Part 3 of 6 Customer Experience Predictions and Trends for 2012 2013.
Hoffman ties Occupy Wall Street movement, Free Apps and internet community to overall customer movement and customer experience shaping for 2012. Free is the new black - is a recurring theme and a new customer demand that companies must address. Also discusses the confusion around 'customer experience' as a legitimate management discipline.
Will You Be Customer Worthy in 2012 3 of 6 MRHoffman NACCM detailed speaker notes part 3 of 6
1. Customer Worthy in 2012? (part 3 of 6)
Part 3:
Interruptions & Disruptions (with all the noise- interruptions and disruptions become norm for infiltrating
customer network – yes, you need a prospect, customer infiltrating strategy – you must be invited)
Co-Surfing (surfing as a community – yes – this is think like a customer – as a group we are now surfing – yes
– some of you were doing this by yourselves before this slide – stats say 60% since I started speaking – this isn’t
gotcha – it’s normal…now)
Community Surfing – (Social reviews, multiple/intent driven profiles – don’t trust internet stats or traditional
reporting – everything is distorted – so what do you measure?)
Hoffman’s Geeky Customer Experience Hobby ( 7 years research on customer experience
– access to major companies and brands and being a customer…and a bit of a measurement geek get's me a book,
a formula and insight into where YOUR customers are going next – and where they are not going)
“Customer Experience” Are We Talking About the Same Thing? (The CEM
problem – customer experience analysis and planning needs to be serious and scientific – Customer experience
consumes hundreds of billions of expense $ and holds a multiple in potential revenue dollars )
Free is the new “Black” – (Free is a business and likely a competitor – but free is a real trend for
2012-13 )
2. We Interrupt this presentation for
context – context big nd essential
13. Continue to NACCM Part 4
Continue to
Part 4:
Customer Frameworks + Algorithms +
Customer Geniuses; Summary & Additional
Predictions
Hinweis der Redaktion
meatiest but also most difficult part of presentation
Oh – Interruptions – I’m sorry – I forgot this – Interruptions are a big deal in 2012 – Companies must strive to interrupt customer’s routines in order to get attention - but of course, the interruptions must be customer worthy – they must be worthy of distracting the customer from what they are doing and the customer must recognize some benefit – the benfit may be a simple reminder, a how to tip or did you know tip. Interruptions in the customer context will become more common place as customers expose their information to the internet including their current location, their search history or another way to think of it is ‘when customers log in to their network – when they identify themselves through some connection point – their smart phone, tablet, PC television, Ipod touch, GPS driver assistance service whatever – however they connect to the network – this is an opportunity to interrupt them – to capture their attention – Of course you can use conventional means - a billboard on the their way to work, a letter with an offer in their mailbox – you see, these are all the same thing – a letter a pop up on a screen – a tweet – they are all messages vying to get your customer’s attention – their success is based on their customer worthiness. An customer worthiness depends on the customer’s context – the message, offer, instruction, news’ fitness to the customer’s situation…. This is covered in great depth in the book Customer Worthy – and the book uses the CxC Matrix to depict and measure each potential customer contact in a customer’s experience.
So…we are still in the interruption – so let’s cheat – I’ll try to get into your context – How many of you typed “Michael r Hoffman” into your laptop or smartphone when I started my presentation or some time this morning?So, you see, we not only are interrupted from external sources, advertisements, bill boards, in store signage, sales calls…As customers, we now interrupt ourselves by searching and trying to enhance our understanding of what’s around us – what’s in store and … this all shapes our context- our context is further enhanced and expectations raised (or lowered)Now, NO I am no Michael R Hoffman the gynecologist - speaking of Am I in the right meeting context ….But I am the 2nd reference in google and Customer Worthy – the book – is the fifth search result – and the two are probably connected thanks to some of you in the audience …Thank youNow you see what we are doing here – we are surfing shared experiences – we are performing a relatively private or even personal act – spying on Michael R Hoffman - as a group - albeit with Michael R Hoffman -
So let’s get more weird and bring local, virtual and interruptions together – this experience mash-up – is more and more common place – but very difficult to assess let alone comprehend and manage from a research, measurement and reporting stand point – yet this mosaic of experiences – bridging shared and private experiences, communities, individuals, topics, rating systems, brands and processes are all part of the new experience stew.Now you and I and Customer Worthy and the book reviewers and Amazon and NACCM and the people at your table and Disney are all connected – This is our current context. Our shared experience
But you see – here is another Michael Hoffman – Mike Hoffman – but at a different LinkedIn ID. Is it the same person?This raises another marketing and customer service challenge, context specific profiles and ID’s.How do you deal with a customer who appears or wants to appear as a different customer? Or wants you to recognize that all the identities are in fact a single person? Or someone that wants you to treat them differently based on which channel and which ID they choose to enter. This potential chaos is one of the challenges over the next 18 months and foreseeable future.It is also another application of the CxC Matrix which will cover shortly and which is explained in painstaking detail in the Customer Worthy book.
Speaking of Geeky Customer Experience stuff – It is important that we all not give up – That we strive to define our customers experience instead of throwing our hands up and saying “it’s just too complicated”Customer experience is complex but not unlimitedly complex. I spent seven years researching customer experience in order to write Customer Worthy and during that time was certain that there must be a standard way to measure and represent customer experience. This research led to development of the CxC Matrix which is a means to depict, measure, monetize and predict what customers will do next – and equally as importantly, what customers will not do nextPredicting what customers will not do is a huge source of innovation – the customer experience algorithm expressed here and available at customerworthy.com enables companies to apply analysis and probability to every customer contact to evaluate, build and measure optimal customer outcome at each customer contact point across your organization.The other geeky tools here, customerpayback.com and the check that is printed from customerpayback.com is another geeky tool that monetizes customer time spent with a company - a formula you want to evaluate, understand and master before your customers and competitors do.
So Customer Experience – It is most important that all of us in the room…. and all of the people in your organizations …… have a clear picture and understanding of what is meant by “CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE” – in this room, we have leaders from customer service, marketing, advertising, promotion, IT, analytics – real representation from major brands across a broad group of disciplines – So why are we all here? How do we all work together in “Customer Experience Management?” This is the trillion dollar question – all of us – all our departments impact customer experience – all our departments impact customer experience that is the essence of my work putting together Customer Worthy and the CxC Matrix – depicting the entire customer experience ecosystem – and matching the customer’s experience, their ecosystem, THE CUSTOMER’s ECOSYSTEM to every company’s surface area or customer contact points - that is what the CxC Matrix is all about – looking at customer experience as a system. Looking at Customer Experience as a managed set of processes. Looking at customer experience as a measureable set of processes managed by each department. Some of these processes are currently managed and measured… must of your customer experience processes are not managed not measured – nowhere has a company thoroughly built out and executed an end to end customer management system…not yet.
Again – moving on from context to APPS – moving from vague, touchy feely, “can’t we hug every customer”- customer experience to carefully, surgically managed, meticulously measured customer experiences– This Amazon page is a reference point – Nothing about Amazon’s design here is ‘by accident’ or just creative whim. This page is designed quite purposefully with specific intent and absolute goals. Each potential click is calculated and each click itself initiates a process – each click performs a function for the customer and performs a function within Amazon and it’s partners… This page is APPs rich – think of each potential click as triggering an “APP”
Oh….And interruptions – Did I mention APPS are Free – now we are back in context as we look at the connection Amazon has made between advertising (digital) product delivery (this app shows where my order is and all the parties involved in getting the product to me)Who knew this level of transparency would be worthwhile – even for miniscule items - … Oh, did I mention FREEFree is a big deal – FREE is the new black in 2012 – free APPS – we covered that – but look here FREE SHIPPING for a $3.49 item – you can not compete with Amazon for FREE – unless you really understand your customer economics and customer and partner ecosystem. You must know your costs and soft benefits in order to innovate like Amazon and UPS are here – This all calls for a new method of writing business cases with a thorough understanding and corporate executive buy-in for customer lifetime value.
Because FREE is not going away soon – BOGO – does everyone know Buy One Get One FREE?FREE is the norm – look here Wal-Mart free shipping generates over 20 million search results – How do you compete with Amazon and Walmart delivering FREE?Have I connected community surfing, apps & free – the association and growth of these three related and intertwined concepts will cause tremendous disruption in 2012.From a corporate perspective each of these trends seems unrelated, disorganized and therefore unmanageable - however, these “free” communities are well organized – Free is it’s own market …
It may be that “FREE (anything)” is enough of a self sustaining ‘search market’ (sufficient search traffic and thereby ad revenue to fuel a set of businesses centered on free… side note – nothing is truly free)Freeshipping.org is an example of free as a businessThere is even an organization, FREESHIPPING.org – Really – What do you think happens when FREE becomes ingrained in customers mind set? You see FREE institutionalized here… but FEE not FREE is the mantra in company headquarters and executive suites GENERATE MORE FEE INCOME – Banks, airlines, hotels and a host of service providers are trying to grow FEE incomeDo Customers notice?