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Learning from the ‘wow’ factor — how to engage customers through the design of effective affective customer experiences

  • Published:
BT Technology Journal

Abstract

’I think ‘exceeds expectations’ is the most pitiful pair of words uttered in the English language. Our aspirations are too low. Think Cirque de Soleil, not Siegfried and Roy. Aim to put a shiver up your customers’ spines. That’s what you should even be trying to do with your call centers’, Tom Peters, Uber-Guru.

In a survey by Shaw and Ivens [1], 85% of business leaders said that differentiation by price, product and service is no longer a sustainable business strategy. 71% of these leaders also stated that they believed that ‘customer experience’ is the new battleground. The same survey found that customers found 44% of customer experiences to be bland and uneventful. Yet only 15% of companies are actually starting to engage customers on both an efficient and emotionally engaging manner. The implication is that companies which start to leverage the power of emotion in the purchasing decision-making process, and leverage that power to improve the customer experience, are likely to succeed in an increasingly commoditised market.

How do companies who are renowned for outstanding levels of customer experience, loyalty and advocacy achieve these levels? To find the answer to that question, this paper looks across organisations globally to find out how the best achieve effective affective customer experiences across all contact channels. A distinct pattern emerged.

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Authors
  1. N Millard
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Millard, N. Learning from the ‘wow’ factor — how to engage customers through the design of effective affective customer experiences. BT Technol J 24, 11–16 (2006). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10550-006-0016-y

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10550-006-0016-y

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