#31 | DCX - Perspectives and insights on digital customer experience
Get Ahead of It. How To Be Proactive; Stand Out in Your CX Career: Acquire the Must-Have Skills for Success; Links to Industry news, ideas, insights, and the DCX Thought Leader Profile of the week
Get Ahead of It. How To Be Proactive.
In today's digital age, customers expect quick and seamless interactions, and you must work to meet and exceed those expectations. One key way to do this is through being proactive in digital customer experience.
Proactive digital customer experience refers to taking the initiative and anticipating customer needs to improve their overall experience. This can be achieved through various methods, including using technology and data to analyze customer behavior and tailor interactions accordingly.
Some examples of proactive experiences across a customer’s journey include:
Personalized product recommendations: Using data and machine learning to anticipate what products a customer may be interested in and proactively recommending them will improve their shopping experience and increase sales.
Predictive maintenance: Monitoring data from IoT devices to anticipate equipment failure and proactively scheduling maintenance can reduce downtime and improve customer satisfaction.
Chatbots: Implementing chatbots can proactively assist customers in answering questions and providing assistance without needing a human representative.
Proactive customer service. You can anticipate customer service needs by monitoring customer interactions and proactively reach out to offer assistance.
Real-time fraud detection: By monitoring for suspicious activity, you can proactively detect and prevent fraud, improving customer trust and security.
Email marketing: By analyzing customer data, you can anticipate when a customer may be in the market for a new product or service and proactively send targeted email campaigns to increase conversion rates.
Account management: By monitoring customer activity, you can anticipate when a customer may be considering canceling their service and proactively reach out to offer assistance or incentives to retain their business.
Customer feedback: You can anticipate issues and proactively address them before they escalate by regularly surveying customers and monitoring social media.
Inventory management: By monitoring sales data, you can anticipate when certain products may be running low and proactively restock to avoid stockouts and maintain customer satisfaction.
Network monitoring: By monitoring network usage, you can anticipate issues and proactively address them to ensure that customers do not experience any disruptions in service.
To achieve this, you need to invest in the technology needed. To enable proactive experiences, you can use a combination of technologies such as data analytics, machine learning, chatbots, and IoT. These tools allow you to gather and analyze data on customer behavior, which can be used to anticipate customer needs and improve their experience.
Companies using data and technology to customize customer interactions will be better positioned to compete. While many of you have already begun investing in the technology needed for a proactive experience, many struggle with turning this investment into actionable insights. When companies don't actively use the data they collect from customers—and instead store it indefinitely—they lose an opportunity to improve their customer experience.
This week’s DCX Newsletter is supported by:
Over 20 million people and hundreds of thousands of teams worldwide use Notion to organize their work and get more done.
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Stand Out in Your CX Career: Acquire the Must-Have Skills for Success
Are you looking to break into the field of customer experience (CX) leadership? Or perhaps you're already in the field and want to take your career to the next level. Either way, it's essential to deeply understand the customer and the industry in which your organization operates.
Here are the top 10 areas of expertise that someone wanting to get into CX should have:
Customer empathy: Understanding the customer's needs, pain points, and goals is crucial for creating a positive experience.
Industry knowledge: Knowing your industry's latest trends, regulations, and best practices are essential for staying competitive.
Data analysis: Collecting, analyzing, and interpreting customer data is crucial for making informed decisions.
Communication: Being able to communicate with customers, as well as internal stakeholders effectively, is critical for building relationships and driving results.
Problem-solving: Identifying and resolving customer issues quickly and efficiently is essential for maintaining customer satisfaction.
Innovation: Thinking creatively and coming up with new solutions is essential for staying ahead of the competition.
Project management: Leading and managing cross-functional teams is essential for driving successful CX initiatives.
Change management: Leading and managing organizational change is crucial for implementing new CX strategies.
Digital proficiency: Navigating and utilizing digital technologies is essential for engaging with customers in the digital age.
Continuous learning: Being open to learning and adapting to the developments in the field is essential for staying current and relevant.
To get your foot in the door, consider starting with a customer-facing role and working your way up. Networking with CX professionals and staying updated on industry developments can also help.
Once you're in an organization, stand out by being a proactive problem-solver, taking the initiative, and being a vocal advocate for the customer within the company.
No matter your approach, it's not always easy to be a CX leader, but staying focused on the customer can tremendously impact your organization's success. Keep this in mind, and you'll be well on your way to being an influential CX leader.
Etc.
Links to Industry news, ideas, insights, and the DCX Thought Leader Linkedin Profile of the week
Target's New Shopping Cart Sensors Are Infuriating Customers (entrepreneur.com)
It looks like a little more user research is needed on this one.
A TikToker has captured millions of views showing what happens when Target's shopping carts move a little too far from the store.
Best Customer Experience Conferences to Attend in 2023 | Apizee
An up-to-date, global listing of CX-related events and perspectives on why to attend, how to get your manager to approve the expense, and how to prepare for an event.
Digital consumer survey finds growth opportunities | McKinsey
Digital is here to stay, with 125 million new consumers in the United States and Europe adopting digital channels since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. But there are still plenty of opportunities, according to McKinsey’s third annual global consumer sentiment survey.
Brain Food Newsletter (fs.blog)
This is one of my favorite Sunday morning reads. Chock full of thoughtful and thought-provoking ideas. Farnam Street (or FS) focuses on timeless lessons and insights for work and life. You won't find fads, sound bytes, or strategies that work for a while and then fail when things change. Instead, you'll find insights and wisdom that makes things easier, not harder.
This week’s DCX Newsletter is supported by:
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DCX Thought Leader Linkedin Profile of the week
Every week, I share a person's profile from Linkedin that I think will benefit your life and career.
This week, I’d like to introduce you to Ian Golding, founder of Customer Experience Consultancy.
Ian is a highly influential freelance Customer Experience consultant who advises leading companies on strategy, measurement, improvement, and employee advocacy techniques and solutions. He has worked in multiple industries, including retail, financial services, logistics, telecoms, and pharmaceuticals, and is an internationally renowned speaker and blogger on customer experience.
He served on the inaugural board of Directors of the Customer Experience Professionals Association (CXPA) and is a certified Customer Experience Professional, providing training and mentoring for other professionals in the field.
He is also the chairman of the judging panel at the UK and Gulf Customer Experience Awards and an advisor and featured columnist for CustomerThink. Ian's first book, 'Customer What, the honest and practical guide to customer experience' was published in April 2018.
He’s also a long-distance runner, climber, and fundraiser for various causes.
Check out his CX Assessment tool.
Get out of your way
If you want to up your Accountability game in 2023, you must get the 365 Days of Accountability Journal with the Accountability Exercise that is changing lives.
Thank you for reading this week. Please share with others you think would benefit.