How Well Does The Behaviour Of Customers Conform To Customer Experience Dogma?

0
160

Share on LinkedIn

CX Dogma: In Today’s World The Customer Experience Is Critical

What do the CX gurus say?  Do they not proclaim the critical importance of Customer Experience?  Do they not assert that in the age of social media Customer Experience is everything?  Do they not say that those organisation that do not pay attention to the Customer Experience will go out of business?

What does the research around Customer Experience say?  Does this research not find that the Customer Experience matters to customers: that customers want easy access to critical information; that customers want a seamless/effortless experience; that 80% of customers will switch to another supplier after one poor experience?

Allow me to sum this up: In today’s business climate the health of a business depends on providing a good to great Customer Experience as customers expect nothing less and will readily switch after one poor experience

Let’s Do A Thought Experiment

You wish to buy a car. You go to a dealership and are greeted by a salesman who tells you that he is not paid on commission. This reassures you – no high pressure selling to guard yourself against. Thereafter, a test drive takes place. You ask for the price and receive it written on the back of the salesman’s business card. So far good – a refreshing difference to your experience with a different car dealer.

After consulting with your wife you decide to buy the car. You ask for the paperwork: formal quote, details of the warranty, and lease payments if decide to lease rather than buy. What happens?  How does the salesperson respond to your request? Here are your words:

We expected this to be forthcoming, so we were surprised when we were informed that this wasn’t possible and he’d given us all the figures.

Being worldly you ask for the sales contract. What happens? The salesman refuses to email it to you. He says it is standard contract and implies that you are making a big deal of nothing: the contract is a standard contract and is signed hundreds of times a day. You are not impressed. You realise that all of your correspondence with the salesperson has been through his person Yahoo account. You have no formal paperwork from the dealership itself.

What do you do?  What does all the research that backs the vital importance of Customer Experience say you will do? I say that CX dogma says that you will not buy from this salesperson, this dealership. You have asked for the basics and you have not gotten the basics. You have been treated unprofessionally – even badly. A poor Customer Experience! Besides all the warning signs are there.

CX Reality: Customer Behaviour Is Not In Line With CX Dogma And Customer Surveys

Ok you being a rational person, one whose behaviour is in line with what you said on the customer survey walk away. You walk away and find a different dealer – a dealer that provides you with the kind of premium Customer Experience you would expect when buying a premium product (Lincoln).

What does the CX guru do?  I share with you his words:

Despite our frustration, we placed the order (reluctantly) as their price was the lowest by far of any other quote we received

Price trumps Customer Experience!  Even for a CX guru who loudly proclaims the critical importance of the Customer Experience (to attracting and keeping customers) price trumps Customer Experience!  

In the real world the quality of the Customer Experience is only one factor. I refer you back to Thinking Strategically About CX: Five Components of Customer Value and this formula:

  • Value = Benefit – Effort – Risk – Price +/- Treatment

What may this formula unconceal?  It conceal the multi-dimensionality of human life: humans juggle, without even being aware of this juggling, many factors such as convenience (effort), risk, price, and the way that they are treated by a supplier. As well as the benefits they will get.

Does CX Dogma and Customer Research Get Anything Right About Customers?

Yes. Can you guess what CX dogma and customer research gets right?  Customers love to complain about how badly they are treated by suppliers. Allow me to end this conversation by sharing the words of the CX guru:

.. we received no letter of confirmation or thanks for ordering the car–no sign of appreciation or documentation of any kind. We were quoted six to eight weeks for delivery. What followed next was missed dates and failure to contact us when promised regarding the delivery…..

Suffice it to say, we were not overly impressed with our experience at Lincoln either. Nor our subsequent treatment by their Finance arm in setting up the lease payments, another whole story in itself.

If you wish to read the original post by the CX guru where he shares his experience and his learnings then Colin Shaw: Destroying The Brand One Experience At A Time.

Final Thoughts

Human living is messy. Be wary of CX gurus and their simplistic pronunciations. Beware of CX dogma: theory alway simplifies and distorts especially when it comes to human beings and human worlds. Be wary of customer research – those who pay for it to be carried out and promoted do so to push a particular agenda.  Be wary of technology vendors – CX worship is the latest techniques to sell tech, the tech itself and its impact on the Customer Experience is questionable.

I invite you to consider that if Customer Experience was as critical as it is then the business world would be desolate one inhabited only by a few stellar brands like Apple, Zappos, Amazon, John Lewis, USAA…. The reality is that ‘not great CX brands’ are legion and they continue to do survive and prosper.

Disagree?  I invite you to share your perspective / experience by commenting.

I thank you for your listening – your listening keeps me speaking despite the increasing temptation to keep silent. My particular thanks to Ilan Kirschilan for reaching out to me this week ( to let me know that my speaking speaks to him) and thus bringing me out of my hibernation.

Republished with author's permission from original post.

Maz Iqbal
Independent
Experienced management consultant and customer strategist who has been grappling with 'customer-centric business' since early 1999.

ADD YOUR COMMENT

Please use comments to add value to the discussion. Maximum one link to an educational blog post or article. We will NOT PUBLISH brief comments like "good post," comments that mainly promote links, or comments with links to companies, products, or services.

Please enter your comment!
Please enter your name here