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Annette Franz, CCXP
Founder + CEO at CX Journey Inc.
Mission Viejo, United States
It's 2022, and Annette is celebrating 30 years in the customer experience profession!
Annette wrote the book on customer understanding! It's available on Amazon in both paperback and Kindle formats: Customer Understanding: Three Ways to Put the "Customer" in Customer Experience (and at the Heart of Your Business).
Annette's second book focuses on building a winning organization through a customer-centric culture. The book, Built to Win: Designing a Customer-Centric Culture That Drives Value for Your Business (Advantage|ForbesBooks), is available on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, BAM!, Target, and hundreds of other outlets.
Are you looking for a keynote speaker, a coach, a consultant, a journey mapping workshop/process facilitator, an influencer, or a thought leader who loves to speak, write, and teach others about customer experience, employee experience, and culture? You've come to the right place!
Annette Franz, CCXP has 30 years of experience (both client side and vendor side) helping companies understand their employees and customers, identifying what drives retention, satisfaction, engagement, and the overall experience, and designing customer experience strategies to deliver a better experience for all constituents.
Annette was named one of “The 100 Most Influential Tech Women on Twitter” by Business Insider and is regularly recognized as a top thought leader in Customer Experience.
She serves an Advisory Board Member for CX@UCI, mentors other professionals in this field to help them advance their careers, and is an international speaker and an avid writer; you can find her thought leadership on her own blog and in Forbes, Business2Community, CustomerThink, TechTarget, Quality Digest, APICS Magazine, and more. She is a Certified Customer Experience Professional (CCXP).
She is also an official member of the Forbes Coaches Council, an invitation-only community for successful business and career coaches. Members are selected based on their depth and diversity of experience.
Available For: Authoring, Consulting, Influencing, Speaking Travels From: Orange County, CA Speaking Topics: customer experience, employee experience, culture
Putting the Customer in Customer Experience
January 18, 2023
Putting the Customer Back into Customer Experience
January 18, 2023
Customer Understanding: Put the “Customer” in Customer Experience and at the Heart of Your Business
January 18, 2023
Featured Topics
Putting the "Customer" in Customer Experience
Everyone talks about customer experience and customer-centricity, but do they really know what that is, what it means, and what it entails.
So many companies give lip service to customer experience - and there are a ton of examples - which means customers still feel like they aren't really at the center of all that businesses do, whether it's designing a product, a service, or a process.
How do we fix that? Customer understanding is really the cornerstone of customer-centricity. In this keynote, I talk about three ways to achieve customer understanding - helping you put the "customer" into "customer experience."
In this presentation, attendees will learn:
*What customer understanding is and how to achieve it
*Why and how customer understanding is the cornerstone of customer-centricity
*What a customer-centric culture looks like
*Why brands must invest in a customer-centric culture: the benefits of a customer-centric culture
Improve the Customer Experience... From the Inside Out
Among the building blocks of a customer experience transformation strategy, focusing on the employee experience is one of the most critical. But why haven't companies made this a priority? We know for a fact that the employee experience drives a great customer experience!
In this presentation, I not only explain what the employee experience entails and how to improve it, but I also share stories from my client work that support the notion that if we fix the employee experience, you'll have resolved 90% of the issues with the customer experience.
You can't fix what's happening on the outside if you don't fix what's happening inside! What other aspects do you need to think about to fix what's happening on the inside? I'll share three other things that need to be considered in addition to the employee experience.
Build a Winning Organization Through a Customer-Centric Culture
A customer-centric culture is one that is deliberately designed to be that way. There must be commitment from the top, especially from the CEO, to put customers' best interests at the heart of everything the business does.
There are 10 foundational principles that ensure you get the culture that you design and allow. This presentation, which became the basis for Annette's second book and which has been updated to reflect new thinking in (and since) the book, is a must-see for organizations that want to shift how business is done to ensure that the customer is front and center.
Empathy: Can It Be Measured?
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February 08, 2023
What is empathy? Why is it important? Can it be taught? How can it be measured? How do you put empathy into action? All of these questions and more addressed in this week's article!
Organizational Silos: Impacting Both Employee and Customer Experiences
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February 01, 2023
After a keynote I did last week, I took some questions. One of them was related to organizational silos, their impact on the experience (for both employees and customers), what you can do to break down/connect those silos, and my thoughts on the role of matrix organizations/structures in breaking do
QUIET QUITTING: IT’S BEYOND TIME TO FOCUS ON YOUR EMPLOYEES
Journey
January 25, 2023
Probably one of the hottest topics in business over the last year or so has been the Great Resignation (Reshuffle, Reset, Renegotiation, Rethink, Reimagination, etc.). The Great Re[insert your preference here] is really the great awakening. Shining the spotlight on employees should have happened long, long ago.
The Importance of A Winning Customer Data Strategy
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January 18, 2023
I am thrilled to share that I took on the role of hosting Concentrix Catalyst's digital talk show series, Born Digital, which is pioneering new ways to connect through organic, human-centered, creative content. We've filmed two episodes so far. Today's article highlights some of the things we discus
If You Have Employees, Then You Need An Employee Experience Program
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January 11, 2023
Employee experience is a hot topic right now. Finally, right? The Great Resignation really turned the focus onto employees and on understanding what’s driving them to switch jobs, move to other industries, or leave the workforce altogether. A lot of studies have been conducted to better understand
When It Comes to Data, Eight Rights Don’t Make a Wrong
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January 04, 2023
Data is at the heart of designing and delivering a great (connected) customer experience. Without data informing your design and delivery, you really are flying blind.
Podcasts to Keep Your Brain Engaged Over the Holidays… and Beyond
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December 21, 2022
It was a busy year of interviews and podcasts to spread the word about my new book, Built to Win: Designing a Customer-Centric Culture That Drives Value For Your Business. I wrote this book mostly for company executives and leaders, but it’s also for others who want to help executives and leaders
Important Reads for #CX Professionals in 2022 and Beyond
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December 14, 2022
It’s that time of the year again: time to reflect on what was, what is, and what’s to come. It seems that hot topics this past year were, not surprisingly (for a variety of reasons), employee experience and culture (among others). It could be because I wrote more on these topics, but my
Change Management Tools: Kotter, ADKAR, or Something Else?
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December 07, 2022
Once priorities have been set and decisions have been made about which changes to make, the next question I am often asked is, “What change management approach or model shall we use? Kotter or ADKAR?” Or, what about the customer experience change management approach I propose? Learn about all th
5 Leadership Tools for Decision-Making and Prioritization
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November 30, 2022
As customer experience professionals, the work you do to identify improvement opportunities and other initiatives to design and deliver a better experience requires you to build the business case and to help your executives prioritize those initiatives – because there are typically many improvemen
Five More (of Ten) Foundational Principles of a Customer-Centric Organization
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November 16, 2022
In last week's post I shared that, in order to get your entire organization thinking differently, you’ve got to first know and embrace the principles and the practices of customer-centricity, and you’ve got to ensure that everyone remains aligned to achieve the desired outcomes of designing such
Five (of Ten) Foundational Principles of a Customer-Centric Organization
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November 09, 2022
In today's post, I outline five of the ten principles of customer-centricity that I write about in my latest book, Built to Win: Designing a Customer-Centric Culture That Drives Value For Your Business. I'll share the other five in next week's post.
Customer Success Trends & Predictions: An Interview With Dickey Singh
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November 02, 2022
In this article, Annette Franz reviews five Customer Success trends and predictions posed by Deloitte and asks Cast.app CEO, Dickey Singh, to weigh in with his thoughts on what he’s seeing relative to each trend or prediction.
11 Things You Can Do to Ensure Your Journey Maps Are Actionable
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October 26, 2022
Journey mapping is one of the most powerful tools to help you understand the current customer experience and to design a new experience. Important to that is ensuring that the maps you and your customers create are actionable. Done correctly and with actions and outcomes in mind, the maps will guide
VALUES-BASED DECISION MAKING
CX JOURNEY™
September 28, 2022
Culture can be defined as core values plus behaviors. Designing a culture is deliberate and purposeful. To ensure that “customer-driven” and “customer-centric” become “how we do things around here” for everyone – as opposed to “sales-driven” or “performance-driven,” which is happening much too often right now, acceptable and unacceptable behaviors for each core value must be defined, socialized, and operationalized.
DRIVING VALUE FOR EMPLOYEES AND FOR THE BUSINESS THROUGH RECOGNITION PROGRAMS
CX JOURNEY™
May 25, 2022
It would be an understatement if I said that 2021 was a challenging year when it comes to employees – remote work, returning to the office, finding jobs, changing jobs, finding employees, ghosting, turnover, wages, raises, the Great Resignation, and on and on. It’s definitely time to start thinking about how you can (and must) do things differently for your employees and the employee experience. But where do you begin?
EMPLOYEE UNDERSTANDING FOR A BETTER EMPLOYEE EXPERIENCE
CX JOURNEY™
March 16, 2022
Without employees, who’s going to build the products, sell the products, service the products, deliver the services, etc.? Who’s going to deliver the experience? Happy and engaged employees are more productive, so it’s up to you to understand them and their needs in order to design a better experience for them – so that they can, in turn, deliver a great experience for customers.
11 TOP TAKEAWAYS FROM 102 CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE EXPERTS
CX JOURNEY™
February 23, 2022
What are the biggest challenges that brands face when they want to implement an exceptional customer experience?
Recently, Clootrack conducted a study around customer experience by interviewing 102 industry leaders from various domains, including customer experience experts, senior leaders of various brands, marketing agencies, CX consultants, analytics and insights experts, and customer experience professionals across the globe.
CX IN 2022: EMPLOYEE EXPERIENCE IS THE BIGGEST HURDLE, AND GETTING LEADERSHIP COMMITMENT IS KEY
CX JOURNEY™
February 09, 2022
I originally wrote today’s post for Momentive.ai. It appeared on their site on January 25, 2022.
Customer expectations were already changing before COVID-19, but the pandemic has amplified them and accelerated new expectations.
These changes drove GetFeedback, the agile customer experience (CX) management solution by Momentive, to conduct research among 2,200 CX professionals worldwide.
THE CUSTOMER’S DILEMMA: ACQUISITION VS. RETENTION
LinkedIn
January 26, 2022
In last week’s post, I wrote about the acquisition versus retention “dilemma” from the marketer’s perspective. Obviously, there are two sides to every story, and the customer’s version is the most important side of this story.
THE MARKETER’S DILEMMA: ACQUISITION VS. RETENTION
CX JOURNEY™
January 19, 2022
hould acquisition vs. retention really be a dilemma? Can’t there just be a balance between the two? Must one outweigh the other?
Companies have long been pouring disproportionate resources – human, time, effort, capital – into the top of the funnel, on attracting and acquiring new customers, while retention efforts have gotten little more than loyalty programs and discount offers.
The answer to the dilemma of focusing on the Buy stages of the lifecycle versus the Own stages can easily be found in this series of statistics that convey a very strong point: retention trumps acquisition, both for the business and for the customer.
CX JOURNEY MUSINGS: CULTURE ISN’T ABOUT CONTROL
CX JOURNEY™
January 12, 2022
I recently read an article on Bloomberg Businessweek (about culture and how to sustain it – or whether it’s sustainable – in the wake of so many employees working from home) in which a Stanford researcher interviewed for the article stated: Culture is a way for organizations to control their members, police their behavior. That’s difficult to do when you can’t—after a meeting—say: ‘You know, John, maybe you shouldn’t have said x or y.’
UX METRICS: WHO, WHAT, WHEN, WHERE, AND WHY?
CX JOURNEY™
January 05, 2022
I originally wrote today’s post for GetFeedback. It A modified version of it appeared on their site in late 2020.
User experience and customer experience are cut from the same stone but have clear differences, not the least of which: who and what UX focuses on and how its measured. In this guide, we’ll outline various ways that UX can be measured – both attitudinally and behaviorally – and explain how to take action to improve the metrics.
USING USER RESEARCH TO DESIGN BETTER PRODUCTS AND SERVICES
CX JOURNEY™
December 15, 2021
User experience (UX) is part of the bigger customer experience (CX) ecosystem. User experience focuses on user interactions with a product, whereas customer experience focuses on the customer (and the overall relationship), who might or might not be the end user.
AI AND THE CONTACT CENTER: WORKING TOGETHER IN HARMONY
CX JOURNEY™
December 08, 2021
Problem statement: The agent experience drives the customer experience. But when agents get bogged down with mundane, repetitive tasks, it takes them away from what’s important, interesting, and impactful – and both the agent experience and the customer experience suffer. Is using AI in the contact center the right solution to get agents back on track?
FOCUS ON THE EXPERIENCE, AND THE NUMBERS WILL COME – ALWAYS
CX JOURNEY™
December 01, 2021
Bain calls it the delivery gap; I refer to it as the customer experience perception gap. Call it what you will; it’s a disturbing statistic that is still relevant today, 16 years later. The numbers may have shifted a little, but the story and the reasons behind the gap are still the same – and are still perpetuated – today.
5 THINGS EVERYONE GETS WRONG ABOUT CUSTOMER SERVICE
CX JOURNEY™
November 17, 2021
Customer service is an important part of not only the customer experience but also the success of a business. Get it wrong and a lot of other pieces of the customer experience and the customer relationship with your brand might (will) fall apart. According to Microsoft, 96% of consumers around the world say customer service is an important factor when it comes to brand loyalty.
THE KEY TO A GREAT CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE IS COLLABORATION
CX JOURNEY™
November 10, 2021
We know that the customer experience is important to the success of any organization. Customers are king, and they vote with their wallets – and with their feet. It’s critical that the experience meets customers’ needs and expectations. Today, customers expect the experience to be simple, effortless, seamless, personalized, convenient, and fast.
THE STATE OF CX: FALL 2021
CX JOURNEY™
November 03, 2021
It’s that time of the year again when folks are looking for predictions about what customer experience will look like next year and beyond. I find it more interesting to reflect on this year as a follow-up to the shitshow that was known as 2020. What did brands learn last year? What are they doing differently this year? Will it stick going into the future? (That’s where the real trends and predictions lie.) How quickly did customer insights rise in importance? How are they being used now?
FROM SALES-CENTRIC TO CUSTOMER-CENTRIC: THREE CRITICAL STEPS
CX JOURNEY™
October 20, 2021
A few months ago, I wrote a post on what it looks like when a company is sales-centric. I’ve seen this culture many times over the last year or so (and prior, for sure, but examples overwhelmingly landed on my desk this year). If you haven’t read that post, it’s an important precursor to this one.
EVOLVING YOUR CUSTOMER SUCCESS APPROACH
CX JOURNEY™
October 13, 2021
I originally published today’s post on Forbes. It appeared on their site on August 23, 2021.
The Customer Success profession was born in 1996, when Vantive, a CRM vendor, realized that their system had a failure rate so high that it drove customers away and sealed the fate of their desire for 100% of customers to be referenceable. Marie Alexander, a former Vantive customer, was hired to help stem the tide. She created a Customer Success department and introduced Customer Success Managers (CSMs) to potential new customers, letting them know there was staff responsible for ensuring their success using the Vantive platform. (Interestingly, so many have credited Salesforce with the concept of customer success, but alas, it was not.)
PRIORITIZATION AND DECISION-MAKING TOOLS: A DELIBERATE 7-STEP DECISION-MAKING CHECKLIST
CX JOURNEY™
October 06, 2021
Last week, I wrote about the RICE Scoring Model, a method used to prioritize initiatives and make smarter decisions. I also mentioned a couple of other post in which I talked about prioritization methods and criteria:
PRIORITIZATION AND DECISION-MAKING TOOLS: THE RICE SCORING MODEL
CX JOURNEY™
September 29, 2021
As customer experience professionals, the work you do to identify improvement opportunities and other initiatives to design and deliver a better experience requires you to build the business case and help your executives prioritize those initiatives – because there are typically many improvements that need to be made.
CX JOURNEY MUSINGS: VALUES CREATE VALUE
CX JOURNEY™
September 22, 2021
Culture is so important to your business. The right culture is even more important. If you ask me, the right culture is always one that is customer-centric. Putting the customer at the heart of the business is what makes the world, er, the business, go round.
WHAT’S IMPEDING CHANGE IN YOUR BUSINESS?
CX JOURNEY™
September 08, 2021
You know you need to make changes in the business, but there are competing forces, those that help to drive the change and those that impede the change. How do you identify and then solve for each of those and, ultimately, bring everyone together?
TIPS TO ACTIVATE YOUR CUSTOMER PERSONAS
CX JOURNEY™
September 01, 2021
A few weeks ago, I wrote about Seth Godin’s concept of finding your Who, which is all about identifying who your products are for. The Who isn’t defined by demographics but by psychographics: their (customer) beliefs, their dreams, their desires. It’s a reminder that developing personas is so important to customer experience design. And it’s a reminder that we should be finding products for our customers, not customers for our products.
CX JOURNEY MUSINGS: NOTHING CHANGES IF NOTHING CHANGES
CX JOURNEY™
August 25, 2021
First and foremost, the CEO must deliberately define (and drive) the culture to be one that puts the customer’s best interests at the center of all the business does. Then, it takes the entire organization to be committed to it, to work together toward a common goal, to put the “customer” in customer experience. You know that there’s a lot of lip service about customer experience and improving the customer experience, but until you put the customer into everything you do, well, it’s just that—lip service.
CHANGE MANAGEMENT AND THE 20/60/20 RULE
CX JOURNEY™
August 18, 2021
I’ve written about change and change management several times over the years, especially last year. After all, customer experience management really is (all about) change management. Change is hard. Well, it can be. But it’s especially hard when not everyone sees or agrees with your change vision.
VISIONARY COMPANIES: ONE PART VISION, MANY PARTS ALIGNMENT
CX JOURNEY™
August 11, 2021
In business and especially in our customer experience work, we seek alignment – from both executives and employees. Executives must all be on the same page; there must be a unified approach and commitment to the work that lies ahead. At the same time, we’ve got to bring employees along, as well, and ensure that everyone is on board to do the work. For employees, this best happens when they are involved in decisions rather than having the outcomes of the decisions forced on them.
7 WAYS TO KEEP THE CUSTOMER TOP OF MIND
CX JOURNEY™
August 04, 2021
“How do you keep the customer top of mind when everybody is working remotely right now?” This was the question that Ben Motteram and I tackled on one of our recent calls. The following is a transcript of the call.
Simon Sinek popularized the concept of finding your Why, which he defines as the purpose, cause, or belief that drives you. He states that the concept is “grounded in the tenets of the biology of human decision making.” Once you find your Why, you can live in alignment with it. Truly an important concept and exercise, both for business and for life, in general.
BUILDING THE BUSINESS CASE: NO PAIN, NO GAIN
CX JOURNEY™
July 21, 2021
One of the most-commonly requested needs – often as a result of CEO/executive asks – is to build the business case for the business to focus on the customer experience. (It’s painful just to write that without thinking about this open letter to CEOs, excerpted from my book, Customer Understanding.)
CX JOURNEY MUSINGS: WHICH COMES FIRST, EXPECTATIONS OR PERFORMANCE?
CX JOURNEY™
July 14, 2021
Customers try your brand with a set of expectations (your brand promise) in mind. How you perform against those expectations leads to some level of satisfaction. If performance meets or exceeds expectations, then customers have a higher level of satisfaction and/or loyalty. If performance is less than expectations, then the brand promise has been broken – no explanation needed on what that means for your company. One sidebar to note here: consumers have higher expectations of iconic brands.
CX JOURNEY MUSINGS: RIDE FOR THE BRAND
CX JOURNEY™
July 07, 2021
What is a brand? And what does it mean to ride for the brand?
Having grown up on a farm, I know brands and branding well. In farm and ranch life, a brand is an identifier for your livestock, a symbol imprinted on an animal’s skin/hide. (There are other forms beyond the iron branding tool, such as ear tags to identify ownership, i.e., to which farmer that animal belonged.) According to The Cowboy Accountant, “In the early days of the American west, a brand was a ranch’s trademark, used to separate and document ownership of livestock. The brand also represented pride, duty, and stewardship, which inspired loyalty and dedication.”
CX JOURNEY MUSINGS: ARE YOU SALES-CENTRIC OR CUSTOMER-CENTRIC?
CX JOURNEY™
June 30, 2021
There’s a difference? Yes, there is.
I’ve been involved in a few conversations lately where it was quite obvious that what these folks were talking about clearly described sales-driven and sales-centric organizations, but not all parties to the conversations agreed with my assessment of the situation.
STRENGTHENING RELATIONSHIPS THROUGH CUSTOMER SUCCESS
CX JOURNEY™
June 16, 2021
The history of the Customer Success profession dates back to 1996, when a CRM vendor, Vantive, realized that their system had a high failure rate, an issue that certainly didn’t help their quest to have 100% of their customers willing to serve as references. Marie Alexander created and led a department she called Customer Success. She introduced team members to prospects, letting them know that the Customer Success Managers were there to ensure the prospect would be successful using Vantive.
EMPLOYEE EXPERIENCE: ARE YOU PROVIDING FEEDBACK OR FEEDFORWARD?
CX JOURNEY™
June 09, 2021
A critical component of a great employee experience is feedback – both from peers and from management. The iterative, continuous improvement that happens as a result of that feedback is important to an employee’s development, productivity, and engagement. But does that improvement really happen? Or is providing/receiving feedback more of a demoralizing exercise?
RESTORING CUSTOMER CONFIDENCE?
CX JOURNEY™
June 02, 2021
The topics of customer trust and customer confidence have come up in conversations a few times recently, especially as it relates to pandemic and post-pandemic actions by several companies. More on that in a moment. To start with, I thought I’d take a closer look.
INTERVIEWING FOR CULTURE FIT
CX JOURNEY™
May 26, 2021
“Hiring for culture fit” is always a hot topic. I love it. I think it’s so important that you get the right people on the bus to ensure you (a) have the culture you desire, (b) deliver the experience customers desire, and (c) see the business results you desire. I’ve written about it a couple times:
IDEATING THE FUTURE STATE CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE
CX JOURNEY™
May 19, 2021
I’ve been know to say, “You can’t transform something you don’t understand.” You don’t want to change things that are working well or that create value for your customers. So know the current state and what to fix and what to maintain before designing the future state. Know the current state so that you can make near-term fixes and improvements while you’re re-imagining and redesigning the future state, which can take some time.
CUSTOMER SUCCESS: BUILDING VALUE FOR CUSTOMERS FASTER THAN THEY CAN ON THEIR OWN
CX JOURNEY™
May 12, 2021
There are so many different customer experience roles these days that I wrote a post a few months ago called “Customer [Insert Term Here]: What Do They All Mean?” In the past, I’ve written a few times about the difference between customer experience and customer service. And back in 2018, I homed in on the difference between customer experience and customer success. Ultimately, I believe that customer experience is the umbrella discipline, and if we get the experience right all of the sub-disciplines will be less costly and their workloads will be simpler and more streamlined.
EMPATHY MAPS ARE NOT JOURNEY MAPS – AND VICE VERSA
CX JOURNEY™
May 05, 2021
Back in 2019, I shared an excerpt from my book, Customer Understanding: Three Ways to Put the “Customer” in Customer Experience (and at the Heart of Your Business, that outlines the various types of maps that you may encounter or use in your work to understand and redesign the customer experience.
Over time, and especially recently, I realized that I probably should’ve included one other map definition in that section of the book for clarity, although there’s a reason I didn’t, which you’ll understand shortly. I’m talking about empathy maps. Too many people think empathy maps are a form of journey map. They are not.
PROVING THE ROI OF REDUCING CUSTOMER EFFORT
CX JOURNEY™
April 28, 2021
As a follow on to the post, Four Actions to Take on Customer Effort Feedback, you’re likely going to need to prove the ROI of reducing customer effort. In this post, I’ll talk about five steps to prove the ROI.
So you’ve taken the time to listen to customers in order to understand the experience they’re having with your brand. You’ve uncovered some real pain points for customers – parts of the experience that require more effort on their part than they expected or deserve! It’s time to take action and make some improvements. [maybe a link here to the previous article on how to take action on CES]
FOUR ACTIONS TO TAKE ON CUSTOMER EFFORT FEEDBACK
CX JOURNEY™
April 21, 2021
One of the biggest mistakes companies can – and do – make with customer feedback is to do nothing at all with it. Remember the old Gartner statistic: 95% of companies collect customer feedback. Yet only 10% use the feedback to improve, and only 5% tell customers what they are doing in response to what they heard.
EMPLOYEE EXPERIENCE DRIVES THE CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE: BUT IT’S NOT JUST ABOUT THE FRONTLINE
CX JOURNEY™
April 14, 2021
I’ve had a lot of conversations in recent weeks about how the employee experience drives the customer experience, but the part that stands out from these conversations is the common thread: that the customer experience only happens via, or is only shaped by, the frontline employees.
CX JOURNEY MUSINGS: THE EXPERIENCE IS EVERYTHING
CX JOURNEY™
March 31, 2021
In last week’s post, I wrote about some findings in Salesforce’s latest State of the Connected Customer report. One of the graphics for the first finding, “customer connections are essential,” stood out to me. The title of the chart is, “Amid Crises, Experience Remains a Key Differentiator.” I agree with that. It’s the sub-title that struck me: “The Experience a Company Provides Is as Important as Its Products or Services.”
CUSTOMERS ARE RE-EVALUATING THEIR BRAND RELATIONSHIPS
CX JOURNEY™
March 24, 2021
I recently got my hands on a copy of Salesforce’s latest State of the Connected Customer report, which captures customers’ thoughts from midway through 2020 and, ultimately, the pandemic and other societal crises during the year. At this point, the key findings are probably not a surprise to read, but the details and stats behind them are interesting, nonetheless.
MARKETING IN THE ERA OF THE CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE
CX Journey Inc.
March 17, 2021
What customers are seeing and experiencing vs. what brands are saying can often be in conflict. The gap between Marketing and Customer Experience (CX) teams is largely responsible for that. In this article, I’ll pose some conversation starters to help bridge that gap and get everyone working together for the benefit of the customer – and, ultimately, the business.
BREAKING DOWN SILOS BETWEEN PRODUCT AND CX
CX JOURNEY™
March 10, 2021
Designing and delivering a cohesive end-to-end customer experience is important for brands to do. To make this happen, your entire organization must be integrated and aligned to work toward that goal. In this article, I’ll address the gap between two important parts of your organization that must be bridged in order to achieve this goal.
CUSTOMER ENGAGEMENT: BEYOND PERSONALIZATION TO HYPER-PERSONALIZATION
CX JOURNEY™
March 03, 2021
I originally wrote today’s post for GetFeedback. It appeared on their site on March 1, 2020.
According to Salesforce, 51% of customers expect that brands will anticipate their needs and make relevant suggestions before they make contact – by 2020. Well, here we are!
It’s amazing how much business has changed in the last 20+ years, and yet, it’s incredible how much it hasn’t. Take for example the concept of 1:1 marketing, introduced by Don Peppers and Martha Rogers in the late 90s. They defined 1:1 marketing (also called relationship marketing or customer-relationship management) as “being willing and able to change your behavior toward an individual customer based on what the customer tells you and what else you know about that customer.” Sounds like something that has been referred to as “personalization” in recent years but has evolved even further to “hyper-personalization” in 2020.
CUSTOMER-CENTRICITY: WHAT EXACTLY IS IT?
CX JOURNEY™
February 24, 2021
The terms “customer-centric” and “customer-centricity” get thrown around a lot; oftentimes, it’s quite clear that they’re being used out of turn. I believe “customer-centric” is often confused with “customer focus,” and the two are very different.
HUMANIZING AUTOMATION TO HELP EMPLOYEES WORK SMARTER NOT HARDER
CX JOURNEY™
February 17, 2021
Back in late 2015, I wrote an article titled Work Harder or Smarter? in which I offered up some ways to help employees work more efficiently – ultimately, to work smarter. The last item on the list was automation. Fast forward five plus years, and automation is likely at the top of the list now for a lot of companies! But for many, the term “automation” brings chills, with visions of job losses and customer frustration.
TRANSFORMING THE CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE FROM THE INSIDE OUT
CX JOURNEY™
February 10, 2021
I’ve written about inside out thinking and behavior a few times, but today’s focus on inside out is a little different.
I often receive requests to train employees on how to deliver a great customer experience. Awesome. I love where they’re headed with that request, but there’s so much more to delivering a great experience than simply training employees to do so. (Yes, that’s a part of it, but not the first part.) As I like to say, you have to fix what’s happening on the inside (leadership, culture, employees) before you can fix what’s happening or do better on the outside (for customers, vendors, partners, and others in your ecosystem).
PARTICIPATIVE RELATIONSHIPS: CO-CREATE THE EXPERIENCE WITH CUSTOMERS
CX JOURNEY™
February 03, 2021
In 2019, I wrote about this marketing phenomenon that I kept hearing about, that customers are in control, that they have all the power. I never felt like that was right. In that post, I wrote: So, when you see those headlines about customer control and customer...
CUSTOMER [INSERT TERM HERE]: WHAT DO THEY ALL MEAN?
CX Journey™
January 27, 2021
Here’s an uncomfortable – yet indisputable – truth: you are in business to create and to nurture customers. Without customers – and especially without employees to create your products and to serve your customers – you have no business. Regardless of company size, region, industry, etc., you are in business for the customer, because of the customer.
12 TIPS TO IMPROVE YOUR CSAT SCORE
CX Journey™
January 20, 2021
You know your customers are satisfied because the customer satisfaction (CSAT) score that you see on your daily dashboard tells you as much. The score is solid. But you aren’t satisfied; you believe it could be so much better. And rightly so – it usually can be. So, what’s a company to do to earn even better CSAT scores?
HOW TO TAKE ACTION ON YOUR CUSTOMER FEEDBACK
CX Journey™
January 13, 2021
Author and businessman Harvey Mackay once said: “You learn when you listen. You earn when you listen – not just money, but respect.”
Those words could not be truer when it comes to customer experience and to your business.
Listening (to customers) is one of the most powerful tools in your toolbox. As Harvey says, you learn when you listen. You learn about the customer, about her expectations, about how well you’re performing against her expectations, about how your products and services help her solve her problems, and more.
The respect part of Harvey’s quote comes from doing something with what you learn. Unfortunately, this is where a lot of businesses fall down. Don’t be one of those businesses! Let me help you take what you hear and what you learn from customers and do something with it. Afterall, insights without action are just expensive trivia!
ON BECOMING CUSTOMER-CENTRIC: USING THE HEAD, HEART, AND HANDS MODEL
CX JOURNEY
January 06, 2021
I was recently introduced to the Head, Heart, and Hands Change Model. On the surface, as we think about customer experience, these words make total sense. They align with Thinking, Feeling, and Doing (which I say are the key differentiators between actually creating a journey map and, well, not).
CUSTOMER TRUST: A TWO-WAY STREET
CX JOURNEY
December 23, 2020
You can see that transparency and integrity are huge components in earning your customers’ trust, as is consistency. I would add authenticity – do what you say you’re going to do; be who you say you are – to that, as well.
Keeping Employees Informed about Customer Experience Transformation Efforts
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December 03, 2019
Communication is a critical tool to secure employee buy-in and adoption, and, especially, to educate employees about the ongoing changes that lie ahead. What questions do they have? What should you consider as you prepare your communication plan? (You have a plan, right?!)
Reducing Customer – and Employee – Effort with Automation
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November 26, 2019
I'm excited to be a keynote speaker at CCW Nashville in January. As part of our partnership, I am sharing some of the content created by my fellow event speakers and offered on the CCW website. If you're planning to attend, I've also included my code for a 20% discount!
Customer Service Happens When the Experience Breaks Down
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November 20, 2019
Why is it important to understand the difference between customer experience and customer service? Get the experience right. Design the experience to be simple, to meet customer expectations, to allow customers to painlessly do what they’re trying to do. And you’ll take a load off your customer
Not Your Father’s Comcast
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November 13, 2019
I was invited to participate in Comcast's CX Innovation Day on Monday, November 4. The event's purpose was to put a spotlight on CX innovation, specifically at Comcast. Comcast is doing some great things! They are not the same company that you remember from 5+ years ago. If Comcast can reinvent itse
What Exactly is Employee Experience?
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November 06, 2019
What exactly is employee experience? And why is it important? I define it and share some stats on why it's so important to put your employees more first!
Understanding Customer Mindset with Journey Mapping
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October 30, 2019
I'm excited to be a keynote speaker at CCW Nashville in January. As part of our partnership, I am sharing some of the content created by my fellow event speakers and offered on the CCW website. If you're planning to attend, I've also included my code for a 20% discount!
Is Your Video Marketing Campaign Benefiting Your Customer Experience?
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October 23, 2019
Today I'm pleased to share another guest post by Lexie Lu. In this post, Lexie shares the benefits of video marketing, including eight tips to ensure a great customer experience with your marketing efforts.
5 CX Questions Mystery Shopping Can Answer
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October 10, 2019
Mystery shopping is a powerful tool to help you understand the experience that you're delivering for your customers. In this guest post, Linda Taylor of MattsenKumar shares five questions that mystery shopping can help to answer.
CX Journey Musings: Hiring for Culture Fit
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October 08, 2019
In the last several weeks, I've seen a couple articles - in reputable publications like Harvard Business Review and The Wall Street Journal - about the "dangers of hiring for culture fit." They cited that hiring for culture fit destroys things like diversity, creativity, and innovation. In this post
Customer-Centric Culture Means Employees First
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October 02, 2019
At the end of the day, your business focus has to be on the people who drive your business—both employees and customers (and vendors, partners, etc.). There can be no customer-centric culture without focusing on your employees first. So, really, it’s all about the people; perhaps to simplify thi
Do Customers Really Want to Be in Control?
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September 25, 2019
"Customers are in control." Why is that a headline these days? What's easy, convenient, or effortless about being in control? What do customers really want?
CX Journey Musings: In the Name of Humanity…
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September 18, 2019
I came across a video recently that was part of a social media campaign by GS Caltex, an energy firm, and has been shared and reshared by many call centers around the world. It's a really sad statement about humans when it has to come to this, but it has/did.
8 Important Questions to Answer to Start Down the Path of Customer-Centricity
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September 11, 2019
Today’s post originally appeared in Forbes on December 21, 2018. How can companies ensure that they are ready to put the customer at the center of all they do? Customer-centric companies put the customer at the center of all they do; they ensure that they make no decisions without first thinki
The “New” Purpose of a Business
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August 28, 2019
CEOs from 181 corporations signed a statement on the "purpose of a corporation" last week. In this post, I share my thoughts on that, offer up some next steps for the CEOs, and question why it took so long!
Linking Behaviors to Core Values
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August 21, 2019
Have you linked your core values to acceptable or desired behaviors to help employees understand what they mean? And then linked those to outcomes for the business? If not, you ought to. Here's how!
Deliver New Value to Your Customers with Future-State Journey Mapping
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August 14, 2019
The fifth step in my journey mapping process is Ideate, which is all about ideating solutions to existing customer pain points and designing a better experience for tomorrow.
Board Chair, Customer Experience Professionals Association
Customer Experience Professionals Association
January 01, 2020
Founded in 2011, the Customer Experience Professionals Association is the premier global non-profit organization dedicated to the advancement and cultivation of the Customer Experience profession.
The CXPA supports the professional development of its members and advances the field by providing shared best practices and education, developing standards, offering networking opportunities, promoting the industry, and creating a better understanding of the discipline of Customer Experience.
Built to Win: Designing a Customer-Centric Culture That Drives Value for Your Business
Advantage|ForbesBooks
March 22, 2022
With her new book Built to Win: Designing a Customer-Centric Culture That Drives Value for Your Business, Annette implores leaders to transform their existing company culture and rebuild it in every way around the needs of their customers. “A customer-centric culture is one in which the customer’s needs and perspectives are woven into the fabric of the organization,” Annette explained. “They are, literally, at the center of every decision, conversation, action, process, and strategy.” Learn about the 10 foundational principles needed to do just that.
Customer Understanding: Three Ways to Put the "Customer" in Customer Experience (and at the Heart of Your Business)
KDP
September 03, 2019
In this book, I cover the three approaches to customer understanding: surveys and data, personas, and journey mapping. I could’ve written the whole book about journey mapping, but there’s so much more to building a customer-centric business than journey mapping. The culture must first be deliberately designed to put the customer at the heart of the business. And all foundational elements of a CX transformation must be in place to make that happen.
Experia Summit is a virtual summit for experience management professionals. In just five days, learn from the best of the best about how to build a people-centric organization that not only puts people first but also experiences phenomenal growth as a result of that.
CX Journey Inc. is a customer experience strategy consulting firm that specializes in laying the groundwork required to establish a CX roadmap and strategy that will drive your culture transformation efforts and ensure that the customer is at the center of all you do. We offer a variety of services, including coaching, consulting, workshops, speaking, and thought leadership/content.
Tags: Business Strategy, Culture, Customer Experience
1 Industry Award
CXPA Impact Award
CXPA
October 07, 2014
CX Impact Awards recognize individuals that are exemplifying excellent customer experience and making an impact on the organization and its customers. From front-line employees to senior leaders, these awards showcase professionals from all backgrounds and industries who have successfully led or supported customer experience, voice of customer, or other initiatives in pursuit of specific customer experience goals within his or her organization on behalf of clients.
Certified Customer Experience Professional
CXPA
June 12, 2014
The Certified Customer Experience Professional (CCXP) credential is the marker of a committed customer experience professional who has demonstrated the wide range of knowledge essential to manage the customer experience in today’s challenging environment.
The CCXP credential demonstrates that a professional has the experience, education, and competence to lead and direct customer experience strategy, programs, and projects. Candidates for these credentials are looking to distinguish themselves in the workforce, validate their skills, stand out to employers, and maximize their earning potential.
Deliver Service That Meets the Moment
Oracle
January 26, 2022
If you're looking for an event host (virtual or in-person), emcee, or panel moderator, I'm happy to help! In this video, you'll see the Oracle Advertising and CX Virtual Summit (filmed in a cool location in Orange County, CA), which I both hosted and keynoted.
Join Thinkers360 for free! Are you a Reader/Writer, Thought Leader/Influencer (looking to increase your earnings), or an Enterprise User (looking to work with experts)?
QUIET QUITTING: IT’S BEYOND TIME TO FOCUS ON YOUR EMPLOYEES
The Importance of A Winning Customer Data Strategy
If You Have Employees, Then You Need An Employee Experience Program
VALUES-BASED DECISION MAKING
DRIVING VALUE FOR EMPLOYEES AND FOR THE BUSINESS THROUGH RECOGNITION PROGRAMS
EMPLOYEE UNDERSTANDING FOR A BETTER EMPLOYEE EXPERIENCE
11 TOP TAKEAWAYS FROM 102 CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE EXPERTS
CX IN 2022: EMPLOYEE EXPERIENCE IS THE BIGGEST HURDLE, AND GETTING LEADERSHIP COMMITMENT IS KEY
THE CUSTOMER’S DILEMMA: ACQUISITION VS. RETENTION
THE MARKETER’S DILEMMA: ACQUISITION VS. RETENTION
CX JOURNEY MUSINGS: CULTURE ISN’T ABOUT CONTROL
UX METRICS: WHO, WHAT, WHEN, WHERE, AND WHY?
USING USER RESEARCH TO DESIGN BETTER PRODUCTS AND SERVICES
AI AND THE CONTACT CENTER: WORKING TOGETHER IN HARMONY
FOCUS ON THE EXPERIENCE, AND THE NUMBERS WILL COME – ALWAYS
5 THINGS EVERYONE GETS WRONG ABOUT CUSTOMER SERVICE
THE KEY TO A GREAT CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE IS COLLABORATION
THE STATE OF CX: FALL 2021
FROM SALES-CENTRIC TO CUSTOMER-CENTRIC: THREE CRITICAL STEPS
EVOLVING YOUR CUSTOMER SUCCESS APPROACH
PRIORITIZATION AND DECISION-MAKING TOOLS: A DELIBERATE 7-STEP DECISION-MAKING CHECKLIST
PRIORITIZATION AND DECISION-MAKING TOOLS: THE RICE SCORING MODEL
CX JOURNEY MUSINGS: VALUES CREATE VALUE
WHAT’S IMPEDING CHANGE IN YOUR BUSINESS?
TIPS TO ACTIVATE YOUR CUSTOMER PERSONAS
CX JOURNEY MUSINGS: NOTHING CHANGES IF NOTHING CHANGES
CHANGE MANAGEMENT AND THE 20/60/20 RULE
VISIONARY COMPANIES: ONE PART VISION, MANY PARTS ALIGNMENT
7 WAYS TO KEEP THE CUSTOMER TOP OF MIND
FINDING YOUR WHO
BUILDING THE BUSINESS CASE: NO PAIN, NO GAIN
CX JOURNEY MUSINGS: WHICH COMES FIRST, EXPECTATIONS OR PERFORMANCE?
CX JOURNEY MUSINGS: RIDE FOR THE BRAND
CX JOURNEY MUSINGS: ARE YOU SALES-CENTRIC OR CUSTOMER-CENTRIC?
CX JOURNEY MUSINGS: CONSENSUS OR ALIGNMENT?
STRENGTHENING RELATIONSHIPS THROUGH CUSTOMER SUCCESS
EMPLOYEE EXPERIENCE: ARE YOU PROVIDING FEEDBACK OR FEEDFORWARD?
RESTORING CUSTOMER CONFIDENCE?
INTERVIEWING FOR CULTURE FIT
IDEATING THE FUTURE STATE CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE
CUSTOMER SUCCESS: BUILDING VALUE FOR CUSTOMERS FASTER THAN THEY CAN ON THEIR OWN
EMPATHY MAPS ARE NOT JOURNEY MAPS – AND VICE VERSA
PROVING THE ROI OF REDUCING CUSTOMER EFFORT
FOUR ACTIONS TO TAKE ON CUSTOMER EFFORT FEEDBACK
EMPLOYEE EXPERIENCE DRIVES THE CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE: BUT IT’S NOT JUST ABOUT THE FRONTLINE
CX JOURNEY MUSINGS: THE MORE THINGS CHANGE, THE MORE THE EXCUSES DON’T
CX JOURNEY MUSINGS: THE EXPERIENCE IS EVERYTHING
CUSTOMERS ARE RE-EVALUATING THEIR BRAND RELATIONSHIPS
MARKETING IN THE ERA OF THE CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE
BREAKING DOWN SILOS BETWEEN PRODUCT AND CX
CUSTOMER ENGAGEMENT: BEYOND PERSONALIZATION TO HYPER-PERSONALIZATION
CUSTOMER-CENTRICITY: WHAT EXACTLY IS IT?
HUMANIZING AUTOMATION TO HELP EMPLOYEES WORK SMARTER NOT HARDER
TRANSFORMING THE CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE FROM THE INSIDE OUT
PARTICIPATIVE RELATIONSHIPS: CO-CREATE THE EXPERIENCE WITH CUSTOMERS
CUSTOMER [INSERT TERM HERE]: WHAT DO THEY ALL MEAN?
12 TIPS TO IMPROVE YOUR CSAT SCORE
HOW TO TAKE ACTION ON YOUR CUSTOMER FEEDBACK
ON BECOMING CUSTOMER-CENTRIC: USING THE HEAD, HEART, AND HANDS MODEL
CUSTOMER TRUST: A TWO-WAY STREET
Keeping Employees Informed about Customer Experience Transformation Efforts
Reducing Customer – and Employee – Effort with Automation
Customer Service Happens When the Experience Breaks Down
5 CX Questions Mystery Shopping Can Answer
CX Journey Musings: Hiring for Culture Fit
Customer-Centric Culture Means Employees First
Do Customers Really Want to Be in Control?
CX Journey Musings: In the Name of Humanity…
8 Important Questions to Answer to Start Down the Path of Customer-Centricity
Board Chair, Customer Experience Professionals Association
Built to Win: Designing a Customer-Centric Culture That Drives Value for Your Business
Customer Understanding: Three Ways to Put the "Customer" in Customer Experience (and at the Heart of Your Business)
CXPA Impact Award
