Customer Experience
Customer Experience is the emotional affect an individual feels about an organization, goods, or services. Customer experience is an area of focus for organizations that view the customer as an important asset. It is also used to describe an individual interaction an person has with an organization.
Jim Rembach is the Opening Keynote Speaker for the Contact Center Network Group
Jim Rembach, Chief Spokesman for Customer Relationship Metrics, will deliver the opening keynote address at the CCNG Optimizing Customer Experience Management Event, June, 20, 2013, in Charlotte, NC.
CCNG is the industry’s #1 Contact Center and Customer Care Industry Professional Membership Network which brings together relevant and cutting-edge information for today’s call center professionals. CCNG selected Jim to kick off their customer care Optimize Event Series based on his nearly 20 years of customer experience management and deep domain expertise in contact center operations.
Jim’s keynote address entitled What Can Contact Centers Learn from Doctors about the Customer Experience?, will focus on powerful statistics and behaviors that impact both physicians and contact center agents.
This content fits in nicely with the event’s topic “Optimizing Customer Experience Management” which aims to uncover the best new contact center secrets, and reveal customer experience management solutions and ideas that are accessible and affordable to organizations of all sizes.
Jim and other subject matter experts will participate in a town hall discussion with attendees to share thoughts, ideas, and ways to exceed customer expectations and raise performance standards. Attendees are expected to receive many take-aways, and will discover powerful new ways to set and measure the right performance objectives, improve quality of service, and win the support of top executives.
Customer Relationship Metrics invites you to learn from Jim and his colleagues at this great event. Please register today or for more information on how to join the CCNG visit their membership page.
If you aren’t planning to attend the event but you still need help with your customer experience needs, please contact Jim Rembach directly by filling out Customer Relationship Metrics convenient web form.
Jim Rembach is selected for the CXPA Expert Panel
Customer Relationship Metrics’ very own Jim Rembach has been selected to join a prestigious panel of nine other customer experience experts to respond to Customer Experience Professionals Association (CXPA) members questions. “Ask the CX Experts” operates via the CXPA website and continues the mission of the CXPA, an international non-profit organization created to enhance the growing professional field of customer experience management. Jim was nominated by the CXPA community and selected to be part of this esteemed panel by the CXPA leadership team and the head of the Education committee.
Members who are facing customer experience challenges enter their questions to “Ask the CX Experts”, which are sent to the expert panel who responded immediately. After the question and answer sessions are over, the CXPA posts the threads of messages in the “Expert Response” area in the CXPA discussion forum so that all members benefit from the insights. Continue reading “Jim Rembach is selected for the CXPA Expert Panel” »
Does your data collection system prevent conditional branching?
“Does your data collection system prevent conditional branching?” is one of the questions in the eBook and self-assessment 25 Mistakes to Avoid with Post-call IVR Surveys, the compilation of the mistakes I have seen in the twenty years since inventing the post-call IVR survey methodology for contact centers. Take the self-assessment to determine where your program has weaknesses. The data collection system conditional branching as one of the self-assessment items is what I talk about in this article.
Why is this a problem?
The question that seems to hit the heart of this topic is to think about the collective group of your contact center’s calls and ask “does one size fit all?” If the majority of your calls are ostensibly the same, you do have a one size fits all scenario. I have not seen many customer service centers where that is true, despite what people think internally. This fact typically comes out when I lead the measurement design portion of our managed service programs. As soon as you think about the different kind of calls, the attributes that need to be measured begin to deviate from the one-size-fits-all list. I generally have to invest a lot of effort trying to reign in a client’s purported differences to identify a core set of service criteria across call types. Eventually we do come to a solution that will allow me to collect the data needed to drive their desired outcomes. Continue reading “Does your data collection system prevent conditional branching?” »
This is a Voice of the Customer Cluster You-Know-What
A 15-person conference call to discuss your Voice of the Customer (VoC) program is a great example of a cluster you-know-what. Have you been on a conference call that is supposed to let all the departments weigh in on collective issues about the VoC customer program that turns into 90 minutes of your life you’ll never get back? Do you ever get anything accomplished with the management by consensus plan? When did our professional lives change from an army of forward-thinking leaders into a stagnant committee of followers? Are people getting too politically correct? Is there even such a thing? Continue reading “This is a Voice of the Customer Cluster You-Know-What” »
Do you think it’s a good idea to transfer upset customers from the survey to supervisors?
“Do you think it’s a good idea to transfer upset customers from the survey to supervisors?” is a question that was included in the 25 Mistakes to Avoid with Post-call IVR Surveys eBook and self-assessment. The eBook and self-assessment includes diagnostic questions for you to uncover weaknesses in your post-call IVR survey program or implement a new program that is not loaded with mistakes that others have made. Now is the time to take advantage of the compilation of problems I have come across in the 20 years since inventing post-call IVR surveying in contact centers.
Why is this a problem?
I know what you’re thinking; who wouldn’t prefer to have their issue dealt with right away compared to when somebody ‘gets around to’ returning their call, right? In this world of instant information, that would tend to be the common choice, however, let’s think about the big picture and ramifications of executing that from a human and business perspective. Continue reading “Do you think it’s a good idea to transfer upset customers from the survey to supervisors?” »
Do you think any survey is better than no survey?
“Do you think any survey is better than no survey?” is a question that was included in the 25 Mistakes to Avoid with Post-call IVR Surveys e-book and self-assessment. The e-book and self-assessment includes a bonus so you actually get 26 questions. The questions are an accumulation of more than 20 years of experience designing and operating post-call IVR survey programs in contact centers. Many of these questions are ones that I have been providing answers to for years. So do everyone a big favor and share the ebook with others in the contact center industry, we need your help to eliminate some of the ignorance about post-call IVR surveying.
Why is this a problem?
While this mindset is not uncommon in companies around the globe, it is not a very productive one and could end up costing you millions over time. And, more than money, it costs people a lot of mental stress. How many times have you tried to explain survey results with the pain of anxiety in your stomach? Continue reading “Do you think any survey is better than no survey?” »
Is your post-call IVR survey program an internal auditor?
How many of you are using post-call IVR surveys in your Voice of the Customer (VoC) customer experience programs? Good. Even if you are not, this will be of interest to you because they are in your future. In the contact center industry, you never want to say “never”. Now, how many of you believe that your surveys are well-executed customer satisfaction measurement tools that deliver more answers than questions? Ok, still a few of you left. Finally, are you using your post-call IVR surveys to be an internal auditor that helps you to identify policy and process problems that negatively impact the customer experience and the employee experience? Hmm…anyone left?
Contrary to popular belief, it’s hard to create that perfect post-call IVR survey program. Only the most skilled craftsmen know how to write questions from a customer experience perspective so they garner actionable insights. Then you must test to find the proper length so you know how many survey questions your customers are willing to answer. Then you have to work hard to get buy-in at all levels so that they develop an ownership to make the organization more customer-centric. Do you think this is enough? Continue reading “Is your post-call IVR survey program an internal auditor?” »
Do you have a rule to keep your post-call IVR surveys very short?
“Do you have a rule to keep the survey very short?” is a question that was included in the 25 Mistakes to Avoid with Post-call IVR Surveys ebook and self-assessment. The ebook and self-assessment contains numerous diagnostic questions to help you to identify many of the common mistakes companies make when implementing post-call IVR survey programs. Twenty years ago when I invented post-call IVR surveying in contact centers, surveys that were too short was not the common problem like it is today. Continue reading “Do you have a rule to keep your post-call IVR surveys very short?” »
The customer expectation will damage your brand.
Recently two highly-publicized customer expectations lawsuits have been in the news; one for Anheuser-Busch misrepresenting the alcohol content in a variety of its beers and the other with Subway’s foot-long sandwiches for coming up short. In both cases the customer expectations were clearly set and advertised (Subway’s $5 foot-long sandwich deal and Anheuser-Busch light beers with the alcohol content of higher calorie brands). In both cases, expectations were so blatantly under-served that customer dissatisfaction went through the roof, the customer experience went in the toilet, and now both brands are dealing with multimillion dollar lawsuits and a serious image problem.
Continue reading “The customer expectation will damage your brand.” »
You aren’t alone with the struggle to extract actionable insights from your CX VoC program.
Join the club if you thought your company executed a world-class customer experience Voice of the Customer (VoC) program but now are struggling to identify actionable insights from the customer feedback. The primary goal is to succeed at the necessary process changes and customer initiatives to improve customer experience, so you must dig deep and ask customer experience focused-questions during your post-call IVR surveys. You get into the club by ending up with data that yields useless results. I wish there were no membership dues for this club but the cost is actually quite high. Continue reading “You aren’t alone with the struggle to extract actionable insights from your CX VoC program.” »
Are your customer processes built on good intentions but fail operationally?
I bet your parents are like mine and love to share their call center experiences because they feel close to you when they deal in your world. It turns out that my mother has been dealing with a banking issue for some time now and has been assigned an agent to call directly. At first she thought she was fortunate to have a direct contact in a sea of 1-800 numbers and endless mazes of automated services but as she’s telling me about this, it’s clear that it’s anything but great.
We all can see that the bank is trying to provide a better customer experience by building a one-on-one relationship but my mother cannot understand why she’s in a silo where no one else in the bank can offer much assistance. Her agent is currently on vacation and no one else in the bank can help because her customer record hasn’t been updated with progress notes. She is unable to resolve the banking issue with another agent and is not happy with the idea of waiting until her agent returns. We can see how the bank is in desperate need of several process improvements but we are not “normal” customers. In their effort to satisfy, they have actually caused much dissatisfaction for everyone who falls into this coverage gap. Continue reading “Are your customer processes built on good intentions but fail operationally?” »
Profiting from Customer Experience Process Improvements.
We all strive to improve customer experience in our organizations but one thing is for certain, change is hard. Positive customer experience process improvement is achieved through a variety of ways: external quality monitoring programs that uncover hidden issues, working through high customer experience dysfunction issues to streamline internal processes, and organizing mounds of customer experience Big Data to better service your customers’ needs are just a few. We selected some of our favorite stories below to show you some of the ways you can improve customer experience processes in your business. Do you find these stories helpful? We’d love to hear your feedback directly. Please tweet me at @jodiemonger. Enjoy!
Services for homeowners are intertwined. What part of each dollar for your product or service is needed to fund a company’s dysfunction? This is a very serious question! Continue reading “Profiting from Customer Experience Process Improvements.” »
Web Experience Survey Mistake #1 – Trying to Measure WAY too much!
My bank sent me a survey invitation after I logged into my account to review my mortgage. I was happy to click on the survey link to discuss my satisfaction with the online experience. After about 6 minutes of clicking through the pages of questions, I had to give up. Time to respond to the survey would take longer than the time I spent on the website.
Given my occupation and obsessive desire to measure customer experiences, I probably stuck with this survey longer than many other customers. Do not try to get all of your customer experience intelligence all at once from one customer experience survey. This is difficult to remember when everyone in the organization has a need for customer intelligence. Continue reading “Web Experience Survey Mistake #1 – Trying to Measure WAY too much!” »
Customer Relationship Metrics’ Most Comical Contact Center Stories
Sometimes it’s good to take a break from the serious, so let’s look back at some of our funniest stories. Wild, 10+ hour customer experience calls, dissatisfied customers completely destroying brick-and-mortar stores, customer service terrorists going on multi-social channel rants — these are just some of our most shockingly true and amusing stories, and we hope you agree. They just have to make you laugh (what else can you do). Do you have a customer experience story or an outlandish customer comment that is laugh-out-loud ridiculous like those below? Tweet us @crmetrics and tell us all about it!
- Man destroys T-Mobile store with fire extinguisher - In Manchester, England a T-Mobile customer learned he would not get a refund. He chose not to take his case to social media, instead he destroyed the store and used a fire extinguisher to spray the place. Continue reading “Customer Relationship Metrics’ Most Comical Contact Center Stories” »
Send all of your Crazy Customers to Zappos Contact Center
Zappos wants to provide excellent service to everyone in their contact center, including the crazy customers that want to stay on the phone for 10-and-a-half hours.
This story makes me really sad. You know, I love a good public relations story just like everyone else. And when you hear many of the (genuine) customer service stories coming out of companies like Zappos you understand how they have built an enviable reputation in the marketplace for generating high customer loyalty. I appreciate what they have been able to do and I hope that people don’t try to take advantage of them and companies like them. Continue reading “Send all of your Crazy Customers to Zappos Contact Center” »
