On the Eve of Halloween, We Explore Common Missteps That Can Lead to Downfall
The moon shines bright on the tops of the trees. A howl echoes across the wood, bellowed from a far off beast with glistening fangs. Piercing the dark is the dim glow of a lantern and the creak of a carriage. A well-intentioned company has embarked upon a perilous journey. They must reach the bustling hub of Success before morn. Meanwhile, the furious beast is hot on their heels. Only when they arrive at the outskirts of the city will they be safe.Suddenly, the road forks ahead, split into four paths. The certainty of direction is now gone, and there’s no clear indication which way the company should lead their carriage. The howls of the beast grow louder, closer. In that moment, it becomes apparent that making the wrong choice would have disastrous consequences.
Frightening CX Mistakes
We’ve set the stage for a bone-chilling tale about failure and success. It’s a delightfully spooky introduction to common yet oft encountered CX mistakes. Keep them in mind as your team attempts to build something truly engaging for your audience.
CX Mistake 1: Not Optimizing for Mobile
In today’s digital world, a business must be available to its customers anytime, anywhere. There’s really only one way to do that: by optimizing your communications channels for mobile access. In fact, by choosing to ignore mobile you’ll be losing business outright, especially when it comes to younger audiences.
It would be akin to our tale’s protagonists being careless enough to drop their lantern somewhere in the forest. More than just a source of light, this lantern was a way to be found by others: a potential signal to other adventurers who might have come to their aid. Now they can expect no such help.
CX Mistake 2: No Real Vision for the Customer Journey
Understanding your customer’s journey is paramount to success. This includes the current state of affairs, your goals and even how the journey affects audience sentiment. You cannot hope to succeed in CX without a clear goal in place and a plan for getting there.
You must both delight your clients and entice them to return, which means you cannot ignore them after they’ve made their initial purchase. What can you do to make their experience better? Are they having problems with a product or service?
In our tale, a map would be instrumental to choosing the right path. Without it, there’s no clear indication of where that company has been, where they need to go next, or even how far they still have to travel before reaching the town of Success.
CX Mistake 3: Ignoring EX as a Part of the CX Strategy
Believe it or not, employee experience is a core element of customer experience. If your employees don’t have their heads in the game, it doesn’t matter how well crafted your journey is — they won’t provide optimal service because they’re disengaged.
Just like CX, EX is ongoing and requires resources such as good communication, proper leadership involvement, gamification and rewards.
For our story, this would be like the carriage drivers running off to save their own hides. They hear the beast coming and jump out, leaving everyone else in the group to fend for themselves.
You need to keep those drivers — your employees — satisfied.
CX Mistake 4: Confusing Customer Satisfaction for CX
Customer satisfaction is not the same as CX. Good reviews, recommendations and testimonials don’t necessarily mean you’re providing an optimal customer experience.
Customer experience involves everything about interacting with a business from the customer’s perspective: how they feel, what they encounter, and what next steps they are compelled to take. Product quality is obviously important, but it’s only a starting point.
Choosing one of the many paths just for the sake of making progress initially feels good to our story’s protagonist group, but that doesn’t mean they’re doing the right thing. In fact, they’re now headed away from the town and towards the dark heart of the forest.
That’s exactly the case with customer satisfaction and confidence accrued as a result of good products or services. They don’t necessarily mean CX is good.
CX Mistake 5: Falling in Love with a Metric
Analytics are used for everything. So much that it’s easy to get carried away and focus on faux stats. These are what many of us would call “vanity metrics,” because they flatter, but are ultimately without substance.
Before weighing a metric, consider whether it’s truly relevant to your business. Does it have anything to do with the achievement(s) you’re chasing? Does it say anything about sales enablement? If a metric seems to show improvements, but your customers aren’t returning, then something needs to be done — the metric is not accurately portraying the whole picture.
Out of the chilly shadows of the forest, the company hears a beckoning call. “Over here! Follow me!” They see a charming figure, and although for a brief moment they suspect she is a fearsome witch, they are quickly beguiled. They follow her down a steep path, all thoughts of the pursuing beast forgotten.
An End to Our Harrowing Tale ...
In our story, the forest is full of danger - as is the case with the many CX mistakes a business can make. One wrong move, a poor choice made in a hurry can lead to more than just the journey’s drawn-out timeline. It can lead to the demise of the company in question.
Alas, we come to the close of our tale. A terrible, nail-biting fate befalls the company.
As for their corpses and carriage … they remain within the wood for centuries to come, a warning to other travelers.
The lesson here is simple, yet vital to anyone seeking success. Maybe it’s time you put more stock in a solid, engaging customer experience program.
Happy Halloween from the CXApp team!
