piHappiness is a global feedback firm on consulting, data, and insights, ensuring that the customer comes first by focusing on customer experience (CX). Its report states that one of the most crucial factors that can identify what makes or breaks a brand is customer experience. Thanks to the latest customer experience applications that are taking up the challenge of understanding what the customer demands are at this juncture, where Pandemic has hit society and global business hard.
Maybe your customer’s expectations have changed now? In such a case, it is important to realize what this experience might look like now and ponder on which parts of your customer journey you might need changing.
It might come as no kind of surprise that as our current pandemic crisis is intensified, the confidence of our customers is dropping to a record low not evidence since the last financial crisis we experienced in 2009.
As all the high street stores closed earlier in 2020, it was necessity and convenience that led to taking the help of online shopping. However, the recent research from some of the best global studies reveals that some three-quarters of the consumers from Britain agree that physical shopping in-store would offer a highly positive experience than buying goods from an e-store.
The actual challenge for most of the stores that provide online services would be on how to retain the customers after there is relaxation of the social distancing measures and people would begin to gradually return to the high street. Also, as stores would gradually start reconsidering their restoration of business over the next few books, they would be in no position to maintain a good customer experience, without compromising on their safety.
In China mainly, where there have been lesser lockdown strictures, businesses are experiencing newer emerging trends. While the trust factor continues to remain a high priority, there have been serious moves by brands that are looking to “Inspire and Engage” consumers with resuming life while adapting to the “newer patterns and norms”.
They would be looking for all trusted brands so that they can provide them with a true sense of safety and security in the turbulent times to see if brands would deliver real value, would act responsibly also do the right kind of thing by the community, something that includes employee welfare.
If the Omicron effect is minimized and lockdown is not strictly imposed, physical customer experiences would resume along with digital ones. The challenge would be to continue collecting customer feedback that clearly demonstrates brands are providing a customized and personalized approach. With most businesses adopting the online as one feedback channel that is primary, it is highly vital that the customer feedback experience software is properly aligned.
Here, getting the timing, target, and tone of the audience plays a vital role towards formulating new, also if needed, to revisit existing customer experience strategies, mainly when the customer’s emotions are really at a high stride.
Customer experience software is entering the tribal businesses
The situation around customer segmentation after Pandemic has changed drastically. Earlier it was by age, gender, or relationship status. A new survey conducted by British Business has helped identify the attitudes and behaviors within different groups – welcome to the Covid-19 Tribes.
Each tribe would display a separate mindset and remain positioned at several emotional ‘event stages’ based on their attitude and outlook towards the recent pandemic and crises, therefore.
For instance, some of the groups include people who hardly care and are oblivious to the fuss around them. They patiently wait to believe that everything would be fine and remain mostly concerned regarding missing other people. Then there are Precarious Worriers who are finding it hard to balance home, financial matters, and schooling. The emotional stages are that of shock, acceptance, denial, engagement, decision, and denial.
Having created each segment of Tribe, it gets feasible to blend the Tribe Data with the other forms of customer data, so that you could ultimately help in improving online feedback for different kinds of audiences. It would also help in shaping external and internal communications, create evolved innovation, and the most significantly, reimagine and advance customer experience strategy. The current customer experience applications are good enough to tap all the requirements and understand the needs of customers, especially in this pandemic better. Depending on which tribe is getting targeted, there could be a series of steps taken. For instance, you may need to provide clear information so that you could minimize friction, inspiration, and connection for customers could allowing them to discover newer experiences plus offering rewards for all those who remain patiently waiting, which would help in creating all the significant customer experience moments that matter.
After successfully identifying a Covid Tribe, it would then become possible to fulfill the rising demands customers come up with. It would be possible through careful communications as the customers would seek advice comfort and reassurance. This would provide opportunities for greater customer experience and would serve in strengthening future brand relationships.
The below-mentioned guidelines could help you in ensuring trust is created and maintained from all the online feedback provided to our customers:
- Build empathy with your customer that is way lot deeper regarding those issues that really matter based on your Covid Tribe requirement.
- Ensure that the brand communications are not envisaged as profiting from Covid, also that customers are completely clearly your business’s first point of concern.
- Let the customers realize they are thoroughly supported, let your customers know you care and that they remain your topmost priority
- Customer experience is one shop window to deliver on promises you make on your brand to ensure your consumer’s expectations are getting clearly attended to
- Try to be different and meaningful in the delivery of your customer experience. Thanks to the customer experience software, it insulates your brand in both the short term and long term to help drive future growth
- Customer feedback might not be your top priority, hence remain prepared to find some dips in the response rates. Tap into other types of data sets to help you realize customer priorities of the present
- Most of the time, actions speak much louder than words, so wherever possible highlight any of the helpful and practical steps you are taking towards helping to improve customers’ lifestyles and lives. A prudent combination would be practicality and empathy.
Step – Adjustment/Transformation for Customer Experience
A customer experience strategy that has essentially worked well in the past may be proving rather less effective currently. We really don’t know exactly how long the measures on social distancing would last, or whether they would be freshly introduced once the lockdown is lifted.
What remains absolutely certain, however, is that during the current times, where uncertainty looms, we enter into a completely new era of customer experience, one that would aim at enriching the lives of the customers than simply meeting their current requirements. We now have the opportunity to redesign what should be done rather than doing the same thing in a different manner using the latest configuration of the customer experience app to provide our customers with a frictionless and seamless customer experience journey.
