Crafting a Compelling Customer Experience Rewiring the Customer Experience Digitally
Total Page:16
File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb
Rewired: Crafting a Compelling Customer Experience Rewiring the Customer Experience Digitally In 2008, Dominos Pizza was staring at trust.” Dominos streamlined the ordering of social customer community software, a difficult future. The company faced process by introducing “Pizza Tracker” says, “We are living in an age of extreme plummetting sales, falling stock prices — an online tracking mechanism to let customer expectations5.” Second, the and a lacklustre brand image. Customer customers view the progress of their complexities of integrating new digital dissatisfaction was running high with pizza from order to delivery. They also let channels with existing operations can be customers complaining about the poor customers build online profiles, with their daunting. A recent survey indicates that quality of Domino’s Pizzas1. By November location and other preferences, thereby over 38% of marketers feel the technology 2008, the company’s stock price was reducing order placement time to as low to build an integrated digital marketing at a record low of $2.832. That is when as 30 seconds. The results have been strategy is too complicated. Over 58% of Dominos decided to chart a new path for remarkable, to say the least. From $2.83 marketers still use basic methodologies itself. From that position, the company a share in November 2008, Dominos such as last-click attribution model has scripted a historic turnaround making has seen its stock price rise to over $70 rather than more sophisticated cross- its entire customer experience digital. The a share in June 20143. Domino’s mobile channel attribution models that are more company focused on making easy-to- sales accounted for 22% of online sales relevant in the digital age6. Third, digitally order and easy-to-track the foundations in 2012, which was larger than the entire transforming the customer experience of its overall customer experience. And company’s sales in 19994. requires an overhaul of organizational they did this across the key channels of culture and traditional ways of managing PC/mobile/social. Dominos launched Such transformative impacts do not customer relationships. 56% of marketers a social media campaign — “What is come by accident. They happen as in a survey described their organizations wrong with the Dominos Pizza?” — a result of carefully coordinated and as customer-centric, but only 12% of their where it sought feedback from customers orchestrated use of digital technologies customers agreed with their assessment7. to help improve its pizzas. Customers and platforms such as social media and This shows that the promise of customer appreciated the company’s sincerity in mobile. However, while the opportunities centricity still has a long way to go. reaching out to them and as a result, the for driving a great customer experience Finally, the pace of decision-making has strategy proved to be highly successful. using digital technologies are significant, hastened and there is a new sense of Professor Renee Gosline of the MTI so are the challenges. First, organizations agility that companies from the Internet Sloan School of Management says, need to manage an ever-increasing tide of sector are bringing. In short, what has “People felt that Dominos was honest customer expectations. As Rob Tarkoff, worked in the past is not guaranteed to and really trying to hear them, which built CEO of Lithium Technologies, a provider work in the future. The Age of Extreme Customer Expectations Consumers are going online to request help on a product or service and want responses fast expect a same-day expect a response response to their within an hour or 66% online request 43% less Consumers are using online channels to complain Complaining 39% 35-44 years 45+ years of Americans 46% 35% are more likely to go online to complain than to praise But younger Americans seem to complain at higher rates than older Americans Source: Lithium Technologies, “Lithium Reveals Extreme Customer Expectations Survey”, May 2014 2 Look Outside to Transform order to gauge customer reactions prior 8 Inside to rollout . Organizations are beginning Less than half of to realize the importance of customer Digital leaders look at technology as a experience. Research indicates that over organizations have a means to an end, and not an end in itself. 86% of executives consider customer company-wide program The end-state is defined by the kind of experience to be a top strategic priority. experience that the customer desires However, less than half have a company- for customer experience, at each touch point. Digital leaders wide program for customer experience, and only 30% have a design experiences based on a forensic and only 30% have a dedicated budget understanding of customer expectations, to fund the transformation9. dedicated budget to fund and actively seek to understand and the transformation. alleviate customer pain points. They ensure that their knowledge of customer interactions extends across all touch So, how can organizations master the points. Barclay’s Bank for instance, Digital leaders look at has set up a website dedicated to new rules that will help them drive lasting technology as a means to customer engagement in a digital world? gathering the voice of the customer. The Our research revealed that four key website called “Your Bank” encourages an end, and not an end in actions play a defining role in delivering customers to publicly share their views, itself. compelling customer experiences — concerns and complaints regarding and differentiate digital leaders from their the bank’s products and services. In peers (see Figure 1). We examine each of addition, the bank puts future changes these actions in the sections that follow. to its offerings to vote on the website, in Figure 1: Creating a Digital Customer Experience Forensic understanding of Focus on impact rather customer interactions and than size of digital pain points across investment all touch points Smart An Outside-In Investments Approach in Digital Channels Seamless Meshing Data Driven of Physical Insights and Digital Experiences Using Big Data analytics to Amplifying the physical enhance understanding of experience with digital customer behavior, technologies preferences and motivations Source: Capgemini Consulting Analysis 3 Focus on Smart Investments in Digital Mercedes-Benz Channels to Enhance Reach and Drive Engagement The automotive industry offers an interesting example of an area where multiple technology trends are coming to fruition at around the same time. Intelligent Digital leaders approach digital highways embedded with sensors, autonomous vehicles, and digital showrooms investments differently. Rather than the are all converging to create new challenges for large automotive players in managing size of the investment, they focus on its customer experience. Mercedes-Benz responded to these challenges by launching impact. Sephora, the global cosmetics ‘Mercedes-Benz 2020 – Best Customer Experience’ aiming to provide customers major, has shown how smart investments with a consistent premium brand experience across all touchpoints – physical as in digital channels can deliver extraordinary well as digital. As Ola Kallenius, Member of the Divisional Board Responsible for results. Sephora has closely tied its social Marketing & Sales explains, “Our goal is twofold — to create special moments media strategy to the way that customers for the customer at every step in the customer journey, and to connect the dots use various social media platforms. across all customer touch points.” One of the key initiatives that Mercedes-Benz Research suggests that Pinterest is better took to drive such a seamless experience is the service brand called ‘Mercedes than Facebook in inspiring purchases10, Me’. Ola explains, “Through “Mercedes me”, we intend to comprehensively and that its users tend to spend more address our customers’ product purchasing, financing, and servicing needs both on every purchase than users of other in the digital and physical worlds. All of the “Mercedes me” services are available social media platforms11. Sephora has via a unified digital platform.” One of the underlying themes to Mercedes-Benz’s focused its customer engagement efforts customer experience initiatives is on the role of digital. Ola says, “In our business, primarily on Pinterest and it was among digital can complement and enhance the physical experience, but not replace the first retailers to integrate the “Pin It” it.” For delivering such a digital-physical experience, Mercedes-Benz adapted its button on its website12. Sephora curates internal organization. Ola expands, “We created a customer experience function lists of popular products on Pinterest with a project and organizational leadership model that is based entirely around and launched a Pinterest-centric email the customer journey. So, we took departments dealing with different aspects marketing campaign, where users can pin of the customer journey, which were spread across the company, and brought products directly from emails. Sephora’s them under a single leadership. The customer experience function is tasked with social media strategy has proved to be creating the blueprint for a consistent global Mercedes-Benz brand experience.” highly successful. The company saw a 60% increase in traffic from Pinterest Source: Capgemini Consulting, “Digital Transformation Review N’ 6 - Crafting a Compelling following its email campaign. Its average Digital Customer Experience”, August 2014