How successful customer experience management works

Technical report by Dario Waechter

Retain customers in the long term with the help of CRM systems

Successful customer experience management (CXM) starts with customer acquisition: companies provide potential customers with the right information at the right touchpoint at the right time during their customer journey. This is right and important. It is just as fundamental to do the same for existing customers. It is important to inspire them again and again. This requires a 360-degree view of each individual customer. CXM forms the basis.

If companies use a customer relationship management (CRM) system, they have already created a solid foundation for effectively looking after customers. Nowadays, however, existing customers also need to be convinced time and again. As part of successful CXM, companies need to collect information about every single moment of contact with the customer, such as when and why they make an inquiry or complaint. If an inquiry is received via the contact form on the website, this should be recorded in the CRM system, for example as a support ticket. This requires a ticket module, which some CRM systems offer "out of the box". For support cases or highly relevant inquiries, priorities can be assigned automatically and the tasks forwarded to the right team. Further workflows are conceivable based on this. Even small optimizations mean that customer complaints or support requests can be processed much more quickly. At best, such concerns can also be turned into a positive experience. The customer experience benefits when companies support their service and sales digitally. For example, if the same support requests are received time and again, companies can store email templates for different target groups and thus optimize their communication processes.

Keeping an eye on customers

At the same time, companies should ensure that service and sales employees always have access to all customer-relevant information. If the customer contacts one of the two departments, for example to enquire about the status of a ticket, they will be reluctant to have to repeat their request. This is not necessary if service employees have access to all information about the customer's entire history. It is therefore advisable to link the CRM solution with other systems and consolidate all customer data centrally so that up-to-date information is available at all times. It is also advisable to link a marketing automation solution with the CRM system. This not only makes it easier to manage and implement campaigns for acquiring new customers, but also improves customer loyalty. Existing customers also want to receive relevant content in the right place at the right time.

CRM without AI soon unthinkable

The better companies know their customers, the better they can meet their needs. Many companies rely on the gut feeling of their sales staff to approach customers as part of cross-selling or up-selling. However, this does not lead to successful CXM. There are now a number of CRM and marketing automation solutions with AI functions. They support sales, service and marketing employees with time-consuming, repetitive tasks. For example, these tools automatically evaluate large amounts of data from various sources and thus relieve employees of the burden of creating forecasts. They also make it possible to better assess customers' needs and willingness to buy. They use scoring to automatically evaluate new inquiries, determine the expected duration of a sales process and calculate the probability of closing a deal. Customers expect excellent services, fast responses and unique experiences. An outstanding customer experience is therefore increasingly becoming a competitive factor.