In today's fiercely competitive business landscape, customer experience (CX) has emerged as the battleground where companies compete for domination.
It's no longer enough to offer a great product or service; customers expect a seamless, personalised, and memorable experience at every touchpoint. According to a survey by Salesforce, 66% of customers expect companies to understand their needs and expectations.
For businesses looking to thrive in customer experience, a world-leading CX strategy is not just a nice-to-have – it’s essential for survival and success.
With over 20 years of experience in the world of customer experience, we've seen what separates the leaders from the rest. Here's what a world-leading customer experience strategy should look like, and where you need to begin to make it a reality for your business.
What are the fundamentals of a world-leading CX strategy?
A good CX strategy isn’t about meeting customer needs, it’s about exceeding them. In order to achieve that, there are fundamentals that a CX strategy will cover including, a CX vision, customer personas, concepting and a roadmap.
Customer Experience Vision
The first and most fundamental part of a leading CX strategy is the development of a compelling customer experience vision. The customer experience vision is a response to the strategic context of the business and the insight from engaging with customers, which begins to set out the essence or DNA of the service and experience you're setting out to create.
Discover how LeShuttle designed their CX vision on the CXD podcast.
Strategy baked in the needs, attitudes and expectations of your customer
To help imagine what your customers need and value, you'll need customer personas, baked in research, to help you shape the interaction between your company and your customers.
Translating a CX vision into a tangible journey
How do you bring the vision to life? What do the experiences and customer journeys look like? This is where concepting and the design of the future target experience comes in. A process that can help you with the generation of new ideas to identify opportunities that could be developed further.
How do you make the change happen?
The Experience Roadmap is an overarching strategic plan that outlines the step changes the organisation is looking to make in its customer experience in a number of phases over an agreed period of time. It's used to inform and shape the plans needed to implement the target customer experience.
Having a CX strategy in place will inform why your customers love what you’re doing, and highlight where their needs are not being met, as well as what opportunities there are to delight them.
Examples of world-leading CX strategies
If you could pick a company with a leading CX strategy, who would come to mind?
Here are just some of the key players in world-leading customer experiences.
Airbnb: They put their hosts at the centre of their offering, and have nailed their omnichannel experience, making it easy for hosts and guests alike to access what they need from anywhere, which is perfectly aligned to their ‘live and work anywhere’ policy.
Amazon: Guided by four principles: customer obsession rather than competitor focus, passion for invention, commitment to operational excellence, and long-term thinking. Amazon strives to be Earth's most customer-centric company, Earth's best employer, and Earth's safest place to work.
Apple: Apple’s purpose is centred around building the confidence and loyalty of customers. Steve Jobs himself said, "You've got to start with Customer Experience and work back toward the technology, not the other way round."
Emirates: The airline has invested in comfort and convenience for its passengers – two of the most important factors people look for when booking flights. It goes above and beyond to provide an impeccable experience for its customers.
IKEA: The Swedish brand focuses on an immersive approach to customer experience – whether that’s in its stores or online. Customers know what they’re getting from the outset: affordable, Swedish-designed furniture they can put together themselves.
Uber: The heart of Uber’s CX strategy is its app, which is focused on the customer. It’s user-friendly, intuitive and puts the customer in control.
Sainsbury's: One of the top UK supermarkets adapted to the latest trends, working together with Engine Service Design to imagine and anticipate how stores and technology should change in response, leading to an ambitious customer experience transformation programme.
Discover more about Sainsbury's customer experience transformation here.
What makes a good customer experience?
In order to provide customers with an experience that’s memorable for all the right reasons, you need to develop a strong CX strategy that puts them at the heart of your business. This sets the tone to create experiences that spark the right emotional connection.
- What do you want their experience to look and feel like?
- How can you make it easy for customers?
- Is there the opportunity for them to feed back and help you improve?
- How do you want to make your customers feel?
- How can you make them feel special?
- Can you tailor the experience to their specific needs/likes?
Do I need a CX strategy?
Customer-centric companies are 60% more profitable than companies that aren’t. So, a well-defined CX strategy is worth the effort and needs to be at the centre of your business.
However, creating a CX strategy is not a one-size-fits-all solution. It requires a holistic approach that encompasses culture, technology, data, and innovation.
The key is to prioritise the customer at every step of the journey and invest in the right people, processes, and technologies to create differentiated experiences that drive loyalty, advocacy, and, ultimately, sustainable growth.
Remember, creating a leading CX strategy isn’t a one-time thing. It’s there to be honed and maintained so you can continue to exceed your customers’ expectations.
So, where do you start?
Here are some tips to help you design and execute a successful CX strategy.
Download our eBook ‘How to Adapt to the Challenge of Shifting Customer Demands’ to discover the common barriers to meeting shifting consumer demands, with tips on how to overcome them.
