In the age of digital transformation that alters all aspects of our day-to-day lives, businesses and entrepreneurs need to adapt to new business environments, and one of the most talked-about trends we see as consultants is ‘customer experience (CX).’

It is a connection between customers and businesses. It’s what customers experience since they first get into contact with brand and business. If there is any pain, difficulty, or problem; it will create a bad experience for the customers. If ‘brand’ is a perception, ‘customer experience’ is a reality, a real contact with the brand. Over 50% of customers say they would immediately change to alternatives if the experience turns out to be bad.

For that reason, businesses that design customer experience well could have revenue growth up to 10% higher than companies without a well-planned customer experience. ‘The cheapest is the best’ is no longer the key to success. Delivering what customers want is what creates value. Based on Bluebik Group’s experience working with leading companies, creating successful customer experience requires planning and designing in 5 aspects:

1. Customer Understanding: businesses must know who their customers are, their interests, and expectation.

2. Emotional Connection: from even before customers recognize your brand until long after they have used your product or service, their decision stems from not only logic but emotion. Touchpoint synchronization is essential.

3. After-Services: good after-services create brand loyalty and word of mouth.

4. Customer Development: continuous development based on customer feedback is vital. Customer’s needs are continually changing in the age of digital disruption. The faster you realize the changes, the faster you could adapt. Not only this benefits customers, but having customer development in a company also increases employee satisfaction by 60%.

5. Governance: customer development requires consistency. It requires a dedicated team and management board that understands that customer experience is an investment. Customer retention strategy may use a low budget but could double customer-lifetime value.

Creating excellent customer experience might not be a success from day one. It requires time, dedication, and, most importantly, customer understanding to design connections between customers and businesses that matter in the age of technological change.