Managing the Customer Experience: Turning customers into advocates

273 Pages·2002·1.39 MB·English

by  Shaun Smith

Managing
the customer
experience
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Managing
the customer
experience
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Turning customers into advocates
Shaun Smith and
Joe Wheeler
An imprint ofPearson Education
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First published in Great Britain in 2002
© Shaun Smith and Joe Wheeler 2002
The right of Shaun Smith and Joe Wheeler to be identified as Authors of this Work have been
asserted by them in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
ISBN 0 273 66195 7
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
ACIPcatalogue record for this book can be obtained from the British Library
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Advance praise
“Refreshing and practical. Managing the Customer Experience shows com-
panies how to build the power of their brand. Smith and Wheeler inspire
your organization to deliver a different and more valuable offering to your
targeted customers.”
Bradley T. Gale, author of Managing Customer Value, and
President, Customer Value, Inc.
“Delivering customers a consistently superior set of benefits is probably the
most important driver of value creation. This book provides a number of
practical insights which will guide the reader on the difficult but fascinat-
ing path leading to great customer value delivery.”
Jean-Claude Larréché, The Alfred H. Heineken Professor of
Marketing, INSEAD
“Afascinating and insightful book which is equally relevant for the leaders
of professional services firms looking to build ‘trusted advisor’relationships
with their key clients.”
Michael Bray, Chief Executive, Clifford Chance
“Managing the Customer Experience is an incredibly practical guide for
building customer loyalty in the new century.”
Marshall Goldsmith, Founding Director of the Financial Times
Knowledge Dialogue and the Alliance for Strategic Leadership.
“Smith and Wheeler show us what the 21st Century Company has to look
like if it is to be successful. They show that great brands are not primarily
built through advertising but by the experience and value they offer
customers.”
Professor Peter Doyle, Warwick Business School, University of
Warwick
“This book shows how to unlock the full value potential of the customer
experience, supported by a wealth of examples from world leaders such as
Tesco and Harley-Davidson. The connection made between the Marketing,
Human Resources and Customer Service functions is very powerful. This,
combined with the emphasis on the role of leadership, makes Managing the
Customer Experience required reading for CEO's, Marketing, Human
Resource, and Operations Directors, and their teams.”
William Gordon, Strategy Partner, Accenture and co-author of
Brand Manners
“In their book, Managing the Customer Experience, the authors bring for-
ward the concept of loyalty and advocacy in customer experience in a very
targeted way … unearthing one of the most essential branding rules, which
is to make your preferred customers your best ambassadors.”
Marc Gobé, President and Executive Creative Director,
Desgrippes Gobé Group, author of Emotional Branding: the New
Paradigm for Connecting Brands to People
“If you are interested in increasing customer loyalty, Managing the
Customer Experienceis the book for you. Most books on the subject focus on
your company's image and tell you why it's important. This book makes the
business case for branding but then shows you how to do it. Full of practi-
cal ‘how to’advice, illustrative anecdotes, and application exercises, it is not
only a good read, but a significant investment in your future success.”
Richard Whiteley, author of The Customer Driven Company
“Managing the Customer Experience provides a comprehensive blueprint
for any organization that wants to deliver a customer experience that sup-
ports and builds its brand. Smith and Wheeler bring this intriguing concept
to life through a well-researched variety of examples, insights, methods,
and tools. Don’t just read this book — use it!”
Scott Timmins, Vice President, College Marketing, Millea Hall,
Babson College
Contents
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Foreword x
Acknowledgments xii
Introduction xiii
1 The age of experience 1
Evolving brands 4
Experiencing the brand 10
Branding the experience 13
The Branded Customer Experience® 15
2 Beyond satisfaction 25
Gimmicks don’t buy loyalty 28
Loyalty at work 32
From loyalty to advocacy 35
3 Loyalty by design 41
Define customer values 44
Design the Branded Customer
Experience® 51
Equip people and deliver consistently 60
Sustain and enhance performance 63
4 A new brand of leadership 71
Deserving to be followed 72
Understand your customers 75
Bring the courage of conviction 77
Unleash the power of people 79
viii Contents
Manage the business from the
customer experience 82
Measuring employee satisfaction 84
Create leaders at every level 88
5 Creating triad power 90
The role of marketing in the triad 92
HR’s real potential 93
Smooth operators 95
Partnership behaviors 96
6 People first 100
Hire people with the attributes to satisfy 104
Train employees to deliver experiences 106
Reward the right behaviors 112
Drive the behaviors from the top 116
7 The Branded Sales Experience 123
Start with segmentation, but drive to
personalization 124
Design a sales process that creates
value for customers 126
Align the sales process with the total
organization 127
Train, coach, and reward the desired
sales behaviors 129
Manage the sales process to deliver
a Branded Customer Experience® 130
8 Putting the “e” in experience 133
Building customer confidence 135
We live in a multi-channel world 137
Blending high-tech with high-touch 138
Contents ix
Aligning the inside and the outside 140
Online in practice 142
9 The Branded Product Experience:
more than a doughnut 150
Experiencing the bear 152
The affluentials 153
The last of the real sports cars 155
Multi-sensory experience or doughnut? 157
10 Keeping the edge 162
Brand revitalization 164
Keeping the edge through a visionary goal 165
The emotional dimension 167
11 Putting it all together 169
The secrets of uncommon practice 171
Forum’s research themes 172
12 Loyalty by design in practice 180
Define customer values 181
Design the Branded Customer
Experience® 182
Leadership results 193
The end or the beginning? 195
Appendix 197
Forum’s Uncommon Practice Research 199
Tool Kit 205
Index 251