WHAT IS CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE?

Practically speaking, the concept of customer experience touches on how customers perceive their interactions with a company and its products or services. The principle encompasses every stage of the customer journey, from initial research and discovery of a brand to purchasing, onboarding, usage, service requests, renewals, referrals and advocacy. High-performing companies focus heavily on understanding and optimizing customer experience as a sustainable competitive advantage.

As a general rule of thumb, customer experience determines clients’ satisfaction with and emotional attachment to a company. Positive experiences where customers truly feel valued, respected and supported lead to higher satisfaction, trust and loyalty towards a brand. Negative experiences due to difficult interactions, confusing communications or unmet expectations deteriorate the customer relationship over time.

While customer service has traditionally focused on specific transactions like purchases and service requests, the customer experience encompasses end-to-end engagements with the company infrastructure, operations, employees and wider brand community. Customer experience is collective; shaped by multiple customer touch points including the website, online account portals, in-store ambiance, sales materials, billing processes and after-sales support channels.

With the proliferation of digital channels and devices, companies must deliver cohesive customer experiences across platforms that align with evolving buyer expectations. That requires coordinating messaging, product information, visual branding and support resources across mobile apps, websites, IoT ecosystems, brick-and-mortar locations and more.

To enhance the customer experience, companies actively solicit customer feedback through surveys, interviews and monitoring online reviews. Voice-of-the-customer data paired with customer behavior analytics inform tailored engagement strategies per customer segment. Tracking metrics around churn rates and customer lifetime value guides business decisions on optimizing support, pricing and product investments to maximize customer experience.

Put the pieces together and it becomes clear that customer experience is measured by whether interactions are frictionless, contextualized and aligned with customers’ needs and preferences each step of the way. Constructing end-to-end customer experiences centered around understanding and fulfilling dynamic customer requirements promotes customer delight and enduring brand affinity.