There’s light at the end of the tunnel…

As we move to Customer Experience 2.0. companies "get"  more than ever that their brands are inextricably linked to customer perception. But it’s getting more complex, and fast.

Increasingly, customers have the ability to control not only the way that they feel about your brand, but they’re controlling how others feel about your brand. 

While CEM is the tool for ensuring these feelings are positive, listening to your customers (online, 1-on-1, and across the board) is the way to understand what those feelings are, and how to shift them.  Remember -- even if you can’t control it, you can influence it. 

Just keep telling yourself “it’s not a train…”

Best,

Michael Hinshaw
Managing Director
MCorp Consulting

In brief, this is (and will
continue to be) an
evolutionary process.
For now, we’re looking at
a combination of:

- Clicks
- Mentions
- RTs (retweets)
- Reach (of a tweet)

Our baseline (0) is a
Tweet that has reached
only my approximately
3000 followers, and
opened (read) only an
average number of
times.

It seems to be working
pretty well so far......

1.) Customer experience 1.0 gave us the understanding of what #cex is & its importance. 2.0 answers the big Q 'Now what?'. http://ow.ly/3JmVb
Witnessing a paradigm shift is always exciting, but it’s also nice to make it to the “now what?” stage. So the doors and windows have been blown open, but now it’s getting awfully wet and dirty in here. So, enter Customer Experience 2.0, the clean up. While you have to buy the Forrester Report to get the full story, one aspect this article and I both know to be true is the power of a Story. (Apologies on behalf of MyCustomer.com for their lack of proofreading…but you’ll get the gist.) (Tweet Score: 64)

2.) Touchpoint Insights: Customer Experience in 2011: The Penalties and the Payoffs http://ow.ly/3vU4Z
As the economy slowly builds up steam the competition for too-few customers is likewise heating up. Whether you convert, penetrate, acquire or steal (and you should do all four), it’s going to take a concerted cex strategy to increase your market share. With more losers than winners a mathematical certainty, what’s your plan to differentiate, satisfy, drive and build? If you’re already measuring, you’ve got a foot on the first rung of a long but climb-able ladder. (Tweet Score: 57)

3.) It’s not about the product, it’s about the audience. http://ow.ly/3BWGs
Are your social media efforts in need of a triple shot of espresso? Read this post, wake up and get that rig back on the road. Thankfully, “interesting” and “relevant” is all relative, and we don’t need to be all things to all people. Just the right things to the right people. (Tweet Score: 52)

4.) Some compelling reasons to not rest on your laurels in 2011 - no matter how successful you were in 2010. http://ow.ly/3wC3L
Perspiration, Innovation, Underestimation…fantastic! No really, this article is more fascinating than it sounds. And best summed up in a quote from Thomas Edison that I wasn’t previously familiar with: “"Opportunity is missed by most people because it is dressed in overalls and looks like work." (Tweet Score: 52)

5.) Reading: "Angry Customers Are Gifts" http://ow.ly/3BWQP
How can this be, you ask? Well, it’s all in the resolution. An ignored angry customer becomes a detractor and that’s never good news (remember the “United Breaks Guitars” guy?). But a formerly angry client? One who’s been listened to, empathized with, followed up on...s/he is likely to become a brand champion. Oh yes….service recovery is a beautiful thing. (Tweet Score: 51)

6.) Focus on your mission (from the perspective of your customers) and empower your employees to deliver it well. http://ow.ly/3CKuN
Maybe we’re thinking about this all wrong. It’s not business, it’s a party. And they’re not customers, they’re your friends coming over. Now let’s show them a good time from the minute they walk into the door until we bid them goodnight...even up to calling Uncle Roscoe a cab. Maybe not the sum total of this article’s point but here’s the part I took away the most vividly: instead of the left hand (let’s call it developers) not knowing (or caring) what the right hand (let’s call them marketing, or CS) is doing, think about your business as a place “your types of people” want to (conceptually) hang out. (Tweet Score: 45)

7.) Could make for an interesting study in user experience v customer experience or product v provider. http://ow.ly/3BZZz
Finally! iPhone wars! For anyone missing the endless attack ads of the last couple election cycles, here’s your chance to get a fix. It’s about to get ugly. (Tweet Score: 42)

8.) Reading: Customer Experience Nirvana: How UX and Marketing Are Set to Increasingly Collaborate http://ow.ly/3BWK4
You say customer experience, I say user experience, she says customer outreach, he says customer interaction. Maybe it’s time to roll them all into one brand-cohesive view of the world? While segments aren’t exactly obsolete, old dividing lines are making less sense in our experienced-based world full of impatient, overloaded, vocal clients. Developers and marketers both deliver experience, and crikey, look what happens when they have a common understanding of what that experience should be…to whom…and why? (Tweet Score: 42)

9.) Reading: "To Groupon or Not To Groupon: New Research on Voucher Profitability" http://ow.ly/3E3qb
If the comments are any indication, Groupon and online discounters of its ilk are giving marketers a lot to chew on with this simple question: is the Groupon model--obviously profitable for Groupon--also profitable for the retailers who sign on? I’m their nightmare user, only buying services (at 40 or 50% off) that I’d use anyway, even at 100% value. But are they making other new customers for life? As one commenter said, these mom and pop operations can “barely track their own basic accounting, let alone this stuff.” But maybe Harvard and Rice can figure it out for them. (Tweet Score: 36)

10.) Reading: "How to Successfully Manage Opposing Strategies" http://ow.ly/3LwK4
When is an opposing strategy really a chance for reinvention? Every time. This article about taking the V (ventilation) out of HVAC (heating, ventilation & AC) just gave me chills. IMHO, this piece deserves a higher ranking than #10. Read on junior engineers…err, I mean marketers. (Tweet Score: 28)