“We see our customers as invited guests to a party, and we are the hosts. It’s our job every day to make every important aspect of the customer experience a little bit better.”
– Jeff Bezos (Founder of Amazon)
As a business owner, I always focus on providing the best services to my customers. After all, the purpose of a business is to create and keep a customer.
When I started my business, I would often browse the internet, read books, and talk to people just to find that one trick that leads businesses to success. At a certain point, I noticed that most successful business owners often highlight the importance of customer experience in their interviews and books.
Now, I had figured out that trick, but I did not know how to implement it to yield the best outcomes. So I researched some more and tried different methods and eventually, I was able to get the desired results.
In this article, I will share with you ten ways that helped me enhance customer experience, leading to the accelerated growth of my business.
But before we learn about those ways, let’s discuss some related basics first.
What is Customer Experience?
Customer experience can be understood as the overall experience and impression a customer has of a business. Suppose I go to a café and order myself a cup of coffee. From the moment I step foot in the café to ordering coffee and going there again for a repeat purchase, everything is included in the customer experience.
Why is CX important?
To understand why customer experience or CX is important, let’s move back to our example. If I like the environment and services of the café I visited, It is obvious that I will want to visit that place again. Not only will I become a regular customer there, but I will also recommend the café to my family and friends, increasing their word-of-mouth sales.
From this, you can gather that CX directly relates to increasing sales, building customer loyalty, and brand image, ultimately leading to the growth of the business.
Why you should use customer feedback as part of your CX strategy
I often see business owners struggling to recognize their customers’ needs and failing to enhance their customer experience. I understand the struggle and fuss about it and the solution that I can provide you is to use customer experience analytics.
Using customer experience analytics and customer feedback helped me understand my clients better. It acted as a communication channel between my business and potential clients. It not only helped me predict customer behavior from the already available data but also helped me engage with clients to understand their future expectations.
INTERESTING TIDBIT The following pie chart represents the top three reasons why businesses proactively invest in customer experience.
Now that I have explained the basic aspects of customer experience to you, I think we are ready to discuss the 10 ways to improve customer experience.
10 Ways to improve customer experience
In this segment, I’ll share with you 10 ways that helped me improve customer experience and lead my business to success-
1. Listen to your customers
I heard a phrase once, “The customer is the real owner of a business.” At first, it sounded rubbish to me, but when I thought about it, it actually made sense. Can you imagine a business without any customers? No right, a business survives as long as it gets customers.
So, who do you think is the real boss?
Listening to the boss is essential, if you want to keep your business alive for long you’ll need to listen to the customers and provide the services they expect and demand from you.
2. Understand your customers
I don’t think it is rocket science to know that you need to understand your customer’s needs and expectations in order to fulfill those. But actually trying to understand so many customers can seem as complex as rocket science.
If you ask me how I did it, well I used a bit of help from technology to analyze customer data and personalize services for my clients. I tried to engage and communicate with customers offline and online to understand what they were expecting. This helped me tremendously to alter my services according to the customer needs and provide a better customer experience.
3. Map your customer’s journey
I created a customer journey map that included everything. I tried to visualize all the obstacles and problems my customers might face, from when they even think of buying my products and looking for them online to their post-purchase experience.
This helped me envision all the areas of improvement for my business that need attention, and erase any friction points to provide a smooth customer experience.
4. Hire and develop a strong team
CX is not something I want to compromise with, in my business. So I decided to create a team consisting of employees skilled in related qualities to provide the best services to my customers.
I would also like to highlight that satisfied employees = satisfied customers, so make sure your employees are well-appreciated and motivated for their jobs.
5. Listen to your team
I have observed several business leaders often neglecting their teams, which is always strange to me because isn’t it a questionable choice to neglect the front-line employees who interact with customers on a regular basis?
That is why it is important to ask your team for their valuable insights, feedback, and observations and make the environment favorable for both customers and employees.
6. Deliver excellent customer service
For customer service and doubts, I used tools like live chat that enhanced efficiency and first-contact resolution, while self-service options empowered by knowledge-base software enabled customers to find answers quickly.
7. Connect with your customers
I always try to connect with my customers on a personal level by engaging in conversations. Actively listening to my customers not only enables me to understand them better but also makes them feel heard and valued.
8. Take an omnichannel approach
I don’t want my customers to have any inconsistencies across different channels. I want them to have a similar, seamless experience across all touchpoints. Taking an omnichannel approach allowed me to cater to a unified experience for my clients, no matter if my customer interacts with my brand through social media, the web, or in-store.
9. Leverage artificial intelligence
I cannot stress enough how much technology helped me enhance the overall customer experience. From data analysis to collecting feedback, it helped me in various steps throughout the process, saving time and effort for everyone involved. I will never stop suggesting the use of artificial intelligence for a better CX.
10. Establish metrics and track ROI
In my opinion, one of the most overlooked steps in building customer experience strategies is establishing metrics and tracking return on investment (ROI).
These two steps help me evaluate the impact of my CX strategies, and initiatives on the ground level.
I introduced and implemented CES, CSAT, and NPS scores in my feedback and survey drives, which helped me gain better clarity on what the customers feel about the services being provided at our company.
BONUS TIP Do not forget to reward your loyal customers with extra discounts and coupons. This will make them feel valued and appreciated and strengthen your relationship with the customers.
Conclusion
I can assure you that implementing these ten ways in your business can give you excellent results and even exceed your expectations. Remember that your business is not about you, it is about the customers, therefore how you interact with them, and provide them matters a lot.
Great CX can help you increase sales, polish your brand image, and ultimately lead your company to success. On the other hand, failing to prioritize CX can do the opposite as well.
At last, I’ll wrap up this article with a quote from Marillyn Hewson (former CEO of Lockheed Martin) –Customer experience is not about delivering a product, it is about delivering care.
