Customer Experience (CX) is all the buzz right now. I recently
had the pleasure of being a Guest Speaker at the Customer Experience Executive
Conference in Chicago. Other guest speakers and attendees included Customer Experience Execs
from Victoria Secret, Nordstrom, MGM, Walgreens, CNN, Teleflora, Vonage, Macys
and other high profile companies.
As we all discussed CX processes, challenges and
opportunities, some very interesting similarities and patterns began to emerge.
It became clear where in the customer lifecycle CX management first appears and
who actually owns the Customer Experience within these companies.
Not surprising, IT owns CX for the vast majority of these
companies. And in general CX focuses on post sale experiences, typically call
center customer service/support processes.
What was definitely surprising was that, for almost every
company in attendance, neither marketing nor sales has any visibility into or
involvement with CX. CX remains siloed deep within the IT org. As such all pre-sale
funnel stage activities and experiences are not usually considered as part of a
CX ecosystem.
Yet all customers experience a number of marketing and sales
interactions during their buyer journey, which collectively form the overall
CX. I doubt I’d get much argument that the customer experience needs to include
everything. From brand, to purchase, to product, to support. And don’t forget
employee CX.
But IT does not own content and marketing does not own IVR
systems, so finding an owner in either camp to manage this can be difficult. Even if you found
one, they would likely focus on their ‘siloed vision of CX’. Not a holistic
viewpoint.
Yes there are CXO and CCO roles. Some CEOs are also great CXOs. (Steve
Jobs and Elon Musk, to name a few). But this role requires a strategic as well
as a technical leader. It’s one thing to talk and quite another to execute.
Even if you have found the perfect CXO, it still requires connecting a single holistic view of
the truth.
Is this even possible? According to eMarketer, less than 20%
of businesses have even successfully obtained this single view and only 3% have
actually integrated online and offline experiences.Yikes.
Most customers really do want you to know where they are in
your company’s lifecycle, no matter what channel they choose to experience you
on. They don’t want to have to repeat themselves with every interaction, and
they don’t want to marry you on the first date either. All the while expecting
their information to be locked up, completely secure. Unfortunately 25% of all companies have experienced some kind of security
breach in the last 12 months, according
to Forrester.
Until a single, fully secure customer interaction platform
is fully realized and integrated, CX will likely continue to be managed like a
railroad track, built in 2 unconnected sections, (pre-sale and post sale) instead
of one completed line.
And while you may not have the ability to install processes
to fill the unconnected sections just yet, as new integrations and identity
security solutions evolve, it will happen eventually. Hey, it took over 39
years to complete the railroad track from the Atlantic all the way to the Pacific.
So what can we do right now? In a nutshell, control what you
can control and use the data you have. The good news is that even siloed, you
can make great strides in improving the customer experience, both on the front
end and on the back end of the lifecycle. They just may not be connected and
talking to each other just yet.
Eloqua Certified Marketing
Automation Best Practices Consultant, Astadia
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