Companies of all kinds claim that a customer-focused approach is the hallmark of the world's best businesses. But how are customers actually treated? Readers may nod in weary recognition at two experiences the author describes:
1. You are glad to be a new customer at an online store and you place an order. The next day, you get a call from customer service insisting that the software captured all the order information except your credit card details. You wonder why and cancel the order. You field more such calls for the rest of the week; and on top of that, you receive their e-newsletter "forever" because the unsubscribe function doesn't work.
2. You are a frequent flyer at a particular airline. Do you find yourself treated as a revenue-generating passenger or a sucker when you attempt to make use of the loyalty rewards and book a vacation for your family?
Four years ago Schmitt wrote Experiential Marketing: How to Get Customers to Sense, Feel, Think, Act, and Relate to Your Company and Brands. Often, he says, a company fails to create a holistic approach to the customer experience and focuses instead on functional product features and functional business transactions. His new book goes a step further, detailing a five-step process for managing the customer experience:
- Analyze the experiential world of the customer
- Build the experiential platform
- Design the brand experience
- Structure the customer interface
- Engage in continuous innovation
Schmitt, a consultant and CEO of the EX Group, has developed brand and experience strategies for clients in various industries. In his book he shares some of those cases so readers can benchmark their own efforts in customer experience management.