Customer Experience is not binary

I was recently presenting work we had been undertaking to design a new experience for a client, Assurant Health in Milwaukee. They have been on the path of improving their Customer Experience for a while and have been making progress. During the presentation the debate turned to ‘should Customer Experience be Assurant Health’s main differentiator?’ Scott Krienke, SVP, Marketing & Products Lines offered a great insight. He said ‘our focus on Customer Experience does not have to be binary; it’s not a black and white decision’. This is very insightful. Scott’s right and this is a great way of describing it. This way of looking at Customer Experience is a real breakthrough for Assurant Health.

Many organizations over the years have focused on ‘product or price’ as their main differentiator. Making the change to focus on Customer Experience as a differentiator can be a big decision with questions around ROI resources, skill sets, etc. Today, many organizations are debating whether Customer Experience should be their main differentiator. I think the insight Scott provides is the answer. Customer Experience is not binary. You can decide, like Zappo’s, to make Customer Experience your key differentiator. Zappo’s say ‘we are a customer service company that happens to sell shoes’. But Customer Experience is not binary. You don’t have to make that type of decision. You are proving a Customer Experience today. As we all know Customer expectations grow all the time so your Customer Experience needs to improve all the time just to stay level with everyone else. Even if you are still focusing on price or products it doesn’t mean that you shouldn’t be looking to improve your Customer Experience at the same time. Customer Experience is not binary…