has developed into

the "experience curve" and define what the desired experience would be at these points.

Oh, yes. How do we obtain the data to plot our initial experience curve? You could use

several sources. I like to begin with the input from marketers, salespeople and employees

within the company I am working with. They should be encouraged to get opinions from

their families and friends before submitting their final scores. This way we obtain theemotion/experience curve the company thinks it is providing to its customers. One

advantage of this is that from the very early stages, everyone in the company is involved

in the program. The results are always displayed through the intranet and people are

asked to comment and enrich the process.

Subsequently I normally structure a set of simple surveys using one of the many

tools EFM (Enterprise Feedback Management) companies have made available. Initially

we try 2 or 3 different surveys aimed at different market segments, beginning with lead

customers whose opinions we value. At this stage we validate if the critical points we

identified in our internal exercise are the same customers regard as important. Normally

there are differences. It is important to highlight that those points which are most

important for your customers should be the bases for your customer's scorecard. Based on

these results we motivate customers to join a respondent panel that will provide us with


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feedback during the whole process and hopefully for a long time thereafter. The size of

the panel varies depending on the type of product. When possible, feedback from these

initial surveys is complemented with direct observations and focus groups. Focus groups

concentrate more on learning about the experience with major competing brands and also

on the most critical scenarios customers go through during their experience with the

product. We make sure customers are aware that the company is highly interested in

listening to their voice and that by speaking out they are helping customize their own

experience. Most customers do it gladly and except for a few cases, I have always found

a great deal of collaboration. One or two months later we are able to have a second graph,

one from the customers and believe me, when we compare the company's graphs with the

customer's, we get plenty of surprises and a great deal of learning. Remember that the

devil is in the details and step 1 needs details and lots of data. The output of this first step

is not only learning the actual state of your consumers' and competitor's experience, and

mapping it, but along the sub-process. The exercise should have identified quite a few

ideas that could and would differentiate you, opportunities to heal customer relationships

and to resolve issues that impact customers, and of course step one constitutes the core

input to step two.

The Experiential platformArmed with the analysis and ideas from stage one; we examine very thoroughly

the gaps the customers have helped identify and begin the process of drafting the

strategy. In terms of the traditional marketing, the experiential platform goes way beyond

"unique selling proposition - UPS" or the "Value Proposition" we are used to. Here we

borrow some key concepts from other managerial disciplines that have proved their value

in strategy definition: balanced scorecard and blue ocean strategy, and combine them into

the development of Schmitt's three strategic components of his experiential platform: the

experiential positioning, the experiential value promise (EVP) and the overall

implementation theme, which details the hows.

Step 2 is perhaps the most critical one of the CEM process since it lays out the

foundation of the entire customer experience strategy. It should be noted that experiential

value promise is meant to look for the most powerful experience that will differentiate

your product in the minds of your clients. In this step we imagine the types of


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experiences we should convey to our customers in order to impact them. In his first book

Experiential Marketing, B Schmitt defined five types: sensory, affective, cognitive,

physical, and social identity experiences. These are the factors that should be analyzed

and then linked to the traditional value proposition (attributes, breath of line, being first,

price), etc. when you are in determined to differentiate your product or service in the

minds of your prospects. The step defines what the experience is going to be like for the

customer/customer segments, why the customer should trust that the company will

deliver the offered EVP, and how different, innovative and revolutionary (a blue ocean

perhaps?) that experience will be.

I recommend to my clients to seek additional advice which normally comes form

advertising and PR agencies, sociologists, psychologists and anthropologist

(neuromarketing has come to age) which are much better fit to propose impacting

positioning and creative implementation themes that would leverage alternative EVPs.

Let us refer to Nokia. Its experiential position is "Connecting People". Its experience

value proposition: "Meeting Mobility and service needs". Design, technology and

customer engagement are Nokia's core elements in its implementation theme. Again, I

suggest having at least 2 or 3 EVPs that have been previously agreed upon after

evaluating their feasibility in terms of demanded resources and expected results. At this

point the company must have completed an assessment of its external and internal

environment (culture); a conviction that the organization has the right skills, motivation

and tools required for the strategy to be flawlessly executed; a complete understanding of

their customers and markets, some of it will come from CRM data; and an approximation

of the competitor's reaction once the plan begins to be executed (steps 3, 4 and 5). Aren't

we missing something? Yes, of course! A set of milestones and indicators that will ensure

that as the program advances, and your customers' experiences are the right ones, the

financial targets will be met in the short, medium and long term. Whenever possible, it is

also recommended to pre-test -in controlled environments- the ideas and proposals that

were developed at this stage. Depending on your own situation, you may have to follow

steps 3 (brand experience), 4 (customer interface) and 5 (continuous innovation)

simultaneously or in a different order


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Designing the Brand ExperienceSteps 1 and 2 are a pre-requisite to any CEM plan and should be done in sequence

and as thoroughly as possible. They constitute the blueprint of your customer experience

strategy. At step 3 we begin translating strategy into actions. It is here where moments of

truth are more critical, where reality meets expectations, where the bottom line occurs.

According to Schmitt, brand experience is determined by three factors: the product

experience including the price, the look and feel and the experiential communications.

The brand experience comprises all differentiating factors of your products or service.

Differentiation isn't necessarily product related, it can be on anything. Going back to

Nokia, when buying a specific Nokia unit, and for that purpose any mobile phone brand,

customers expect a working phone with few or many features d

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