Using Emotional Energy to Make Your Customer Experience Programs Easier, Faster and Smarter

Photo by paul bica

Identifying and designing for your customers' and employees' emotional needs will simplify and improve the efficiency and effectiveness of your customer experience programs.

During the Total Customer Experience Leaders Summit in April, Daryl Travis, CEO of Brandtrust, described how to discover and leverage emotional energy to drive better business results.

• Step 1: Understand how your brand makes your customers feel. Brands are about feelings, not facts. Emotion drives behavior. 95% of decisions are driven by non conscious processing. Forget the "Voice of the Customer," think "Mind of the Customer."
• Step 2: Focus on the moments that matter most, which are the ones that are most emotional. It's your competitive advantage. Establish an emotional brand purpose. A brand must stand for something important and must be authentic.
• Step 3: Create and pulse employee energy for delivering peak customer experiences. Ongoing measurement optimizes the energy and the experience for employees and customers rating energy level.

The Cleveland Clinic is an organization that builds trust and credibility through their brand purpose. Here are two videos from the Cleveland Clinic empathy series featuring life-
changing stories with emotional energy that are unforgettable.

Empathy: The Human Connection to Patient Care by Cleveland Clinic

If the video doesn't appear, you can view it at http://youtu.be/cDDWvj_q-o8


Patients: Afraid and Vulnerable

If the video doesn't appear, you can view it at http://youtu.be/1e1JxPCDme4

Some moments in the customer's experience simply matter more than others. The critical part is figuring out what people can't or won't tell you so you can make a difference their lives.

Peggy L. Bieniek, ABC is an Accredited Business Communicator specializing in corporate communication best practices. Connect with Peggy on LinkedIn, Twitter, Google+, and on her website at www.starrybluebrilliance.com.

The Open Systems Model: A Blueprint to Transform Your Organization's Customer Experience Program



Photo by paul bica

"The difficulty lies not so much in developing new ideas as in escaping the old ones.”  - John Maynard Keynes, Economist and Author

Here are highlights from a case study on HP Financial Services' 12-year customer experience program transformation:

HP Financial Services' core purpose is to differentiate the HP experience by serving as a bridge between technology and finance solutions enabling customer's achievement of their business goals. The key to their success is their engaged 1,500-employee workforce supporting customers in over 50 countries.

During the Total Customer Experience Leaders Summit in April, John Sullivan, Global TCE Leader, HP Financial Services, described his organization's 12-year journey to transform their customer experience program to drive benefits from a customer point and to minimize customer effort:

• Phase 1: Organization Design Around the Customer
• Focus on customer relationships
• HP Culture, HPFS Operating Philosophy, Open Systems Model
• Phase 2: Understanding Our Customers
• Systemic understanding of customer experiences. Focus on improving delivery experiences and perceptions.
• Segment our customers
• TCE Research Programs, Closed-Loop Process
• Phase 3: Focus on Colleague Engagement
• Focus on enhancing colleague behaviors and skills
• TCE Education, Communication, Rewards & Recognition Programs
• Phase 4: Process Experience Management
• Focus on improving process experience through process engineering. Strong process, operations and technology collaboration.
• Six Sigma, Process Roadmaps, Process Improvement Plans
• Phase 5: Customer-Driven Experience Management
• Look through the lens of the customer experience focusing on ease, not delight
• Focus on developing/implementing strategies to deliver a low effort experience
• The Pledge, Service Acumen, Escalation Protocols

As a result, overall loyalty scores improved seven points in the last four years. In addition, they achieved a 17 point improvement in the "Secure and Favorable" segment, which contain accounts that enable Share of Wallet growth.

According to John, their blueprint is an Open Systems Model, a measurement process that gives continuous feedback. Based on the premise, "Organizations are perfectly designed to get the results they get," the Open Systems Model is a powerful leadership tool that:

• Teaches systemic thinking
• Enables more effective analysis and action
• Provides common frameworks and language to facilitate and enhance communication
• Aids and enhances alignment, which is crucial to organizational effectiveness.

Learn more about the Open Systems Model and how to turn this information into meaningful, measurable action to drive customer loyalty.

Peggy L. Bieniek, ABC is an Accredited Business Communicator specializing in corporate communication best practices. Connect with Peggy on LinkedIn, Twitter, Google+, and on her website at www.starrybluebrilliance.com.

Why Your Brand Needs Social Customer Service

Everyday users go online to complain about brands – on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Pinterest – you name it. Responding to these complaints in real-time reduces the impact of them on your bottom line.

These days, customers aren’t calling your 800 number. Instead, they are getting on Facebook and complaining about you or sending a Tweet about your lousy service. Social customer service is a very different ball game with unique practices, plans and a different timeline. You’d better be listening for online complaints and be ready to respond in real-time or face potentially negative profits.

Social customer service emerged because organic online conversations require an immediate response. When a customer complains about you on Facebook or Twitter, you’d better be listening and respond within a short window or poor attitudes about your brand escalate. Social customer service connects your customers with people, both inside and outside of your organization, and with the information they need to solve problems and make better decisions. Not to mention, your customers expect it.

Check out this infographic, which highlights the key reasons your business needs social customer service: