Customer Experience University - Winning Loyalty & Engagement One Customer at a Time

Think Efficiency and Effectiveness | Team Member and Customer Experience Value

Writing for the online magazine Simplicable, technologist John Spacey defines value creation as “any process that creates outputs that are more valuable than its inputs.
For me, customer value often is more a function of reducing clutter as opposed to increasing complexity. Clutter removal often involves streamlining cumbersome processes that hamper value delivery.
For more about the role of value creation in the future of customer experience success, please pick-up or gift a copy of my book Stronger Through Adversity or you can download one of my many complimentary eBooks including one I just wrote about Stronger Through Adversity. You can do that by visiting josephmichelli.com.

It’s Not About Price. It’s About Perceived Value. | Team Member and Customer Experience Value

For the sake of example, let’s assume you purchased a beverage and you pay full price for it. Let’s further assume you received half as much of that beverage as you usually do for that price. You likely will perceive the transaction as having been 50% less valuable to you even though the price was the same as normal. Since perceptions of value are affected by far more than the quantity of an item a customer receives, experience designers seek to drive perceived value across a range of dimensions like product quality, environmental aesthetics, service consistency, and even the gratitude of the provider.
The ultimate goal of this approach is to leverage research on perceived equity to produce customers who will refer your business to others. Equity research has shown that to optimally drive loyalty customers should feel they received slightly more value than they paid for. If they receive less value than they paid for they feel cheated. If they received value commensurate with what they paid, they feel satisfied but they are vulnerable to churn. If they receive far more value than what they paid for they often lose respect for the provider and fear the company will go out of business. So, the optimal end state is to give slightly more value than your customers expect.

What‘s Value Got to Do With It | Team Member and Customer Experience Value

How do you create value for team members and customers? In Stronger Through Adversity, Amir Dan Rubin, Chair and CEO of One Medical, discussed how he adjusted value drivers in response to the pandemic. For more about the role of value creation in the future of customer experience success, please pick-up or gift a copy of my book Stronger Through Adversity or download one of my many complimentary eBooks at josephmichelli.com.

Make it Simpler & Less Cluttered

According to retired four-star general Colin Powell, “Great leaders are almost always great simplifiers, who can cut through argument, debate, and doubt to offer a solution everybody can understand.” I would argue extraordinary customer experience brands are also great simplifiers.
This is the fifth and final post in a series titled "How to Deliver Memorable Experiences in a Pandemic and Post-Pandemic World."
In the midst of all that confusion, team members and customers rushed toward leaders and brands that simplified their experiences and made their lives as easy as possible. In Stronger through Adversity, Ben Salzmann, President & CEO of Acuity Insurance offered insights on how to simplify the employee and customer experience by effectively leveraging technology and empowering team members through training.
Have you looked at your customer experience and sought to remove complexity, corporate-speak, and unnecessary steps?

Faster into the Future | How to Deliver Memorable Experiences in a Pandemic and Post-Pandemic World

Racecar driver Mario Andretti once said that “if everything seems under control you are not going fast enough.” His words are appropriate for automobile racing and apply to customer experience delivery as well. Is your average response time from customer service below 5 minutes?

Emotion Drives Memory | How to Deliver Memorable Experiences in a Pandemic and Post-Pandemic World

"Our memory is enhanced by the emotion attending the event. The more intense the feelings, the more accessible the memory." Those words from Professor Robert Dykstra have profound relevance given the intensity of emotions experienced from early 2020 to the present day. The pandemic has produced sustained and heightened emotions of fear, anxiety, uncertainty, sadness, isolation, and loss. As such, the actions of leaders, team members, and brands are more vividly recallable than pre-pandemic events. Against that backdrop, it has become increasingly important to look for elements of a team member or customer journey that produce pain or pleasure. During the pandemic and into the future, are you demonstrating competence, consistency, responsiveness, and reliability that fuels positive emotional experiences?

Deliver Memorable Internal and External Customer Experiences in a Pandemic & Post-Pandemic World

Brian Solis observed, "Each business is a victim of Digital Darwinism, the evolution of consumer behavior when society and technology evolve faster than the ability to exploit it." Calling back to Brian Solis' quote, do you believe your business is experiencing digital Darwinism - reflecting an expedited evolution of consumer behavior, COVID-19, and technology advances?

How to Deliver Memorable Customer Experiences in a Post-Pandemic World | We Are Forever Changed

Many of my clients ask what they need to do to engage team members and customers well-past the pandemic. While I have my hunches, I prefer to look at data on what people say they want from their employers and companies with whom they do business. In addition to self-reported preferences, I watched consumer behavior dating back to research conducted as the virus first took hold in China.
This is the first post in a series titled How to Deliver Memorable Internal and External Customer Experiences in a Pandemic and Post-Pandemic World.

The Gifts of the Pandemic | Stronger Through Customer Experience Elevation

"My humanity is bound up in yours, for we can only be human together." Those are the words of civil rights leader Desmond Tutu.
This is the final post in a series titled The Gifts of the Pandemic.
For me, one of the most significant benefits of this unwanted crisis has been a recommitment to the human experience. By that, I mean, leaders have demonstrated more compassion and respect for their employees' needs. Team members have made sacrifices for one another and exceeded customer expectations.
For more about human experience elevation, please pick-up or gift a copy of my book Stronger Through Adversity, which provides more than 20 pandemic forged lessons from 140 plus leaders like the CEOs and Presidents of Target, Verizon, Kohl's, Microsoft, and Marriott. To elevate the experience of those fighting COVID-19, I'm donating a portion of the book's proceeds to the international nonprofit Direct Relief, which provides food and supplies to those on the frontline.

The Gifts of the Pandemic | Stronger Through Gratitude

It’s easy to remember a time when someone failed to acknowledge our contribution. However, it’s almost impossible to know how often people walked away from interacting with us feeling underappreciated. Based on my experience this last year, I’ve noticed leaders expressing gratitude more frequently to their team members. Michelle Gass, CEO of Kohl’s, exemplifies this unintended benefit of the pandemic.
Michelle told me one of her top priorities during COVID-19 has been to “consistently express my tremendous gratitude and thanks to our 100,000 associates. In every message, I’ve been very intentional about saying thank you. Sometimes it was in recognition for people who are on the front lines in our e-commerce fulfillment centers. Other times gratitude would be expressed for those who made curbside pick-up possible."
To learn more about the role of gratitude in crisis, please pick-up or gift a copy of my book Stronger Through Adversity, which provides more than 20 pandemic forged lessons from 140 plus leaders like the CEOs and Presidents of Target, Verizon, Microsoft, and Marriott. As an expression of my gratitude, I’m donating a portion of the book’s proceeds to the international nonprofit Direct Relief, which provides food and supplies to those on the frontline.