Customer Experience Management: Strategies And Best Practices Essay.

a) Compare and contrast the emerging concepts and practices that underpin the customer experience

b) Apply the influence of perception to the customer experience of service delivery

c) Document a customer journey map

d) Develop and communicate a customer experience strategy

e) Identify tools to monitor and evaluate a customer experience strategy

What is Customer Experience Management (CEM)?

Customer experience is an essential aspect of every successful business of global companies and businesses in various industries are primarily competing on customer experience

Outcompeting other companies hence require companies to deliver better customer experience in their product and service delivery  

According to Hill (2011), companies that focus on their customers often record an increased annual revenue as compared to other that only focus on the quality of products and services they offer. Benefits include greater workforce agreement rates.

What is Customer Experience Management (CEM)?

- It is a collection of strategies and processes used by a company in tracking, overseeing, and organizing every interaction between the company and the customer  (Hill 2010, p. 4)

Objectives of CEM

Optimization of interactions from the perspective of customers

Fostering customer loyalty

Enables easy management of the customers by the company

Steps to forming a customer centric CEM in the organization

To effectively adopt CEM, the company should;

Design a plan or strategy encompassing all the customer interactions have a 360- degree customer view  with updated data on the company accounts having an updated system that can connect both the clients and business Personalizing its business through new technologies (Hardy 2012, p. 5)

How CEM strategy  will give the organization competitive advantages

Adopting CEM strategy in the organization will;

Understanding customer perceptions

Organizing its interaction with its customers

Emotional analytics will help the company to gauge the benefits the customers gain from the company

It is a method that is relevant to the millennial generation that form a bigger percentage of the current business environment.

Toyota started its operations in the 1980s (Hardy 2012, p. 5)

It is a Japanese automobile company that operates in the global automobile industry.

It machines are said to required fewer repairs and can last for a longer duration.

Currently, the company still have unique designs and is consistent in its innovation of modeling ideas resulting to their long-term customer preference and excellence in operation.

Importance of customer segmentation for the company

Helps in reaching a target market such as the sports community

Enabling marketing team to reach the most ideal customers and not waste time and resources on impressers

Enabling the company to craft relevant messages for the targeted customers

Initiates easy connection with the target audience, communicate resonating messages, and develop positive customer relationships

Identification and differentiation of customer segments

Adopting the CEM strategy will enable the company to easily segment its customers  such as;

Geographic segment

Psychographic segment

Demographic segment

Behavioral segment

Geographic segment

Involves initiating campaigns targets audience on the basis of their location such as;

- customers within a town

As a large business with international market, the company can focus on offering services to specific audience within specific locations

Demographic segmentation

It will involve dividing the market on the basis of  the characteristics of the audience such as age, gender, income, occupation, etc

Useful when it comes to targeting multiple segments at the same time

Behavioral Segmentation

It involves the classification of customers on the basis of  different attributes ;

Objectives of CEM

Occasions such as weddings, sports, etc

Loyalty and purchase patterns

Awareness and usage

Enables the company to reach out the target audiences through specific campaigns

Value proposition for each segment

There is a need for value proportion in the company since;

Users cannot access information if customer information is  not connected, effectively organized, or distributed.

The company has difficulty in developing a ‘single view customer’ platform with organized customer data. poor handling of technical support has led to reduced customer experience

Despite the good performance of Toyota company in the automobile industry, it still faces several challenges in dealing with the customers (Bhulal 2017, p. 59). i.e.

Poor customer segmentation in connecting multiple feedbacks on various data channels

Poor collaboration between the functional departments

Incorporate the voice of employees too

Ineffective leverage of reports to integrate information from different customer voices

Ineffective customer response

Opportunities for improvement

Despite the few gaps identified in the manner in which the company is treating its customers, McLean  (2014) denotes that there are still more opportunities for making a better customer relationships i.e.; more opportunities in international market Toyota is a global company with a brand name hence has higher opportunities for progress

Established customers and products

Recommended CEM Strategy

Suitable strategy- Voice of the Customer (VOC) and customer feedback

- high level of competition within the automobile industry

 - will help the company reach out to customers on their specific desires in the market.

What is Voice of Customers (VOC)?

It is the description of the feedback from the customers concerning their service expectations and experience  with the services and products offered by a company (Hill 2011).

It  focuses on expectations, needs, and  product/service improvement  

Characteristics of the best VOC strategy

Connects multiple feedbacks on various data channels

Provides automatic collaboration between the functional departments

Delivers a clear business result

Incorporate the voice of employees too

Leverage reports that display and integrate information from different customer voices

Competitive benefits to the company

According to Fogleman (2013), effective VOC strategies will enable the company to;

Engage and connect with customers at key customer points in the journey of relationship

Maximizing the company profit  

Prioritizing on the identified wants and customer voice needs

Solicit and evaluate new ideas, solutions, and concepts

Enlisting customer data and intelligence to learn on effective marketing in a one-to-one fashioned and personalized way

Identifying the location of customers and marketing to them in real time.

Enables the organization to give a customer-pointed in relation to a discrete customer purchase

How will the company build an effective VOC program?

The voice of the customer can effectively be understood as an ongoing conversation

The key aspect is hence gathering and using a timely information that will initiate improvement

The above can be effective using multiple touch points such as support, sales,  accounting, and warranty interactions

Steps to be considered in building VOC program

Capture- identify the internal and external listening sports of customers. This can be done through surveys across all the touch pints for the customer

Steps to forming a customer centric CEM in the organization

Analysis- evaluating a real-time customer feedback through the relevant stakeholders

Act- knowing the problem, take corrective action towards the customer requests

Monitor- helps in tracking results and uncover patters of improvements

According to Fogleman (2014), achieving loyal customer relationship through VOC requires the adoption of IDIC model. With an aim off;

Maintaining a prolonged genuine customer relationship with the existing customers of the company

Realizing the value maturity and uniqueness of customers through an individualized service to every customer

Remaining competitive in the market segmentation through the retention of the existing customers as well as invitation of new customers  

How will IDIC model help in achieving effective VOC

IDIC Model is a four step mechanism involving;

Identification of customers

Differentiation of customers

Interaction with customers

Customizing them

- The model will hence help in customer segmentation process to identify and take action towards what they desire

Customer differentiation

Involves building the profile of the customer to serve them as per the services they desire to achieve

The company will be able to identify the non-profitable customers, the top customers, large customers that have  ordered less services, and customers that buy more from the competitors.

Customer Interaction

This involves the on-site interactions with the customers on issues such as service questions, or tailoring products

At this point, the company will be able to identify and listen to the expectations and needs of the major customers

The interactions occur in a customer-preferred channel

Customer Customization

Is the mass customization of the content of customer information as per the segmentation achieved at the acquisition process

Also involves a further market research to evaluate the possibility of tailoring the products to meet the needs of the customers in a more competitive manner

Recommendation for better CEM

To increase the effectiveness of customer experience through VOC, the company needs to adopt the following strategies;

Adopting relevant VOC infrastructure/ right technology  for the following benefits;

- effective CEM  needs to be backed with updated infrastructure

-  technology has become a primary focus for all business hence makes it relevant to the current market.

Precautions to be taken in adopting VOC in the company

With a focus of increasing its customer relationship, the company need to ensure that;

collect, continually monitor, and organize the voice of its customers

Listen, verify, and measure customer voices to direct goals and priorities

Avoid wasting effort and resources by investing on customers who do not add value to the future of the company

Conclusion

No private or public organization or company can become an effective competitor and a market leader without listening to customers

The perceived quality from customers is the leading drive in every business success

Adopting VOC and a CEM strategy will ensure Toyota Company remains competitive in the global automobile industry

References

Bhulal, V 2017, 'The Impact of Customer Relationship Management and its Significant Relationship to Customers' Satisfaction in Cooperative Banking: (A Case Study of Kangra Central Co-operative Bank)', Global Journal Of Enterprise Information System, 9, 2, pp. 59-66, Business Source Premier, EBSCOhost, viewed 14 August 2017.

Fogleman, D 2013, 'Customer Service', Training, 50, 2, pp. 44-45, Business Source Premier, EBSCOhost, viewed 14 August 2017.

Hardy S, 2012, ‘Introduction to Marketing: environmental analysis on Toyota cars, Birmingham, World Scientific Publishing. New York Times Business Journal, Vol.33, No.3, pgs.4-12

Hill, B. (2010). Seven Steps to Mastering Business Analysis, Bradford, J: Ross Publishing

McLean, G 2014, 'Customer Service Behaviours in Korea and Implications for Training: Lessons from an Exploratory Critical Incidents Study of Customer and Employee Service Encounters', Asia Pacific Business Review, 13, 1, pp. 1-20, Business Source Premier, EBSCOhost, viewed 14 August 2017.