5 Top Customer Service Articles for the Week of October 21, 2019

Each week I read a number of customer service and customer experience articles from various resources. Here are my top five picks from last week. I have added my comment about each article and would like to hear what you think too.

Advanced B2B CX Strategies Nobody Talks About by CustomerGauge

(CustomerGauge) In our latest eBook, we asked some of the top CX experts and influencers to discuss how B2B companies they’ve worked with have revolutionized their customer experience.

My Comment: Let’s kick off this week’s Top Five roundup with an eBook that was just released. CustomerGauge asked five customer experience experts (myself included) to address issues that B2B companies and leaders have in creating a strong and successful CX program. You’ll have to give them your name, email address and some other basic information to get the eBook, but don’t let that stop you. It’s a great publication with some important and powerful ideas.

Why Focus On Customer Experience? Here’s Why. by Jon Picoult

(Forbes) Here’s the little secret that business leaders don’t like to discuss: many of them aren’t sold on the idea that a great customer experience actually pays off.

My Comment: I’m always intrigued when I see the stats about how customer-focused companies outperform those that aren’t. This article has one of my favorite stats, which is how companies focused on CX not only substantially outperformed the market, but also outperform CX laggards by almost three times!

Top 6 Customer Experience (CX) Strategy Tips for 2020 by Raj Roy

(MarTech Advisor) In this article, we explain why a CX strategy is critical to accelerate the achievement of your business goals, with the top 6 customer experience strategy tips to prepare you for 2020!

My Comment: As we head toward the end of the year there will plenty of experts (myself included) sharing their predictions and trends for customer service and CX for the upcoming year. If there was a race to be the first to create the 2020 list, then Raj Roy would be the winner. Here are six good strategies worthy of your consideration.

Customer Success — A Unifying Mission for CRM and CXM by Bob Thompson

(CustomerThink) In this article, I’ll discuss how the “customer success” movement has developed, what it means, and why I believe it should be a unifying mission to help companies get value from both CRM and CXM, or whatever term you want to use for being customer-centric.

My Comment: There is a lot of important information here about Customer Success (CS). I’m surprised that more companies aren’t taking a closer look at this powerful strategy. It should be baked into the customer experience. The author quotes the CEO of Gainsight’s Nick Mehta’s definition of CS: “The combination of getting customer outcomes with the experiences they want.” In other words, help them be more successful with your product. If you haven’t thought about CS (and even if you have), you should read this article.

How to Use Personalized Email to Build Emotional Intimacy with Your Brand by James Glover

(Retail Customer Experience) Which single metric correlates most strongly with a brand’s retail success? You might be surprised to learn it’s not click-through rate (CTR), or segmentation precision, or even the seamlessness of the customer journey — instead, it’s a more elusive factor that’s interrelated with all the above.

My Comment: The main focus of this article is on building emotional intimacy with your customers – and email just happens to be one way to do it. (Note: Email is not dead!) There are a number of recognizable (huge) brands mentioned that have done an excellent job of creating emotional intimacy. You may wonder, how can brands like Amazon and Target creating intimacy? Well, they do. And so can you by focusing on “Moments of Meaning.”

BONUS VIDEO

Customer Service Calls In Real Life by Tripp and Tyler and VERINT

This video is a … MUST WATCH! I promise you it will make you smile – if not laugh-out-loud. We can all relate to this humorous example of a customer trying to get his TV to work.

Shep Hyken is a customer service expert, professional speaker and New York Times bestselling business author. For information on The Customer Focus customer service training programs go to www.TheCustomerFocus.com. Follow on Twitter: @Hyken

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