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Blog Posts

CX is a game changer – here is why

January 26, 2020

Sam Richardson

In an ever-increasing competitive world, companies need to find their forward momentum in something more than traditional marketing, sales and distribution. We at Nepa found CX Customer Experience to be that competitive edge.

A recent study discovered that companies who have truly embraced customer experience are three times more likely to exceed their business goals, an amazing feat for any company in any industry.

Data from the study also suggests that if two near-identical companies, both offering the same products or services and operating in the same industry, the market leader of the two will be the one with an implemented CX strategy.

CX is the game changer

If CX is the game changer then what is CX? Well, here at Nepa we define CX, or Customer Experience, as the experiences that matters the most to your customers. By placing a continuous focus on your customers experiences, no matter where or how, you will ensure that the very lifeline of your business is on track. Also, if your business is on track you will have both time and resources to optimize for market growth.

Can CX really be that successful?

Yes, it can and we have the experience to prove it. Here at Nepa we have CX technology and expertise to deliver customer-centric growth in 4 steps. Furthermore, the companies we work with are well known leaders in their markets.

Our 3-step approach:

Hear your Customers
Connect the CX program to your business data and optimize for Customers and Growth
Empower your Employees

By following our proven approach, you will optimize your customer experience to drive growth.

We all want success so start having yours today

It is already the end of January and 2020 will not wait for any late bloomers. So contact us today and start your CX journey.

Blog Posts

The Brand Metrics That Actually Matter

November 4, 2019

Sam Richardson

Brand is back. A strong, sustainable brand is a critical component in generating long-term sales, so companies are investing in brand building communications and marketing.

So, what’s the silver bullet in measuring brand value? Unfortunately, there isn’t one. But there are metrics you should pay particular attention to. Almost as important as the metrics you choose are the frequency with which you review them. Fortunately, this is clear cut – you need to measure continuously. Reviewing your brand metrics once a quarter, or worse, once a year doesn’t cut it. Your brand is the living, beating heart of your organization. Now that that’s settled, let’s get back to the hard part – below, we have outlined six metrics that should be part of a weekly review to have brand impact.

1. General awareness

Do shoppers know your brand exists in the market? Do the right shoppers know your brand exists? Measuring if shoppers having general awareness of your brand is one of the first metrics that you’ll want to pay close attention to. Generally, awareness lets a company know if they are breaking through the noise. If your shoppers are not aware of your presence in a category, this may be a good place to shift focus and resources.

2. Media recall

Similar to general awareness, media recall tells a company if they are being seen and heard. Where general awareness establishes who knows the brand exists, media recall goes a level deeper. You have a brand message, but is it memorable? You spend millions of dollars to support the brand, and you need to know the marketplace impact. Some channels will create a more memorable experience than others. Knowing which ones are the most productive will allow you to allocate your budget more efficiently. Those channels will change, so to understand what’s working you need to track this metric on an ongoing basis.

This metric is unique from the others in this list that it’s not generated from an overall brand tracking study, but rather from an ad tracking study that builds up from consumer reaction to individual advertising units. Whether as a standalone program or part of a sophisticated brand tracking program, ad tracking is critical to improving marketing and communications tactics to move the overall brand metrics.

3. Consideration

As shoppers move along the path to purchase, are they considering your brand? Why or why not? Having a presence during the consideration stage can provide a strong understanding if shoppers see value in your brand. Also, you need to know what drives consideration, and how to influence it. How, when, and where to push the right buttons.
Measuring consideration is a strong metric that can provide insight in a number of ways.

4. Competitors

It’s not just shoppers who matter, understanding your position relative to your competitors is vital, too. How do you stack up? On price? On products? On service? – All up, how is your brand experience different than your competitors. If your products are similar, you have to find other ways to differentiate yourself. Building a strong brand is critical to creating a unique position in the marketplace.

5. Willingness to pay

A strong brand can translate into a willingness to pay on the part of shoppers as the perceived value of the brand is factored into the cost of the product or service. This is in some ways the end game for brand development – creating a strong shopper preference – and a sense of value – that feeds through into a willingness to accept, or even embrace, premium pricing.

6. Preference

The final piece – brand preference. It takes the longest to establish but adds major value. Preferred vendors often get the first look from shoppers, and the first opportunity to capture a sale. Those who offer similar products face less pressure to compete on cost, which can contribute to overall profitability. If you have become a preferred brand, you’re ahead of the pack.

If you acknowledge that brand is vital, then you have to measure its impact. Unfortunately, marketing ROI measurement as it is currently practiced tends to focus on influencing short-term sales while the effect of long-term brand investment is either ignored altogether or not taken fully into account.

Understanding the brand Metrics that Actually Matter allows you to measure its impact in the most cost- and time-efficient way. With those metrics in hand, resources can then be more effectively allocated between supporting short-term decision making and longer-term brand support. Your brand building initiatives then become more intelligent and focused, delivering measurably better ROI across the marketing program.

Blog Posts

The CX Loyalty Metrics that Actually Matter

October 25, 2019

Robert Beatus

A key challenge of implementing a CX program is demonstrating its value up and down the organization. To do that, you have to show that it delivers results. There are no shortage of metrics available, but that’s part of the challenge: big data doesn’t always mean big insights. How do you identify the metrics that really matter?

While what matters will differ from company to company and even unit to unit, there are some basic principles that apply. You need to have a 360 degree view of the customer, one that includes both observed and stated loyalty as well as behavioral and emotional characteristics. You want to identify metrics that clearly deliver business value and, ultimately, drive an increase in revenues and a growing customer base.

As a first step, you have to define the most effective KPIs. To do this, you need to understand and define how loyalty drives your business and which types of loyalty are most important. There are stated and observed emotional metrics, and stated and observed behavioral metrics. Each has its value, depending on what you want to do and the audience, but it is generally agreed that from a customer point of view emotional loyalty is more enduring than behavioral loyalty and observed behavior more insightful than stated behavior. Still, each has something to add to the overall picture.

Keeping in mind that there is no real “magic bullet,” what tools are available to help you capture the metrics that actually matter? We have identified six.

1. Net Promoter Score

The Net Promoter Score (NPS) has gained huge traction in the last ten years, with the consulting firm Bain and others claiming it’s the only data point needed to predict consumer behavior. This seems to us overly optimistic. The metric divides customers into three categories: detractors, passives, and promoters. The score is determined by subtracting the percentage of detractors from the percentage of promoters. It’s an important number and can be very effective in change management because it’s easy to understand.

2. Repurchase Intent

Repurchase Intent is another good metric. This seeks to measure loyalty by tracking a customer’s intent to stay a customer. It’s especially powerful for subscription-based services as it implicitly incorporates barriers to switching.

3. Cross Selling

Cross Selling is a good number, too. It captures existing customers intent to buy more products or services from a company, an important indication of loyalty and a powerful tool for growing the business.

4. Price Tolerance

Price Tolerance is another way to measure just how loyal your customers are. Are they willing to pay more for your product? How much more? The preference for your products versus your competitors at various price points can reveal a lot about their loyalty.

5. Customer Loyalty Index

The Customer Loyalty Index (CLI) is a standardized measure designed to track loyalty over time. It incorporates the values of NPS, repurchase intent, and cross selling. While this would seem to be an interesting metric, in practice it’s often hard to understand and its value difficult to communicate. Most users will find its constituent metrics more valuable as standalone tools.

6. Share of Wallet

Finally, there is Share of Wallet, a metric that measures how consumers divide their spending among various brands in a specific category. This tool works best for fast moving consumer brands and can offer insights into relative strength and market share. It’s less helpful for modelling purposes and, like CLI, can be hard to communicate.

Why loyalty matters

Few businesses can survive for long without customer loyalty. No one can stay ahead of the competition all the time, and loyalty buys you breathing space, it allows you to experiment with new products and services and to make the occasional mistake. CX is designed to provide insight into how to develop and grow that kind of loyalty.

But simply implementing a program is not enough: you have to prove its value every day. To do that, you have to measure, and to make your measurements effective, you have to have the right metrics. Those metrics, in turn, must be selected for their ability to generate business value.

Blog Posts

Forrester weighs in on marketing measurement and optimization

October 16, 2019

Sam Richardson

We were eager to see Forrester’s latest Now Tech: Marketing Measurement and Optimization Solutions, Q3 2019 report that was released last month. In part because we were hoping to see Nepa included in the vendor list (Spoiler Alert, we were!) but also because the report helps to increase understanding of the business impact of marketing with measurement and optimization tools – a topic that we care a lot about at Nepa.

Here are a few things that jumped out to us from the report and our take on them:

“21% of B2C marketing decision makers say that their firm is lacking the capability to measure marketing results”

It’s paradoxical that at a time when marketing activity generates more data than ever, marketers struggle more than ever to understand what is most effective to separate the signal from the noise.

Marketing measurement and optimization solutions such as Attribution Modeling, Marketing Mix Modeling, Path to Purchase, and Campaign Measurement all provide marketers with an understanding of what works best.

“A marketing measurement and optimization platform enables marketers to:
• Understand the business impact of marketing budgets;
• Determine the optimal mix of channels; and,
• Forecast results of alternative marketing plans.”

Today’s C-level executives expect all functions to be accountable for contribution to the firm’s financial performance. In response to this trend Marketing needs to go beyond “soft metrics” like impressions and communicate the business value of its efforts.
This type of analysis goes well beyond reporting up the chain – by connecting activity to financial performance through statistical techniques marketers also gain valuable simulation tools to optimize the media mix and predict the results of different tactics.

“Modernize Your Marketing Measurement Strategy”

In addition to providing a list of marketing measurement and optimization vendors, the report suggests all marketers and analytics professionals take a fresh look at their measurement approaches. Here’s the gist:

Experienced measurement users – seek out new approaches to unify siloed measurement approaches.

Measurement holdouts – Choose a partner now, predictive analytics are especially useful during economic slowdowns.

Smaller brands – The cost-benefit analysis of marketing measurement investments have shifted to favor adoption, even for marketers with smaller budgets.

All marketing teams – include “analytics literacy” on the team to utilize measurement and optimization tools to be more effectively and support the missionary aspect of marketing – communicating the benefits of the measurement program up and down the organization.

Technology is evolving rapidly as senior management becomes more and more insistent on understanding marketing ROI. It’s no longer enough to have a vague sense that on some level marketing drives sale. You have to know when, where, how, and how much. And you need to be constantly improving, based on incoming data and changes in the marketplace and shopper behavior.

At Nepa, we recognize that Forrester is highly influential across multiple industries and are pleased to have been included in their analytical coverage. This report serves to further confirm the growing maturity of the marketing measurement and optimization technologies, as well as an overview of vendors in the space, including Nepa.

Blog Posts

Why a recession is a good time to ramp up marketing

October 10, 2019

Robert Beatus

After a record 10-years plus of economic growth, the U.S. and other parts of the developed world are starting to worry about recession. If history is any guide, many retailers and CPGs will take a close look at their marketing spend as a potential source of savings should growth falter. In doing so, they may be missing an opportunity to invest for the long term and to build market share.

Companies have typically reacted in two ways to a slowdown: they cut costs across the board, including marketing, and they seek to optimize the remaining marketing spend, focusing on activation and ignoring brand. This is short sighted. Brand is a key determinant in the path to purchase, while brand loyalty is expensive and time-consuming to build, but easy to squander. As an article in the Harvard Business Review (HBR – How to Market in a Downturn) put it, “Building and maintaining strong brands—ones that customers recognize and trust—remains one of the best ways to reduce business risk.”

There are other advantages to continuing to maintain marketing spend during a slowdown. Competitors may cut back, allowing others to capture a larger share of voice. As demand for advertising space declines, media pricing becomes more favorable to the buyer, meaning you get more impact for the same amount of money, or the same amount of impact for less money. In short, there’s a chance to capture market share.

We know of one consumer retailer that decided to cut its media budget by about 15% and to reallocate significant parts of the remaining budget from brand building to activation. The idea was to invest more in price promotion, drive short-term sales, and cut costs. (The decision was not based on media or sales modeling optimizations.) The result was a drop in sales of almost 10% the following year and even more damage to the brand. Later analysis showed that media investment had contributed about 20% of sales and that investments in traditional brand building channels had been an important part of the program’s overall effectiveness.

In that same Harvard Business Review article, the author wrote that, “marketers may forget that rising sales aren’t caused by clever advertising and appealing products alone. Purchases depend on consumers’ having disposable income, feeling confident about their future, trusting in business and the economy, and embracing lifestyles and values that encourage consumption.” All these are challenged during a slowdown – making brand a more important factor in whether a customer stays with your product or finds an alternative.

“CMOs across the board are seeing shrinking budgets and increasing expectations. And with that, demand for more transparency around how their marketing investments are performing and effecting their long-term brand is more important than ever,” says Robert Beatus, Head of Research Design at Nepa. “Understanding today’s complex shoppers requires sophisticated analytical techniques like Marketing Mix Modeling (MMM), Attribution Modelling and other emerging marketing analytics.”

One of the most promising analytical methods to recently develop is the space of Path-to-Purchase (P2P) analytics. It helps marketers measure changes to shopper psychology, as priorities are reassessed and new behavior patterns emerge, based on the touchpoints and combinations of touchpoints they experience on the way to buying a product or service. In a recession, shoppers are more open to switching brands or retailers, and P2P can help identify the reasons for that switch. As it does so, it simultaneously improves the ability to invest in the touchpoints that increase conversion, always an important function, but even more important during a slowdown.

On the corporate balance sheet, marketing is often treated as an expense rather than as an investment. In practice, it is an investment in the future growth of the company. Investing in marketing during a recession may allow a retailer or CPG company to expand market share, attract new consumers, and position its products for faster growth when the recession ends.

Blog Posts

CX Business Value Starts with Buy In

September 27, 2019

Sam Richardson

By now it’s well established that a CX program, properly executed, can reenergize organizations and transform the customer experience. Getting the technology in the door is relatively straightforward, but before CX can work its data-driven magic you need management buy in.

Based on our experience we have identified four levels of that need to buy in:

Board of Directors
C-Suite executives
Mid-level, e.g. Insights Dept. or LOB leader
Front line employees

Board or CEO:

Initiating the successful development of a CX program is intimidating. If the mandate doesn’t come from the top of the organization, gaining Board- and CEO-support early on could make or break its success. Senior people promoting CX improvement as a strategic imperative provides motivation for the rest of the organization to support initiatives. Further, executive level backing leads to changes in organizational structure and resource allocation required to be a customer-centric organization.

Recommended action: Pick the Right Test Case

Board and CEO approval is important and picking the right test case for rolling out CX is one of the best tactics available to gain momentum. Start with businesses you know and where you can quickly show value. The focus needs to be on “must have” and not “nice to have”. Establishing a clear purpose and ownership of the process while involving key stakeholders makes it easier to achieve results.

Take, for example, a retailer that experiencing declining sales due to retention issues. Focus on a vertical or business unit that can ease the CEO’s pain point – improving the digital experience, for example. This results in customer needs being solved quickly and allowing for preventative measures to take shape for future issues; and ultimately creating happy, returning customers. Being focused early on to show results is a win for you, your CEO and your customer.

Mid-Level

Mid-level buy in has a somewhat different paradigm. In this instance, the CX program is likely centered on a department or business line and has not yet captured the entire organization. These executives generally don’t have the ability to dictate implementation beyond their own sphere of influence and the program itself may not yet be seen as a high priority for senior management.

Recommended action: address a current business problem

To make a program successful at the mid-level requires a demonstration of the power of CX to foster change. One proven way is to focus on a handful of business cases where CX can be put in place and show results quickly for specific managers you may need the support of. This is best done by addressing their current business problem, rather than trying to change the whole organization at once. Nothing succeeds like success, and measurable improvements in the customer experience that lead to better business and bottom line outcomes are the most powerful way to build support and expand implementation.

Front Line Employees:

Front line employees are also critical to making CX work since they’re the ones who ultimately interact with customers. As with management, the best argument is one that uses data to demonstrate a benefit – improved sales and higher commissions, or more repeat business, for example. Your front-line employees are the face of your business. When your customers have have fewer problematic interactions, they become more loyal.

Recommended action: create a system of tiered measurement

Up or down the organization the program should include a number of elements that have been demonstrated to improve success. Create a relevant, compelling story internally. Plan and prioritize how you will communicate that story to your audiences. Create materials to make your case and use cross-functional workshops to spread your message, motivate and attract new stakeholders. Your employee training is key to engaging the front-line with your CX initiatives.

But regardless of where you seek buy-in, setting expectations is critical to long-term success. One way to do this is by putting in place a system of tiered measurement, with milestones at six months, one year, and so on. This provides time to listen to colleagues and to more fully develop the roadmap for creating a customer centric company. Another tip: don’t starve the program for resources at the start. As you move ahead and the results become tangible, they then provide the proof points for expanding the program across the organization.

Blog Posts

The Win-Win Proposition

August 2, 2019

Sam Richardson

Sports teams have an advantage other businesses generally don’t have: an unusually loyal and enthusiastic customer base. But that doesn’t mean they don’t require attention…

Business intelligence and analytics are the new frontier for sports franchises. While it’s become commonplace to use big data to analyze on-field or on-court performance, less attention has been paid to the business side. That’s starting to change. Data is constantly being collected in interactions with fans through ticket and merchandise purchases, mobile ticketing, point-of-sale purchases, in-stadium surveys, websites, and social media platforms. “Gamifying” surveys and providing rewards is another great way to collect information.

The next step for franchises is to analyze and integrate all that data and turn it into actionable insights. Until recently, most teams did not have business analytics departments (and many still don’t) so much of the data that was being gathered was not fully leveraged and tended to sit in the data warehouse or CRM system. Now, teams are increasingly recognizing the value of what they have and the need to make better use of it. As for any business, fan (or customer) retention is a critical concern. And while sports teams have a built-in advantage, they should not take fan loyalty for granted.

Data-driven programs can be used to better understand fans and create touchpoints for building loyalty and expanding fan relationships beyond the strictly transactional. These may include customized offers like seat upgrades that reward loyalty (while also growing franchise revenues), and providing newsletters and more personalized communications. More broadly, these communications offer the opportunity to enhance the fan experience with everything from specialized food vendors to stadium entrance and egress.

The newest front in building fan relationships may be the move towards “cashless” stadiums. This is helpful to fans – it reduces waiting times at concession lines, a big source of fan complaints – but it also provides another source of business intelligence. Management can understand what’s selling and what’s not in something like real time. They can test price points to optimize revenues. And, they can see who’s buying what and use that data to generate more personalized offers.

As elsewhere in the world, data will continue to pour in to sports franchises. But as they leverage this data, teams need to remain sensitive to the special bond they have with their fans.

Sometimes loyal fans can be suspicious of what the team is asking them to provide from a data standpoint. Often, fans don’t understand the bigger business picture – they just want their team to win. To that end, it’s important to be transparent in how and why fan information is being collected, and in how it will be used. By sharing their data with the team, fans can contribute to a much better understanding of their needs.

This approach creates a win-win proposition: fans get a better in-game experience and deeper engagement with their team; while team management builds loyalty, increase revenues and puts the team in the best position to win and the club to grow.

Interested to learn more on how we can help with your fan insights?

Blog Posts

Old Clubs Leading the Way with New Fan-driven Approach

July 16, 2019

Sam Richardson

I’ve been fortunate to attend two conferences this summer in the great sports town of Chicago.

The Intersport Sports Brand and Engagement Summit run by the Sports Business Journal and the excellent 29th Annual ALSD Conference and Tradeshow brought sports organization leaders together with companies like Nepa who are at the cutting edge of sports research and analytics.

During the course of both conferences, it was great to see how far sports teams have come in understanding the value in their fans and partners. – However, it was also clear that many still do not have a proper handle on developing better fan insights. Data-driven approaches and new technologies are an imperative in this day and age.

I’ve always been a big fan of the Windy City, having first visited in 1989, three years after the Chicago Bears enjoyed their famous Super Bowl XX winning season. At the time, I was an undergrad studying my bachelors’ degree in Scotland, but had taken the summer off touring U.S. sports cities with a buddy.

We arrived in Chicago and, being big NFL fans, made a beeline for the iconic Soldier Field only to find the stadium locked up for the offseason. Unperturbed, we knocked on the big iron doors at the old south entrance to the stadium and managed to talk the groundskeeper into letting us in after coming ‘4,000’ miles from Scotland just to see Soldier Field! We were rewarded with a wonderful hour-long self-guided tour of the old stadium and even managed to get our feet onto the hallowed turf.

Thirty years later, almost to the day, I was back touring Soldier Field, this time as an attendee at the ALSD conference, where Nepa were invited to speak on about disruptors in sports.

Originally constructed in 1924 and dedicated to U.S. servicemen and women who died in WWI, the 61,500 stadium has changed a lot in 30 years thanks to a somewhat controversial $660 million ‘flying saucer’ renovation in 2003. Sadly, the modern redesign resulted in the stadium being ‘dropped’ from the National Historic Landmark register.

But while the new architecture and continued location has its critics, I was impressed with how well the new architecture had complemented and preserved the ‘feel’ of the old building by conserving the inner concourse and its iconic Greek colonnades outside.

What impressed me most though was how the Bears, celebrating their 100th season this year, have embraced new technology in almost every aspect of the revamped facility from adding a comprehensive mobile app and DAS wireless network to ticketless entry, new video boards, interactive seating charts, locked charging stations and in-seat ordering.

Up on the North side of town, the changes made at the historic Wrigley Field are even more impressive. The Bears played at Wrigley from 1921-1970, but it’s more famous as the home to the Chicago Cubs since 1912, when it opened as Weeghman Park. Changes and renovations to baseball’s second-oldest stadium had to be considered carefully to respect the history of the grand old dame, but the Cubs have embraced new technology and modern improvements while preserving the romance and majesty of this iconic facility.

Their ‘1060 Project’ began in 2014 and since, the old stadium’s bleachers have been expanded, a 4,000 square foot jumbotron has been installed (but respectfully to mirror the iconic old green scoreboard) locker rooms upgraded and the bullpens relocated. Four new luxurious field-level suites have been added to increase club seats from just 70 to 1,700 with new revenue-generating locations such as the “W” Club, Barrel Room (sponsored by Makers Mark), the 1914 Club (American Airlines), the Catalina Club and the Bunker Suites – all of which hark back to the history of the Cubs and the golden age of Wrigley.

The Cubs have taken key learnings from this five-year project, citing the following keys to their success: plan early, adopt a data-driven and client-focused approach, speak to the fans and offer them what they want, create urgency, sell creatively and never forget about service.

It would have been easy for both the Cubs and Bears to sit back on tradition, rest on their historic laurels and continue to sell based on their fan’s loyalty. But the move to modernity and state of the art technology, while respectfully preserving and indeed enriching their traditions, has very much been embraced by two of America’s oldest sports teams.

Both of these organizations have realized, that in order to continue to attract fans away from their home viewing experience and other competing interests, they must remain relevant by continually talking to and surveying their fans for feedback, as well as staying focused on high levels of service, luxury, convenience and technology being offered by their competitors both inside and outside of sports.

In both cases, century-old institutions have embraced technology and a data-driven approach to maintain and grow their business in the new digital age. If even the Cubs and Bears are doing this, shouldn’t your organization be doing the same?

Blog Posts

Successful Programs: Services & Insights from Forrester VoC Report

July 12, 2019

Sam Richardson

Is your Voice of the Customer program speaking to you? Or are you spending more and getting less than you expected?

In a recent report advising CX leaders on when and how to transition Voice of Customer (VoC) vendors, Forrester CX Analyst, Faith Adams, suggested starting with a services partner to make the most of the technologies already in place. We were thrilled that Faith mentioned Nepa as one such services partner. While coverage of the CX measurement space has focused on shiny new tech offerings in recent years, we’re proud to be recognized for what we believe is our willingness to challenge conventional thinking with flexible technology infrastructure and services to build on what works.

Humble brag over – read on for our brief summary of the 3 Key Takeaways from the June 2019 Forrester report, How To Transition Your Voice-Of-The-Customer Vendor

Takeaway 1 – “Failure is not always the vendor’s fault”

Forrester notes that the complex intertwinement of client and vendor can make it difficult to make a change, so some caution is warranted. There will be implementations that come up short. There will be a need to continually fine-tune programs and, sometimes, to find new vendors. Whoever the vendor, organizations will have to change, too, if they want to maximize value. This includes how they conduct surveys, share data and communicate internally, and, importantly, how they manage the balance between technology and services.

Takeaway 2 – “Consider the reimplementation option”

Noting the cost in time and money, Forrester suggests that companies first consider a reimplementation of an existing program before moving to a new vendor. It’s at this point that bringing in a new (or a first-time) service provider makes sense. An outside point of view can bring fresh perspective, and the provider may be able to introduce ideas that head off the need for a wholesale change in technology. Nepa works with many clients in this way, optimizing existing VoC capabilities and working to identify and capture more incisive insights from existing infrastructure.

But if the VoC program is too deeply flawed, and the level of management frustration has reached a point of no return, then there may be no other choice than to make a change. When that becomes necessary, it’s important that you approach the process in a systematic way. An entire post could be written about that – but with an increasingly complex set of VoC technologies, it’s best to take your time and engage help in the process.

Takeaway 3 – “Successful VoC programs balance technology and services”

In recent years, there was a tendency to look for tech-only, DIY, solutions. As CX metrics remain below expectation and flat, companies recognize a need to do something different to address their current challenges, which include data formatting and siloing, failure to fully exploit the insights available from the data, an inability to incorporate unstructured and unsolicited data, failure to track and report ROI, and many more. In another post, we’ve shared more thoughts on ways a services provider can help companies identify and address these weaknesses.

As Forrester notes in its report, VoC is still at an “immature” point in its development in spite of all the tools and talent available to improve the platforms. That means mistakes will be made. At the same time, new technologies will be introduced that will move the state of the art forward. Some vendors will keep pace, others will fall behind.

Whether you’re changing vendors, doing a reimplementation, or looking at VoC for the first time, it’s important to have a resource available who understands the technology and can guide you along. If you’re there, start with a call to Nepa.

Blog Posts

CX and Brand: Better Together

June 26, 2019

Sam Richardson

Whatever happened to Brand? In the rush to embrace customer experience (CX), it’s become something of a marketing orphan. Our research shows that just 6% of companies are currently using Brand as an input for their CX strategy.

But consumers don’t make the same distinction. They associate CX with Brand and Brand with CX, and one influences the other. Consumers start on the path to purchase and make buying decisions based on both Brand and CX, emotion and experience. And while transactional CX measures last transaction and complaints, strategic CX works with Brand to harmonize the promise and the delivery. But many companies continue to measure Brand impact and CX separately, and fail to understand how to maximize the interaction between the two.

There are several reasons for this. It may simply reflect “siloing” within the organization – with different teams and different systems collecting data that supports brand and CX and then not sharing that data. It may also be a function of the different media that are targeted and how their impact is measured. Brand, for example, tends to go wider through the use of broadcast and other mass-oriented media. Its message is often emotional. CX is generally more targeted, and more oriented towards last touch and generating a short-term action. But Brand often precedes CX – for example, an emotional response generated by the Brand can start the customer on the path to purchase. Or, as Forrester puts it, Brand sets the tone and CX brings the brand to life (or should).

Where things go astray, however, is when Brand messaging and CX don’t link up. Forrester Research has stated that, “The ideal gap between the brand image (what customers are promised) and the brand reality (what customer actually experience) is zero”. But the research firm also notes that, globally, 57% of marketing decision makers say that aligning CX with brand is not a top priority. Where the values and the messaging don’t align, there is a high likelihood of creating confusion and frustration among purchasers.

So how do you bring the two into alignment? We recommend starting with a four-step process, as follows:

Don’t do CX in a vacuum. Use the Brand to design the Customer Experience.
Identify the most important customer journeys from the customer experience.
Measure the emotional experiences often associated with Brand. Make sure they are consistent with CX.
Align goals for Brand and CX across the organization. Create teams to share data and insights.

The fact is that 80% of CEOs believe that their companies deliver very good Customer Experience but only 8% of their customers agree! This is a serious challenge and it results in part from a misalignment of CX and Brand (among other factors). By better aligning Brand with CX, you establish a more consistent and emotionally appealing journey for the purchaser and create the opportunity to strengthen relationships and increase sales.

Sam Richardson

CX is the game changer

Can CX really be that successful?

Our 3-step approach:

We all want success so start having yours today

Sam Richardson

1. General awareness

2. Media recall

3. Consideration

4. Competitors

5. Willingness to pay

6. Preference

Robert Beatus

1. Net Promoter Score

2. Repurchase Intent

3. Cross Selling

4. Price Tolerance

5. Customer Loyalty Index

6. Share of Wallet

Why loyalty matters

Sam Richardson

Here are a few things that jumped out to us from the report and our take on them:

Robert Beatus

Sam Richardson

Board or CEO:

Recommended action: Pick the Right Test Case

Mid-Level

Recommended action: address a current business problem

Front Line Employees:

Recommended action: create a system of tiered measurement

Sam Richardson

Sam Richardson

Sam Richardson

Takeaway 1 – “Failure is not always the vendor’s fault”

Takeaway 2 – “Consider the reimplementation option”

Takeaway 3 – “Successful VoC programs balance technology and services”

Sam Richardson

So how do you bring the two into alignment? We recommend starting with a four-step process, as follows:

CX and Brand: they’re better together.