Why Your Customer Experience Isn’t Great (and How to Make It Great)

We all know that great customer experience (CX) can take our business to new heights, get people talking about our company, and set up our business for financial success. Poor customer experience, however, can do the opposite.

Customer experience mistakes can cost our business quite a lot in lost revenue. In some cases, customer experience mistakes can undo tons of goodwill – still so many businesses are making them.

Chances are, your business is guilty of at least a few of these mistakes. If you are, there’s still time to turn things around as most of these mistakes can be avoided with a little bit of planning.

Without further ado, let’s dig into the most common mistakes that could be hurting your customer experience right now and impairing your CX game. And how to fix them!

1. You are not leveraging customer feedback

One easy way to improve your customer experience is by asking them what they think about your business, and transforming what they have to say into actionable insights so that you can act on it.

Most businesses just collect customer feedback but they don’t act on it. Now you don’t have to take my word for that – have stats to prove:

52% of people around the globe believe that companies need to take action on feedback provided by their customers.

If you are not leveraging your customer feedback you are hindering your business growth.

Not sure how to leverage customer feedback? Well, you can use a feedback analysis tool that can analyze your customer feedback at scale and turn it into actionable insights.

Remember customer feedback is a powerful asset to any business and it should be leveraged effectively.

2. Not having an omnichannel feedback strategy

The way customers interact with a business has changed dramatically in recent years. More than a decade ago, there was only one way to reach a business – by phone, not anymore.

Nowadays customers are interacting with your business across channels – from email to live chat to social media. But when it comes to feedback collection most businesses still restrict them to one or two channels. Don’t make this mistake.

With omnichannel customer feedback collection, you have the opportunity to gain broader feedback and understand your customers deeply.

The world has become omnichannel – your feedback strategy should be too.

3. Your customer service isn’t consistent across channels

Most businesses know that customer service plays a crucial role in improving the customer experience. The higher the quality – the better the customer experience. But there are very few who know that when it comes to CX, it’s not just quality that matters: it’s also the consistency.

Need some convincing? Check out these stats:

According to Forrester, 69% of U.S. online adults shop more with retailers that offer consistent customer service both online and offline.

According to Aberdeen Group, companies that provide a consistent service quality across multiple channels retain 89% of their customers, whereas companies that do not provide a consistent quality are only able to retain 33%.

71% of consumers want a consistent experience across all channels, but only 29% say they actually get it.

Keep in mind it is no longer optional to invest in omnichannel customer service – it is imperative.

4. You are running after perfection

This is the single biggest mistake businesses make. They run after perfection – they want to deliver perfect customer experience every single time.

Now you must be thinking what’s wrong with that – after all customer experience is everything. Well, there is one big problem with this approach – no one can deliver perfect customer experience every time.

Why?

Because CX is continuously evolving – it’s a moving target. No matter how hard you try you can’t deliver perfect CX every time. As CX guru Paul Greenberg says, “You simply cannot delight your customers all the time.” So, the goal should be continuous improvement – not perfection.

5. You’re not working hard to improve your customer experience

You might assume it is common knowledge that if you want your customers to keep coming back – you’ve to provide a superb CX and, every business is doing that.

However, that is not always the case. Most businesses want to improve their customer experience, but there are very few who are providing a superb customer experience.

Recent research reveals that only one in ten organizations see themselves as ‘very advanced’ in respect of customer experience. If you don’t fall in this narrow bracket (and the odds are slim, really), you are not working as hard as you should improve your CX.

Now you must be thinking how can I make my customer experience to the next level? The easiest way to do this is: never assume what your customers want, always ask them what they want.

Do you know 80% of companies believe they are providing great customer service, but only 8% of customers agree with them? To bridge this gap, it’s essential to collect and analyze customer feedback in real-time.

Wrapping up:

We all know that customer experience is the key to business growth. And, that’s why every business is striving to improve CX. But, no matter how hard you try to up your CX game – if you are making any of these mistakes you won’t be able to elevate your customer experience.

Are you currently making any of these customers experience mistakes’? Would you like to add a few more to the list? Feel free to chime in the comment section below.