CX become a mere lipstick

Has customer-centricity become a mere lipstick in today’s world? The reason why the big ones are failing the industry.

Why do so many Customer Experience initiatives fail? What you can do to make it better?

If we look at the actual economy and trends nowadays, we see that CX has become the main keyword for all big players. Such a popular term. But what is their key strategy? In reality, most don’t talk aber user and customer centricity, they are talking abour AI, BigData and Software solutions.

• Use big data for great CX
• Use our best tool for a CX journey
• All think about individual projects, not about the core of CX.
• Only marketing and CX is included, not all other departements. If only two departments are involved - how can you deliver great experiences?
• Actually, the most important department for this topic is human resources, but they never hear about CX.
• CX appears easy and supposedly everyone can do it, but in fact so many of CX professionals have no idea about real Customer Experience

Do you have the same impression?

People talk about technology and about software and they call it Customer Experience, when in fact they forget to think about the real human - about the actual customer. They are talking about the visualization of the full journey. Beware: If you trust them blindly, you’re setting yourself up for trouble. You can’t measure the full customer journey. It’s much more complex than it may initially look like. You always can measure and show parts of it with a software tool. In the end, to find the real insights, you have to dig deep, hands-on.

Of course there are some exceptions and this represents my personal view of the actual market, created through a multitude of conversations and projects in the past years. And it is really disappointing to speak with people, who excell at selling the „best experience“ and you realize, they indeed have not much understanding of the actual term.

To create a great customer Experience it usually takes a long way, and so often, it’s truly a change management process.

In this article I will describe a the difference between BX / CX / UX and the most important steps. Let’s have a look at our CX Master framework which visualizes the complexity of a whole customer Experience in a real simple way. I will mention the ten main eight points you must attend to in your next CX initiative.

CX Master Framework

1.)   THE CORE | THE STORYLINE

Every company should have a core, a heart. Customer Experience is all about telling stories. What is your core? Ask 4-7 employees if they know the core values and the core mission and vision of your company? Write down your story, your mission and your mantra. Every employee should know it, as this will allow not only for a better culture, but ultimately help you achieve a higher CX impact. In the end it’s always about the people, and your employees are the first that need to be targeted! If they don’t understand it, how can you expect a user or customer to do so?

2.)   CUSTOMER CONTACT DEPARTMENTS

Every customer experience initiative has to start with the Human Resource department. They have to know which know-how and which characters are important to integrate a full CX vision. Without the right mindset in your company you never will create a great CX. So start with the internal mindset, with an internal campaign and find people with the right skills. How can you deliver a great experience, when people don‘t understand what happens? So for me, HR and Management are the key players for implmenetating great UX.

Why do we divide UX & CX? The definition and the wording says, UX is about the User who uses a product or service and CX is about the customer who buys the product or service. So typically it makes no sense to cluster both areas, because at the end it is the same oftentimes. As I observed the market, UX is typically more in the Business to Business market, because those who buy are typically not those who use. BtoB companies focus 90% on the customer and forget the user. That’s a huge problem. CX is typically in the Business to consumer market, of course – there, the customer and the key users are predominantly the same. So in fact, UX is spart of CX.

3.)   USER EXPERIENCE | UX

The User Experience is all about the product and services before and after. A lot of departments are usually included in the whole UX development process. So from my point of view, all „near the user“ departments have to work together. No borders, but high transparency. Starting with the Marketing & Product Management and also comprising the Service and Research and Development. Only when all start to move together can a great User Experience be created. A monthly UX update is a must.    

4.)   CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE | CX

The Customer Experience is much more than User Experience. It includes the UX and in addition includes the entire sales and customer process. That means someone who buys a product or service is often not the person who uses the same. This is the main reason why User Experience is at the moment much more important in the Business to Business market, because normally companies concentrate one the customer, not on the user. BtoB products look like and feel like 20 year old products. In addition to create a great CX is also missed in BtoB because from my point of view, marketing professionals often don’t have the know-how about great CX. They are experts in BX.

5.)   BRAND EXPERIENCE | BX

Brand experience is everything about the brand. You can be no user and no customer but you know a brand and maybe you like the brand. It’s all about branding - and for me that’s the core know-how in a marketing departments. The cores skills often differentate from CX & UX skills. Nevertheless also every branding initiative, campaign, every ad should have the beginning at the core, Will go into the market and should strengthen the core again! Like every customer journey. Your TASK is to make your brand better.

6.)   TOUCHPOINTS

Touchpoints are normally defined as the company’s responsible interfaces to their user or customer. But at the end, a user has much more touchpoints during his journey with a company than a company is responsible for, or can actively influence. A users journey includes other services and products, because you life is not only centured around the one company. So the big ones can’t visualize the whole journey in their software tools.

Efficiencey Touchpoints require an „automate or simplify“ Design appraoch and Experience touchpoints demand for an „slow down and emotional“ design approach.

Magineering pyramid for a "Slow Design" approach

Needs Innovation for a "Fast Innovative Design" approach

7.)   CUSTOMER JOURNEY

Now, let’s chat about the famous customer joureny or user Journey. As you can see in the master CX template, a journey has touchpoints in the user-, customer-, brand area and in their real life area. So for a company, such a journey is much more complex to create, because for different targets you need also different solutions.

a.      Different areas

b.      Different target groups

c.      Different design approaches

8.) SUPPORTING DEPARTMENTS 

Last but not least, the Inner circle of a company is also responsible for a great customer journey and experience. Research and development should find solutions for the customer need and not only technical solutions. It is much easier to focus on new innovations, when you know the need. Lawyers are typically those who defend the company from the customer. But how should you be a customer-centric company if people inside are working against you. It’s like a virus. Also lawyers should know the customer needs, working together with the customer for the best solution for both parties. And in fact, the IT department can make it happen, for a better cooperation between customer and company. We often have the case that we are not allowed to use any tools. IT is the foundation of a future communication, so also they have to know all different user & customers.

To summarize, if you look around, you realize that the big ones are conentrating on tools.

• Use Big Data for a great CX
• Use AI for a awesome CX
• Use our tool to design your journey, you get all data

I wonder, if there are many companies who actually make the move and start by saying something like,

„ Hey come on, let’s focus on the customer need“. And then actually do it.

So here it is: Let’s focus on the real customer journey and not only on "touchpoints we can EASILY measure." Let’s start with the storyline and not with the IT. Data and AI can support you in personalisation – it’s a foundation of a lot of experiences, but it’s NOT the ONLY TRUTH as all want to tell us.

Come on guys, let’s focus again on the customer and user. Customer Experience is all about the EXPERIENCE of the CUSTOMER – and moving back to this notion will ultimately benefit everyone!

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Hannes Robier is organizer of the World Usability Congress and publisher of the UX Trend Report. He is additional founder of the usability and user experience-consulting agency youspi GmbH. He has worked in the field of User Experience, Customer Experience, Usability and Service Design for more than 15 years, consulting organizations of all sizes and various industries. Hannes earned the Customer Experience Management Certification in the USA in 2007 and was a successful participant in the BETA phase of the Certified Professional for Usability and User Experience (CPUX) - F (2013). Together with the university of Vienna he created the global UX quality certification center and the first UX foundation certification by UXQCC. No enough Hannes developed and leads the firs Design Management course in Europe.

He is also lecturer for usability and user experience at the University of Applied Sciences in Graz FH JOANNEUM, Vienna FH TECHNIKUM and has given speeches at various national and international conferences. Moreover, he is author of „UX Redefined – Winning and Keeping Customers with Enhanced Usability and User Experience“, a book covering the essentials of usability and user experience published by Springer, as well as two books on personality development.

Read more article by Hannes Robier