How To Sell Customer Experiences Not Customer Service

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(01:05): Hello and welcome to another episode of the Duct Tape Marketing Podcast. This is John Jantsch. My guest today is Jeannie Walters. She’s an award-winning customer experience expert, international keynote speaker and founder of Experience Investigators, a firm helping companies increase sales and customer attention through elevated customer experiences. She’s a charter member of the Customer Experience Professionals Association and having worked with numerous Fortune 500 companies, including Orange Theory Fitness, SAP, Comcast, and JP Morgan Chase, just to name a few, we’re going to talk about customer experience. So Jeannie, welcome to the show.

Jeannie Walters (01:44): Thank you so much, John. I’m thrilled to be here.

John Jantsch (01:47): So I start a lot of my shows asking if people to fine terms, and I find that there’s a lot of terms out there that we use every day that maybe people, they have a misunderstanding or I think, well, at least I like to get your baseline. So when somebody says customer experience, how do you define that?

Jeannie Walters (02:06): Well, I’m so glad you asked because it is a term that gets thrown around a lot and often when I introduce myself and I say something about customer experience, people immediately make the mental jump to customer service.

John Jantsch (02:18): And

Jeannie Walters (02:18): They love to tell me their worst customer service story as a customer. And customer service is part of the experience, but the way that we define customer experience is it is literally what happens throughout the entire journey. Every interaction you have between a brand and a customer from before they even know they need you to all the way to when they leave you or become a lifelong customer. And I also like to remind people that your customers are having an experience whether you talk about it or not. And so what we try to really help our clients with and what I’ve been dedicated to for all this time is really helping get more proactive and intentional about designing the customer experience so that you can really relate to what customers actually need in that moment and then give them that so that they keep going through the journey with you.

John Jantsch (03:16): As I listened to you, describe that there would be some, myself included that would argue that sounds like marketing. I knew this was coming. So where is customer experience a subset of marketing? Does it walk alongside marketing? How do you fit that in?

Jeannie Walters (03:34): So I look at it as two different lenses that compliment each other. So marketing is really an act inside the business to help connect with customers and help actually kind of guide them to where we think they should go next. That’s what we’re trying to do. Customer experience is more about understanding from the customer’s perspective, what is it they need when so that we can actually design that inside the organization. A lot of the work we do in customer experience is helping really us as business leaders understand how to even understand the customer journey because we are taught to think about our role and our org chart and all of those things. Customer doesn’t care.

John Jantsch (04:21): Plus, I think a lot of it goes on today without our knowledge, right?

Jeannie Walters (04:24): Oh, absolutely. Absolutely. We have so much less control than we did

John Jantsch (04:29): 10,

Jeannie Walters (04:30): 15 years ago for sure.

John Jantsch (04:34): A lot of times when people think customer experience, they’ll say like, oh, we need to wow our customers, which that could be good, but how do you first align? I know with marketing plans and marketing strategy, we always try to align them with business goals. I assume that there’s a role for that alignment when you talk customer experience isn’t there.

Jeannie Walters (04:53): Yes, absolutely. And this is one of the, I think persistent myths out there is that as customer experience leaders, we need to care about our customer satisfaction rate or our net promoter score or things like that, which absolutely, but those are measurements, they’re indicators, they aren’t outcomes. So what I like to do is look at what are the organizational goals? What are we trying to do here, and what are the levers we need to pull within the customer experience to help us both understand how to get there and also look for opportunities and challenges and ways that we can just make things a little easier for our customers? A little less friction. I personally don’t believe we have to wow every customer every time because that’s not realistic either.

John Jantsch (05:43): It’s exhausting.

Jeannie Walters (05:44): Yeah, it’s exhausting. And some of those things that are held up as those wow moments, they’re not scalable. They’re things that are pr, they’re great PR and marketing, but they’re not necessarily scalable. So what we to look at is really understanding what does your customer need in this moment and how do we know? Because sometimes humans say one thing and they behave differently. So you can have all the surveys in the world and you could still get it wrong. So you really need to be savvy about understanding customer behavior, operational metrics, the indicators that are out there to help us get the business outcomes that we’re aiming to get.

John Jantsch (06:22): Yeah. What was that Henry Ford saying? If I’d asked my customers what they wanted, they would’ve set a faster horse.

Jeannie Walters (06:28): That’s right. That’s right. That’s right. And innovation is a huge part of this, and it’s a huge opportunity, but that means that you can’t just ask because humans don’t make any sense.

John Jantsch (06:43): Well, and a lot of the greatest innovations out there, the iPod for example, I mean, nobody was even thinking about that as something that they needed, right?

Jeannie Walters (06:55): Right, exactly. Exactly.

John Jantsch (06:56): So what role do you see increasing role? There’s definitely a role, huge role for good or bad technology playing in customer experience. I mean, you have technology that I think at one point sometimes people look at it as, oh good, we’ll never have to talk to those damn customers again because we’ve got this technology that’ll do it. And then there’s also places where it’s like, no, the example I always love to use is when I go see my eye doctor, I don’t want to have to call somebody. I want to go on there, schedule my appointment, and they’ve got my record there. To me, that was a better customer experience, but when I’m getting examined, I want somebody who’s very listening and different experience. So how do you help people navigate technology?

Jeannie Walters (07:42): Yeah, it’s a great question because I mean, one thing to keep in mind is technology is a tool on the toolkit. You still have to figure out what is the overall strategic vision that you have, what are you trying to do, who are you serving? All of those things. But what I really am seeing that I get excited about is actually exactly your example. We want more self-service options. As customers, we want to be able to have choice based on context. Sometimes I hear people categorize people like, well, the big one before the pandemic, the big one was, well, anybody 50 plus, they’re not a digital customer, right? Well, and of course that is not true. It’s all about context. There are times where you don’t want to call. There are times where you need to call and we need to give customers options. And technology gives us so many great ways to, again, proactively think about this and design those touch points. So if somebody gets stuck with that technology, do they have an option where they can call somebody who knows that they’ve already been through that? Because the most frustrating thing that can happen is you spend your life telling a chatbot your life story, and then they can’t help you and you pick up the phone and call and they didn’t know that happened. They have no visibility.

(09:02): And that’s the technology I’m seeing that I think will vastly improve the customer experience, is connecting the dots inside the organization and giving the right people the right visibility so that when you call and you’re already angry and you’re frustrated because you just went through that chatbot thing, somebody who is answering that call understands that’s where you are in your journey and can respond immediately and say, I have all your information. I know exactly what to do next, and I’m sorry that happened. So I think we have to blend the ease and efficiency of technology with the understanding and empathy of humans on a regular basis, and look for ways that we can basically jump in at either point and give customers the options that they are asking for.

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(10:46): That’s oracle.com/duct tape oracle.com/duct tape. You bring up a good point though, the cliche of the generational thing that you used there, but there are realities in some generational differences into how people want to be treated, or at least what their expectations are. I always kind of tease my kids if I can be cliche, I’m just a lot more patient than they are. If something doesn’t work the way it’s supposed to work, they’re out of there. And I’m like, okay, let’s try another path. Do companies need to try to understand that? Is it possible to understand the generational differences?

Jeannie Walters (11:25): Absolutely. And I think a big one that I’m seeing is that the way we behave as customers is very different. And part of that is, I mean, there used to be an expression that if your mom used tide detergent, you used it, right? There was just no question. And now the younger generations are much more likely to, number one, align their values with who they do business with, and they’re very serious about this. There have been other generations who about it, but aren’t necessarily acting on it. These younger generations are acting on that. So you need to make sure you’re visible and transparent with your values in a different way in order to attract the right customers. The other part of that is to your point, there’s some irony in some of the behavioral assumptions we make because some of the younger generations are actually more savvy about when to call.

(12:20): So they reach a certain point and they know the only way I’m going to get this solved is by calling, but they’re prepared for it. They’re not, not frazzled, they’re just solving their problem in a different way. So we have to again, figure out what’s the best way to serve them in that moment within this context, because I really believe that all of us as humans, I mean the world is changing at such an incredible speed, and we have to learn new things every single day. We can’t just do what we did last week, and we have to keep up with that for customers. But it’s all about the context of the need and where they are in their journey, and also who they are. There are some people who they want quick answers, they don’t want a lot of empathy. They just want you to tell ’em what’s wrong and move on. There are other people who, they want the whole thing. They want to tell you everything that happened. And so we need to figure out how do we recognize those people and serve them in the best possible way in that moment. And some of that is generational, and a lot of that is contextual now.

John Jantsch (13:24): So I’m going to come back to that point, but you mentioned speed, and I would say speed has become a huge driver today of customer experience or at least expectation. I was watching a movie the other day and these kind of teenage kids, their mom had died a few years ago and they found a camera of hers and they had film in it. And so they took it to a place and the guy said, do you want the one hour service? And they were like, it’s going to take an hour.

Jeannie Walters (13:51): That’s a great example.

John Jantsch (13:52): It really is. And I do think so how are you factoring in the idea that speed is just become an

Jeannie Walters (13:59): Expectation? Well, I think in a way it’s always been an expectation, but we’ve learned as customers kind of how to be complacent about it. And so one of the things that I always look for is what are the assumptions we’re making about time? And what I mean by that is, for instance, one of the things I love to ask in these workshops we do is, okay, what do you do really well here? And a lot of people say, well, we get back to people we’re really friendly. And I’ll say, okay, so what’s your definition of soon? And you get 18 different answers. Because if you don’t define what we mean by those time indications, we are going to set the wrong expectations for customers. And that’s where disappointment comes in. So some of this is about setting the right expectations and being proactive when we don’t know something, when we have to call back and say, Hey, I don’t have this yet, but I will. And so I think part of what customers are expecting is the worst. You’re not going to call me back when you say you’re not, or what do you mean it’s going to take an hour? That’s a great example. That’s crazy to them. And so we need to make sure that when we talk about time, we are all speaking the same language. And sometimes that’s just not the case right now.

John Jantsch (15:26): Yeah, because so much of success in life, let alone in business, is just meeting expectations, right? Absolutely. If you thought it was coming Friday and it came Thursday, you’re a hero. But if it came Saturday, it was like, no, the whole thing failed. So how much of this in an organization, when I heard you describing people making decisions about, oh, this person’s already angry, so I need to handle it this way. How much of that is taught? How much of that is just culture?

Jeannie Walters (15:57): Oh, that’s a great question, John. I think, I mean, it’s definitely a combination of both because we can teach and train to so many different scenarios, and somebody will show up with a totally different one the next day because humans have all sorts of crazy stuff happen. So we have to both develop a culture where people feel empowered by a similar value structure. And what I mean by that is we use something called a customer experience mission statement. And the reason we started developing this is because we saw that a lot of people said things like, well, we want to deliver exceptional customer experiences, but you and I might handle those things differently based on our life experience and our judgment and all of that. And neither one is wrong, it’s just different. But if you are inconsistent, that actually chips away at the trust with the customer.

(16:50): So we want to make sure that we are really aligned around a culture that empowers people to make the right decisions in the right moment. Having said that, we need to spend some time on teaching and training and alignment, because otherwise we are just asking everybody. I mean, one of my favorite examples of this is I was looking at the goals of an organization, and one of their big goals was we need to deliver friendlier experiences for our customers. And I said, well, how do you know if you’re succeeding at that? And so we have to spend some time figuring out what are we really saying? What are the stakes in the ground? What are the milestones? How do we know if we’re successful? Because then you can bring that back to the culture and say, this is what we really mean. This is who we are no matter what, and this is how we show up for our customers and for one another. And that alignment is really important too. We can’t treat customers one way and treat each other a different way.

John Jantsch (17:49): And that’s really to the culture point. You’re absolutely right. I mean, a lot of times, I used to say years ago that any way, shape and form in which your business is coming into contact with a customer or prospect, that contact is performing a marketing function. And a lot of times as organizations grow, the leadership has no contact with the customer anymore.

Jeannie Walters (18:10): Yeah, it’s very true.

John Jantsch (18:11): And yet those people are probably treating the customers about as well as you’re treating them, right?

Jeannie Walters (18:20): Yep. Yep. That is definitely something that as people get further up in the org chart, they get further and further away. And to your point, the opposite is true where all of the behavior rolls down the org chart too. And so it is really important that people feel, again, that alignment with values that’s just so important in any culture.

John Jantsch (18:41): Yeah. I know in our organization over the years, I’ve had people that customer, they have a bad experience with a customer, and they’re kind of bad mouthing the customer in front of the team. I’m like, we just can’t do that ever, ever, because it’s not acceptable for them to do. And if we’re saying that’s the behavior, but especially in smaller organizations, that takes intention, doesn’t it

Jeannie Walters (19:05): Does for sure.

John Jantsch (19:06): Tell me a little bit. So if I came to you and I said, Hey, this customer experience thing sounds awesome, you need to customer experience us. How would that start? I mean, are we going to map out journey points or touch points? I mean, what’s the process look like?

Jeannie Walters (19:21): Yep. I always think of customer experience work and really setting the foundation for it in any organization as a three step kind of foundational process. And then we move into, we’ve got all these tools in our toolkit, like customer journey mapping, but I like to start with the idea that it’s a mindset, it’s a strategy, and then it’s a discipline within your organization. So you kind of have to think about it. Any other part of your business, you would never say, for instance, we should really do sales, so let’s bring in somebody, do a workshop. And if that doesn’t work, I guess sales doesn’t work. That would never happen. But we do that a lot with customer experience. We think it’s a magic wand. So we like to think about it as to get the mindset you need that customer experience, mission statement, something centralized within your organization.

(20:09): So we do workshops and strategy and executive coaching on that, and then we go into strategy, which is really what are you trying to do and what are the efforts that we’re going to put into this to achieve those outcomes? So we define those outcomes and all of those things. That’s with something we call a strategy success statement. And then we move into the discipline of it. How are we going to get this done? Who’s involved? How do we actually work together? How do we get our leaders involved and how do we know if we’re successful? And all of those things. So that’s kind of the foundation of it. And then there are things like, yeah, we want to map out what is the ideal experience. I really believe that innovation is experience driven right now. You think about the disruptors of the last 20 years, they’ve all been experience driven. And so we do something called experiential innovation where we help people think about how do they disrupt their industry with experience. So there are all these different ways, and it’s all based on what are you trying to do as an organization and how can we help you be the most successful you can be, while at the same time making it a win. So your customers, your employees, and all your stakeholders love you. That’s really what we’re trying to do,

John Jantsch (21:19): How important. We’re going to run out of time here. So I’ll wrap up pretty quickly. I’d love to know, so I’ve got this roadmap. We’ve identified things, processes, campaigns, whatever that need to be put in place. How important is testing and monitoring and analyzing, this worked, this didn’t work. Let’s try something. I mean, I’m sure a lot of people are senate, forget it people, right? It’s like, this is our process. Here’s our SOP go.

Jeannie Walters (21:43): Yep. Yeah. It is important, and I like to think about it less about testing and more about pilots, because a lot of times you want to test things in a way that you’ll know yes or no, and humans just are very unpredictable. And so what I like to do is take a smaller kind of subset and say, okay, let’s learn from this pilot, because we always get feedback. We always learn something in that. Then you can start applying at scale and see what works and what doesn’t. So we do that as well as inviting customers into the process, making sure that if you’re doing customer journey mapping and you never talk to a customer, you are missing a huge opportunity as well as your frontline workers, your cashiers, your customer service reps, your salespeople. Sometimes they’re left out of the process mapping, and I’m like, no, we need them. So we think about it as customer collaboration. You need to have that along the way every step of the way,

John Jantsch (22:44): And even customer or units inside of an organization. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve talked to a leader of marketing and sales and customer service, and they’re like, wait, after we get an order, you do that.

Jeannie Walters (22:55): Absolutely. That happens. Absolutely. Yep.

John Jantsch (22:57): So it’s pretty incredible. It’s like, oh, nobody bothered to talk to each other.

Jeannie Walters (23:01): Great. That’s right. That’s right. And that’s what I love about things like journey mapping and service blueprinting, because you get people together and just the act of that can create real change in an organization.

John Jantsch (23:13): Yeah. Well, Jeanie, I appreciate you taking a few moments to stop by the Duct Tape Marketing Podcast. Is there some place you’d invite people to connect you and learn about your work?

Jeannie Walters (23:20): Sure. Yes, please join us@experienceinvestigators.com. We have a ton of stuff there in our learning center. And then you can also find me on LinkedIn, and I’ve got a few LinkedIn learning courses out there too. So I’d love to hear from you.

John Jantsch (23:33): Again, appreciate you taking a few moments, and hopefully we’ll run into you one of these days out there on the road.