Among the topics discussed the role that customer experience plays in brand featured heavily. Charlie Williams, CEO of CXCo said at the outset that this is the ‘Age of the customer’ with empowered buyers now demanding a new level of customer focus. The customer’s view on the service or product plays a huge part in whether a brand thrives, which means companies should be taking extra steps to ensure they’ve met the expectations of their customers.
To take an example from the insurance industry, customers who were non-respondents to a survey had an average 76 per cent renewal rate, but those who responded and then received an effective closed loop call had an average 89 per cent renewal rate. With around 400,000 customers this translates into a massive £164.8 million value to the business.
Completing the circle
Mr B & Friends CEO, Simon Barbato, continued the theme to illustrate how customer experience and brand proposition are inextricably linked. Citing examples from BT and British Airways, Simon showed that if you fail at one, you fail at both. He demonstrated how the third part of the equation is employee experience.
Our work with Principality Building Society on their five-year transformation programme delivered the whole triple-pronged experience.
Principality was formed 160 years ago. With over 500,000 customers the organisation had a solid history and customer base, but it was losing relevance rapidly. Working closely with the senior leadership and marketing team, our remit was far-reaching: brand identity, retail design, digital, customer communications, internal brand programme, and, of course, the flagship sponsorship vehicle, the Principality Stadium.
Following brand planning work, we developed the purpose statement ‘helping customers to prosper in their homes’ and then created a brand proposition that Principality could own and build: ‘Where home matters’ – this statement became the focal point for a complete brand transformation programme, which included customer-focused branch design.
Employee experience was brought to life via the creation of the ‘Home Team’ – an internal brand ambassador programme that we conceived, designed and delivered to help Principality employees understand and embrace cultural and brand change within the business. To change the business on the outside, our focus was to engage internally.
The brand proposition was supported by a CXCo-led customer experience programme that delivered an outstanding 79.2 NPS score – meaning customers stay longer and spend more than others.
Since the work was launched the business has posted year on year growth increasing its savings book from £7bn AUM to £9.3bn, breaking all product sales records, growing its retail network and delivering the brand successfully to over 1,200 colleagues.
Paying attention to customer experience is proven to deliver results by adding the extra layer of brand appeal that can so easily be overlooked. If you’d like to discuss customer experience for your company get in touch with Charlie at charlie.williams@cxco.co.uk
