Customer Experience: The New Frontier of Growth
| Date :10-Dec-2019 |
By Vyom Shah :
While checking out from a Ritz Carlton hotel, a child forgot his stuffed giraffe toy and to console the crying boy his father made up a story that the ‘giraffe’ was taking an ‘extended vacation’. Though the guest had called up the hotel requesting to find the toy and send it across, it would still take couple of days before the toy reaches the guests. Meanwhile, to make the father’s story seem true, Ritz Carlton took pictures of the ‘giraffe’ in various poses – taking a sunbath besides the pool, getting a massage, roaming on a golf cart and so on, and shared with the guest.
The family was so delighted at Ritz Carlton’s gesture that it shared the incident over social media and it went viral, increasing Ritz Carlton’s brand. Internet abounds with thousands of such tales of heroic customer service. However, with most top-tier companies breaking the frontiers on customer delight, Customer Experience (CX) has become the new battleground. Couple of decades back Indian moviegoers were queuing up in front of ticket counters to purchase movie tickets. Then came ‘Book My Show’ (BMS), which enabled Indians to book tickets online. People however still had to go to the same ticket counter to get the prints - BMS noticed this and introduced Mobile- tickets. It continued identifying such problems in customers’ journey and went on solving them.
Think of various features that BMS offers – pre-booking and delivery of snacks on seat; ‘Split Tickets’ with friends who are arriving late; book an Ola within BMS App. This is essentially what CX is all about - understanding the needs and problems of customers and accordingly solving them, thus creating value across all touchpoints. According to a CEI survey, 86 per cent of buyers will pay more for better CX. 68 per cent of customers who switch brands, do so due to poor or indifferent service. With benefits of more sales, customer loyalty, brand building, reduced costs and increased profitability, CX has become the New Marketing. And it’s not only global companies like Starbucks and Disney championing CX, even Governments are also warming up to it. Indian Government’s ‘Passport Seva’ delivering a seamless and hassle-free journey is a success story of a good CX.
Technology is playing a pivotal role in delivering great CX. We’re working with a Central India’s large Multi-speciality hospital to enable its entire patient journey over WhatsApp - reducing wait time for patients, reducing need of customer representatives and adding a channel to deliver seamless experience. Similar such solutions are being developed. While large businesses have budget to invest in technology and CX solutions, there are lot of things that even SMEs can do. A friend went to a Taj Hotel and while dining, something spilled on his shirt. A waiter saw that and quickly ran to get a glass of warm water with baking soda that he offered to my friend to apply on the shirt, to avoid staining it.
My friend was mesmerized by this experience. This is the sort of pro-active service that even small restaurants can deliver. Recently, more than 300 climbers queued up to summit Mt. Everest creating a sort of ‘Traffic Jam’. Unfathomable as it may sound, such precarious scenario exists in today’s business world marked by hyper-competition where companies are queuing up to serve the best. To compound it, customers have increasingly become ever demanding. To stand out from the crowd, companies are going to great lengths to woo, wow and win customers, and CX is one such effective way to do so. The author is the Founder of Phronesis Strategies.