Author: Mark Atterby

Digital technology is vital to be able to provide personalised customer experiences at scale and in a way that is economically viable. Yet, digital transformation can appear disconnected from human experiences and build barriers between customers and the brand. We’ve seen the rise of chatbots, AI and increased automation matched with the rapid shift to all things digital in the last few years. “When poorly designed”, comments Elisa Adams, CEO of Sprout, “These automated systems and channels can leave customers feeling frustrated and confused. From chatbots that fail to understand or properly register what the customer is saying to automated…

The unexpected or apparently random discovery of a new product, according to recent research, can have a major and positive impact on the customer experience. When customers unexpectedly discover something new that they like, their enjoyment and satisfaction of a particular product or service will be greatly enhanced. Recent research by the University of Sydney, University of Florida and Rutgers University demonstrated how important the random discovery of new products can to the overall customer experience. When serendipity is introduced into the experience of discovering new products the positive feelings associated with it are greatly magnified. The research looked…

From chatbots to hyper-personalised experiences to better understanding customers, AI and machine learning have been used in a variety of contexts to improve the customer experience. In 2022, the role of AI is expected to expand as enterprises become mature in its adoption. More and more business leaders in Australia as well as consumers are becoming more comfortable with AI and building a level of trust in its ability to automate and enhance decision making capabilities for an organisation. Jason du Preez, general manager APAC for SugarCRM, observes, “We anticipate that in 2022, more Australian organisations will realise and materialise the…

Most organisations store vast amounts of information about their customers in transaction systems such as their billing and CRM systems. They are also constantly surveying customers for their feedback and recommendations as well as drawing on customer insights from social media and other external sources. By Integrating all this data, brands hope to build a more complete and unified picture of their customers. There are numerous reasons for organisations wanting to do this. The primary reason is to better understand customers and their behaviour which can translate into more sales, lower cost to service and increased customer loyalty and engagement.…

Too many customer experience projects stall because leaders are unable to demonstrate the value these projects create. Connecting specific customer insights to specific tangible benefits for the business is critical to overcoming this challenge. Initially, executives can get very excited over the promised benefits of becoming a customer centric organisation: greater customer loyalty, higher retention and engagement, lower cost to serve as well as improved customer and employee satisfaction. But they are often unable to articulate how improving experiences for customers will create value for the business. After the customer experience transformation project commences the initial enthusiasm behind it will…

A subsidiary of Energy Queensland, Ergon distributes electricity to 746,000 customers across most of Queensland. Ergon manages customers across regional and remote areas of the state, from Cape York in the North all the way down to Dalby in southwestern Queensland. Most of Ergon’s customers are households, but they also cover small-to-medium businesses, commercial enterprises and agricultural / farming customers. Ergon has been on its customer experience journey for nearly a decade now. That journey has been a road of continual improvement, as Rachel Eade, Senior Customer Delivery Specialist at Ergon Energy Retail, reflects, “We commenced on our CX journey…

Zoom2u was founded in 2014 to provide Australians with a better delivery experience. The pandemic created a massive surge for their service due to the growth in ecommerce and home delivery. Steve Orenstein, founder and CEO, explains how Zoom2u coped with the rapid growth, while transferring staff to work remotely yet still maintaining exceptional delivery experiences. Steve started Zoom2u in 2014 due to the frustration he felt when ordering something online and not knowing when, exactly, it was going to be delivered.He comments, “I saw an opportunity in the courier space to give customers a better delivery experience. Having experienced,…

B2B (Business-to-Business) customer experience receives less attention than its B2C counterpart and can often struggle for attention against other corporate priorities. B2B brands who embrace CX, however, can seize the opportunity to make more revenue and profits. Paul Robertson, Marketing Director at Inspectorio, believes creating positive customer experiences in a B2B context can be more rewarding than with consumers. He comments, “In B2B, experiences between customers and businesses can last for significant periods of time. The customer lifetime value is often greater meaning there is more at stake.” In many ways, delivering CX is similar in a B2B context as…

The Bendigo and Adelaide bank wants to become the bank of choice for Australia within the next five years. Megan Papadopoulos, head of consumer connection, explains how their Customer Experience (CX) and digital transformation strategy is critical to the bank achieving its goals. The bank was formed by the merger of Bendigo Bank and Adelaide Bank in November 2007. The separate brands still exist where Bendigo Bank is the retail brand that deals directly with customers and Adelaide Bank is the brand that services mortgage brokers and third-party partners. Papadopoulos, who is in charge of the bank’s contact centre operations,…

Content plays a pivotal role in the digital experiences of customers. Every web page, blog post, tweet, explainer video, ebook, or podcast is an opportunity to create a meaningful brand experience. A customer’s journey may start by reading a snippet of information in a search engine query and continue until the customer is reading a user manual for the product they just bought. It’s the content that has guided them on that journey. Due to the Internet, customers now have more information about potential products and services than they have ever had access to in the past. It’s easy for…