Customer Experience : From Communicating to Connecting

ll good companies do things right and hence become successful. However, in times of mature markets and intense competition, the need to go beyond the established comfort zones arises and the subtle nuances of ‘Customer Experience’ become increasingly relevant.

Gaining customers in times past meant: Researching the market; Picking a segment of target customers; Developing or customizing your machine for the segment at the best price point; Pitching professionally to them; Rinse and Repeat. The formula needed no further tweaking. Now, Customer Experience is the battlefield where customers are won or lost.

When orders are lost to the competition, it is common in performance review meetings to have discussions that revolve around the lack of specifications, features, price or rapport.

However, when you correspond with the customers at a senior level, the reasons for the loss of order, more often than not, turn out to be beyond these realms. Your machines were just fine for them they tell you and so was the price, but the competition could offer them what they were exactly looking for. What this means, in simple terms, is that the competition could speak the customers’ language and anticipate and tell them their needs even before the customers could realize that themselves.

Good companies have competent systems of design, manufacturing, testing, logistics, and support, which are well aligned internally as per their perspective. These need to be aligned externally with the customers’ needs. This is the ‘Customer Experience’ that distinguishes a good company from a great one.

There is a need to develop a ‘Customer Experience Strategy’ after having sincerely sought answers to questions such as: What is our true overall value proposition? Who are our customers? What customer experience do we promise? What capabilities do we need to deliver that experience? and How will our culture help or impede us from delivering that experience? The answers to these will lead to aligning the emotional elements of the customer experience with the customer touch points, including pricing, with the best capabilities of the company.

A customer experience strategy is the delivery of the value that is distinguished by the experience the company delivers to its set of customers. This experience is the composite of performance of the machine and the entire service channel with the technology used. A good customer experience strategy will coordinate all the needed functions, skills, and practices.

Quote :

T K Ramesh
Whole time Director and CEO
Micromatic Machine Tools Pvt Ltd