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Navigating the Customer Experience

Join host Yanique Grant as she takes you on a journey with global entrepreneurs and subject matter experts that can help you to navigate your customer experience. Learn what customers really want and how businesses can understand the psychology of each customer or business that they engage with. We will be looking at technology, leadership, customer service charters and strategies, training and development, complaint management, service recovery and so much more!
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Now displaying: March, 2022
Mar 29, 2022

Gadi Shamia is the CEO and Co-Founder of Replicant, a conversational AI platform founded on the belief that machines are ready to have useful, complex conversations that will transform the way they interact with the world. Prior to Replicant, Gadi helped take Talkdesk, a $10B contact centre software market leader from a seed-stage company to a Unicorn startup as its COO, and played a key role in architecting and executing its 20X growth in people and revenue.

 

Questions

 

  • Could you share with our listeners a little bit about your journey?
  • Can you share with us a little bit about how organizations are using AI to enhance customer experience? And have you seen that change more drastically, especially in the last 2 to 3 years?
  • Could you also share with us how the intelligent voice automation is helping to improve business outcomes for companies who don't have enough manpower to keep up with demand?
  • What's the one online resource, tool, website or app that you absolutely can't live without in your business?
  • Could you share with us maybe one or two books that have had the biggest impact on you, it could be a book that you read a very long time ago or even listened to, or one that you have engaged with recently, but has really left a big mark on you.
  • Could you also share with us what's the one thing that's going on in your life right now that you're really excited about? Either something you're working on to develop yourself or your people.
  • Where can listeners find you online?
  • Do you have a quote are saying that during times of adversity or challenge, you tend to revert to this quote, it kind of helps to get you back on track if for any reason you got off track, or you got derailed? Do you have one of those?

 

Highlights

 

Gadi’s Journey

 

Gadi shared that he likes this question because it gives him an opportunity to share with people that a lot of one's journey is luck, and maybe early smart decisions. But some of them in some cases no way to predict how one decision will lead to the next opportunity.

 

He got into tech as an accident actually, he studied accounting and economics. The tech industry at the time in the 90s was not really evolved actually even studying computer science was one of the easiest degrees to get to. And accounting economics management type degrees were really hard to get to at the time, really reverse from what is today.

 

And he got into tech because his university was on strike, because their tuition was increased. So, all the students went on an almost a semester long strike. And back in Tel Aviv, and a friend of his said, “Hey, you seem bored. Somebody's looking for a quality assurance person, a tech company.” He said, “I don't know what quality assurance is, don’t know exactly what tech is but let me give it a try.”

 

And he jumped in, he really liked it and they really liked him and his journey in technology really started because he was bored during a strike in university, he could have been an accountant by now.

 

And then from there one thing led to the other, joining a tech company was great, it later on split into two. I stayed was one of the two sides is a Co-Founder and build an ERP and accounting software that is still used today. It's called SAP Business One it was acquired by SAP back in 2002. Had a chance because of its acquisition to spend 6 years as senior executive at SAP. And really one thing led to the other in a way that eventually led him to do what he does today. So, some luck, some hard choices, some easy choices, and you can find yourself in a great career.

 

Organizations Using AI to Enhance Customer Experience

 

Me: Now you have a lot of experience working with AI. And of course, there's a growing demand for it globally. Can you share with us a little bit about how organizations are using AI to enhance customer experience? And have you seen that change more drastically, especially in the last 2 to 3 years?

 

Gadi stated that yes, they actually at very beginning of wider adoption of AI in organizations, AI has been here as an option for several years, but we're just seeing it become more mainstream because in any area, any new technology, the first generation tend to not be great.

 

If you've compared Google Maps to some of the older versions of navigation software, in almost all cases, the first generation paves the way to better products that are using more advanced technology and some of the learnings of the previous generation. So he thinks we're in the first era of wide adoption of AI because it finally works.

 

And we see AI used across multiple use cases. The first adoption of AI was actually for quality assurance and call analytics. Traditionally in contact centres, calls were this black box and you record them for quality assurance and training purposes but really no one ever listens to them because the time it takes to listen to a phone call, the time the call takes. So it's pretty hard to listen to call especially on mass.

 

So what we see is more and more companies were adopting call analytics as a way to listen quote unquote, to many calls at the same time and derive insights but also training materials back to the agents. And this is really helpful because it allows us to train agents and help them learn faster. But it actually doesn't solve the fundamental issue we see today in the customer service space, which is lack of agents.

 

So it's great that we can train agents better but over the last couple of years, we've seen a problem, it used to be pretty bad becoming almost catastrophical. Agent availability was always an issue in the contact centre space and the pandemic made it much worse. We all heard about the great resignation, where more and more people choose not to participate in this type of job, tends to be entry level, mundane and repetitive. So the available pool of agents decreased quite dramatically.

 

And an added disruption that the pandemic added was childcare, was people becoming sick themselves, people caring for maybe older parents, and agent availability dropped even further.

 

So if you talk with customers today, the question they’re asking is not how we train agents is how we hire more agents if it's even possible. And then can we train them and onboard them faster, but more importantly, can we start using AI to automate some of the most mundane and repetitive work of those agents, so we can free up these agents to do more meaningful work.

 

And the reason he’s so excited about this change is that it's a triple win to everyone. If you can take away from the agents the most menial, repetitive tasks, their work is going to be more rewarding, companies are going to be inclined to pay them more, they're more likely to stay longer in their jobs, and customers are less likely to wait hours to speak with an agent. So it's a pretty interesting intersection where AI can really create a relief for the first time in a meaningful way.

Intelligent Voice Automation Helping to Improve Business Outcomes for Companies

 

Gadi shared that this is the core of what Replicant does. And they have many, many examples of what the impact of that and he’ll give a couple of examples. As he said, they hear constantly from their customers that hiring became their biggest challenge. And they hear quotes like, “I now try hiring 9 people for every five roles because I know that in the first two months, 4 will leave.” So you have to hire more people for the same exact number of openings. People stay for a shorter period of time, it used to be a year to year and a half. Now agents will call it quits after 6, 7 months. So that's an ongoing problem.

 

And couple of interesting examples. One of them was one of their customers ECSI in a financial service area. So they deal with student loans and other payment products and their hot season is somewhere between January and tax time, which last year was May, this year, hopefully will stay April.

 

And the first four months of the year, they get the majority of their calls around student loans, tax forms, and so on. So every year the ritual was similar, you have to go and hire extra 20, 25, 30 agents to just help with the seasonal increase and this is a very hard task. Everybody high season agent knows that you have to hire people for a short period of time, they're less committed to the business, they come there to plug a hole, if you train them but then the whole thing goes away at the end of the season and you have to repeat the whole thing every time you have a predicted increase in call volume.

 

So, for ECSI, this is the first year when they don't have to hire seasonal agents to deal with the tax issues because they're able to automate a majority of their simple calls and repeatable calls around tax and tax forms, “I didn't get the form, please send it again to me.” And so on.

 

It's created a really interesting experience, for the callers, it used to be or this is the hot season, I have to wait more to speak with an agent just to get the form I probably lost in the mail. Now they get an answer within seconds and the solution was in 2, 3 minutes.

 

For the company, they don't have to go through the rigmarole of starting somewhere in October to identify, interview agents, hire them in December, train them over the holidays, and make sure they are ready to take calls in January, just to let them go in April.

 

So, the win here is both on the customer side where the calls don't have to wait on hold anymore. But also on the company side that doesn't have to go through this process which takes a lot of time, effort and energy from management, instead of focusing on continuous improving of customer service. So, that's one example where it's really helpful.

 

Another one, which he really likes is one of their customers in the roadside assistance space, they are serving large areas of Canada, Canada has a pretty hard winter this year and literally they told them they could not have answered all the emergency roadside service calls they got in some of the coldest days.

 

Because as you can imagine, a cool day and people try to start that car and they can't and they need roadside assistance and when a day like this happen, all of a sudden, instead of getting X number of calls, 100 calls, you get 300 calls and it's really hard to summon up enough agents in a day like this. Also, because the agent might be stuck at home with a dead battery.

 

So, the ability to answer any number of calls that came their way and be able to help all their customers in the coldest, hardest days was a big, big change from previous years for them, where some calls had to wait for 20, 30 minutes on hold, sometimes stuck out of the car in 5 degrees weather.

 

App, Website or Tool that Gadi Absolutely Can’t Live Without in His Business

 

When asked about an online resource that he cannot live without in his business, Gadi shared that he thinks for everyone it would be Google. He really forgets how he looks for information and either way, Google became this notepad that allows you to really get quick answers for questions. But then also got kind of deepen your research. This is one that comes to mind first, but he will say that it's so much easier to consume information today that he can't really name one tool, he thinks if he had to, it's Google.

 

But he learned a lot from Twitter because of the randomness of that. He follows an interesting selection of people that covers a lot of areas of his interest. And it helps you learn from a less structured way, in Google, you go and seek an answer to a question, in Twitter in a way, you stumble upon topics you may have not thought of often and kind of open a new way of thinking for you. So, he likes the randomness of Twitter, but also a huge fan of audiobooks and podcasts.

 

And he constantly listened to at least one audiobook and maybe a couple of podcasts that he’s excited about and it's interesting. His style of doing that, he likes to walk the dog and listen to a podcast and it helped him think freely about some other areas which may not be directly related to what he does, but can lead to interesting thoughts and solutions at work. So, just a way to provoke thinking much more than maybe learn something new. So if you look at what he's using every day is Twitter, Audible, Google and whatever his favourite podcast platform. Currently, he’s using Spotify, but it changes over time.

 

Books that Have Had the Biggest Impact on Gadi

 

When asked about books that have had the biggest impact, Gadi shared that he wants to give credit to Crossing the Chasm: Marketing and Selling High-Tech Products to Mainstream Customers by Geoffrey Moore, which was one of the first technology books he’s ever read. And he’s not sure that if the impact of this book, the book is amazing and impactful, he will explain why. But also it was one of the first books that he read so it may have been the transformation he went through was more impactful because it was just one of the first books like the first call you may have had on cell phone in the middle of the desert, it’s always more impactful than the new version of the iPhone that seems a little bit more of the same.

 

But he read the Crossing the Chasm, he worked on his first ever product that eventually is the one that was acquired by SAP and now turned to BSAP Business One. And they had this classic crossing the chasm problem. They launched this product and the first day they launch it, it literally was on DVDs, this is this was mid 90s and literally, they couldn't print enough DVDs to deal with the demand they had. And 30 days later, everybody returned the product, not everybody but 80% of the customers use the 30 days money back guarantee and return the product. And it became much, much harder to sell to mainstream customers and it took them 3 years to kind of crack the code of what a robust ERP product needed to look like until they're able to get to the mainstream and start getting wide adoption that eventually led to SAP acquiring a company and taking this product globally.

 

And he thinks the reason the book was so impactful was one, it came at exactly the right time, he was in a chasm was his company unable to move from early adopters to more mainstream buyers. The second is, it provide reusable useful tools that he use actually across his career. There's a concept of nine point checklist of product launch that he’s still using today even as Replicant, one of the first exercise they've done as a leadership team is use the nine point checklist from this book that he read in 1995 to define the target market, the focus customer, the problem they're trying to solve. So having a reusable tool in the book that you can use 25 years after you read it, is just unique. There are so many books that just talk about small specific topic and they're really no more impactful than an article. And he thinks this book having this long lasting impact on him, is very unique. Now, he has read hundreds of books after that, each one of them left a small mark but this is definitely the most impactful book he has ever read in a business sense.

 

What Gadi is Really Excited About Now!

 

Gadi shared that it's a really interesting time when it comes to people development; it's something that he cares about greatly. So, as you said at the beginning, people can start calculating his age just by his years of experience and work in different companies. And his perspective, not shifted but evolved to really believe that the most important thing we can do as business leaders is be accountable and responsible to help our own team develop and grow. When you work in technology, especially when you're young, at least his perspective was that was really cared about the product he built and technology he built and he got a lot of traction from building a product that sold a lot of customers, like he still gets a lot of traction from it. But when you look in retrospect, he doesn't miss the products and now own and run by other people, he misses the people he works with and he feels most rewarded by seeing their career.

 

The intern that worked with him at ASAP and now CEO of a company that is probably going to be lasting for generations. Or the product manager that he hired 20 years ago and now is a Senior VP in a large public company running their entire product line and she's now by the way, a consultant and helping Replicant as kind of part of the give back programme in the Silicon Valley. So, if this is the most rewarding thing for him, he wants to make sure they as a company, continue to help their team launching their careers and make their stay at Replicant maybe 5 years or 10 years or 20 years a meaningful stop in their career.

 

So a lot of what he’s focused on right now as they kick off 2022 is how do they provide this type of support to their team, being a remote company having people in Canada, in the U.S, some people in Europe. How do they create a platform that allows everybody to launch and improve their career and find Replicant to be a learning and growing experience.

 

Another area where he’s really excited about is finding ways to support people in a more personal way. Companies traditionally stayed away from anything mental health or too personal especially in the U.S culture, we supposed to kind of keep things separated, you only work here, let's not talk about your emotions. And he thinks now, and maybe the pandemic helped with that, it became more normal to talk about mental health in the workplace and the impact of the pandemic and the impact of isolation and the impact of working remotely. So, he’s excited to kind of tackle this relatively new problem and find ways to define a new SAT score between companies and its employees, about how might they support people also in their mental health journey and in their mental well being, maybe better than mental health, but their mental well being.

 

Me: All right, sounds good, very good, very forward thinking of an organization because you really have to take care of the person as a whole.

 

Where Can We Find Gadi Online

 

Twitter – @gadishamia

LinkedIn – Gadi Shamia

Website – http://www.replicant.ai

 

Quote or Saying that During Times of Adversity Gadi Uses

 

When asked about a quote or saying that he tends to revert to, Gadi shared that he doesn't have a quote, but he has a story. Early on in his life, he served in the military and he was in several situations that were really complicated, it's not necessarily a matter of life and death, as much as they were just complicated, where it looks like everything that could have gone wrong, went wrong, and then another time over and another time over and another time over. And the stress was real, and impactful and physical.

 

He used to remind myself a story a lot when he was younger, and just the fate memory of the story is very helpful by just remembering being stuck in the mud without being able to move at night far away and having series of issues happening one after the other. And then after a couple of days of intense work being able to get out of this mess. And he just reminds himself that, “Most of the issues he faced today are not at the scale.” And they're not really life and death and they could be resolved in different ways.

 

So, when he feels like he’s overwhelmed mainly, he remembers the feeling of being overwhelmed when he was 22, much less experienced with much more severe consequences of a mistake. And he just says, you know what, we can just go through it and just having this peace of mind that he will be able to navigate it because it’s not going to be as bad as that helped him a lot, especially early in his career.

 

Please connect with us on Twitter @navigatingcx and also join our Private Facebook Community – Navigating the Customer Experience and listen to our FB Lives weekly with a new guest

 

Grab the Freebie on Our Website – TOP 10 Online Business Resources for Small Business Owners

 

Links

 

The ABC’s of a Fantastic Customer Experience

 

Do you want to pivot your online customer experience and build loyalty - get a copy of “The ABC’s of a Fantastic Customer Experience.”

 

The ABC's of a Fantastic Customer Experience provides 26 easy to follow steps and techniques that helps your business to achieve success and build brand loyalty.

This Guide to Limitless, Happy and Loyal Customers will help you to strengthen your service delivery, enhance your knowledge and appreciation of the customer experience and provide tips and practical strategies that you can start implementing immediately!

This book will develop your customer service skills and sharpen your attention to detail when serving others.

Master your customer experience and develop those knock your socks off techniques that will lead to lifetime customers. Your customers will only want to work with your business and it will be your brand differentiator. It will lead to recruiters to seek you out by providing practical examples on how to deliver a winning customer service experience!

Mar 22, 2022
Stuart Leo is the founder and CEO of Waymaker.io – an intelligent business management platform that helps leaders build a better business in 30 days.

 

Stuart is a global thinker in strategy, systems and leadership development. As a founder of Waymaker.io, he has led the creation of Waymaker’s Leadership Curve - a revolutionary way of building clarity, alignment and remarkable results for any organization.

 

Questions

  • Could you take maybe one or two minutes just to kind of share with us a little bit about your journey, even though I did read a very short piece on you, it's good when we ask our guests to express in their own words, how they got to where they are today.
  • What are three keys to growth for any organization?
  • Now, strategy is very important for business. Why do you think for some businesses strategy tends to be confusing? And how can leaders become more strategic in their decision making?
  • Could you share with us what's the one online resource, tool, website or app that you absolutely can't live without in your business?
  • Could you share with us maybe one or two books that have had the biggest impact on you? It could be a book that you read or listen to many years ago or even one that you've engaged with recently.
  • Could you share with us what's the one thing that's going on in your life right now that you're really excited about? Either something you're working on to develop yourself or your people.
  • Where can listeners find you online?
  • Do you have a quote are saying that during times of adversity or challenge, you will tend to revert to this quote, it kind of helps to get you back on track if for any reason you got derailed or you got off track.

 

Highlights

 

Stuart’s Journey

 

Stuart shared that the journey is much like many other startup founders. He loves business, he loves working with people. He loves serving others in business, that's why we all do what we do. And for a very long time, he worked in corporate life and jumped out of corporate life to get out and do his own thing as you always are inspired to do.

 

And then for about 10 years he ran a consulting company, working in strategy and brand and sales tech and mar tech. And obviously, customer experience was a huge component of that. And then, along the way, they started seeing and observing problems that their clients would have, that they realized could be best solved with some software, as opposed to just some advisory services.

 

And so, they ended up pivoting which is always a fun journey, and developing a platform they call Waymaker.io, which at the end of the day is there to help you build a better business, and they help people get unstuck in their business, they help people find breakthrough and they help leaders put the leadership and management operating systems in place so that they can step back from their business and enjoy all the things that their business should provide them in terms of lifestyle and freedom.

 

So, a very traditional way of doing a startup, the more he listened to other startup founders, everybody comes from another business, you see a problem and you jump in, and you want to get in there and solve it. And that's really his journey.

 

Three Keys for the Growth of any Organization

 

When asked what are the three keys to growth to any organization, Stuart shared that number one, you must, must be clear on the problem you're solving and if you're not, then you would have lost focus. So number one, what is the problem we're solving, and that is the ultimate underlying purpose of the organization.

 

There is no other purpose outside that organization but to solve the problem, you exist to solve for your customer. It's very easy for organizations to get lost when they lose focus on their purpose and their purpose is their problem, we exist to solve X problem for a customer. And that's number one.

 

Number two, you must build people by building skills. Fundamentally there are two things you must build in every organization. The first is skills and the second is systems.

 

So number three, the third key to growth is the implementation, development of systems. There's a bit of a myth sometimes out there in business world that he thinks exists and that is that you must systemize everything. And he thinks that's actually a fallacy, you're only telling half the story.

 

You must build people who can be supported with systems and as we build people through skills and leadership development, and then support them with great systems and process then they can do amazing things.

 

So three keys to growth, number one, must, must, must be really clear on the problem solving, never navigate away from that. Number two, build people. Number three; build the systems to support those people.

 

Me: Do you think one is more important than the other, people versus systems?

 

Stuart shared that he always thinks people are more important than systems when it comes down to an organization and he thinks that's a philosophical answer versus a practical answer.

 

We should value a system for the return it makes on a business and we should value a human because they're human. And he thinks often we get that bit round the other way and systems become more important than humans. And so, that's when he thinks humans feel like they're cogs in a machine, whether they be a customer or an employee.

 

And he thinks that's that the underlying secret. He’s a big believer that that skills, which is ultimately building people far more important than the systems. Because the systems won't work if you don't have people with the skills. He always say this, there's no point putting in amazing systems, they're like Ferraris in your organization and sticking learner drivers in them, all they’re going to do is crash on the first corner.

 

Leaders Becoming More Strategic in Their Decision Making

 

Me: Now, strategy is very important for a business. Why do you think for some businesses strategy tends to be confusing? And how can leaders become more strategic in their decision making?

 

Stuart stated that that is such a good question. He actually wants to step back and really challenge this idea of strategy. And he’s a big fan of big thinkers and one of the biggest thinkers in the world in this space is Michael Porter from Harvard, who wrote the book on it.

 

And he loves his statement that everybody in the world thinks that strategy is a set of actions. In fact, if you Google the word strategy, Google's going to tell you, it's a set of actions. And that's in a business context, that's actually wrong, that's not what strategy is.

 

And strategy is a position that we hold in the marketplace. And it's psychological first, and practical second, and he thinks that's the big mistake we all get wrong in business.

 

If we get the strategy right, i.e., the position we hold in the market, this is why the customer aspires to buy from us, and to experience our product. If we get that right, then the practical actions fall into gear.

 

So, strategy is first and foremost, a psychological moment, it's a position in the mind of the customer, in the mind of the marketplace that we pursue or hold and defend.

 

And then it's a set of actions to either build it, hold it, defend it, or grow it. And that's what strategy is, strategy isn't an action plan and we've got to get that thinking out of our heads in the business world, and go, our strategy is to be this kind of business, for this kind of customer, for these reasons, that’s strategy.

 

And when that's really clear in an organization, you can be strategic at every level of the organization; a frontline customer service person can go, yeah, I get it. I know that this is who I'm meant to be, because this is what the customer expects of us, the brand. Boom, great. They're now strategic. Does that make sense?

 

Me: It does definitely. So there's a book as you were talking about strategic thinkers, because there's a book, it talks about what kind of thinker you are. I'm trying to remember, the book is actually called What kind of thinker Are you? Have you ever heard of that book before?

 

Stuart stated that he’s going to plead ignorance. He’s not exactly sure but give him some more information.

 

Me: In the book it talks about like strategic thinkers, bottom line thinkers, possibility thinkers, it's a really, really popular book, but he has a workbook for that book that you would do with leaders to kind of figure out their thinking style. I use it a lot sometimes, especially when I'm training leaders because I find some people think that everybody thinks the same way. And I think in an organization, we all can’t be thinking strategically, right?

 

Stuart shared that if we put it in that context, of course, yes.

 

Me: So I just wanted to know what your thoughts were on the different thinking styles. I can't remember the name of the book, it’s going to come to me before I finish this conversation with you but it popped in my head just now when you said it. The book is by John Maxwell How Successful People Think.

 

Stuart shared that he loves John Maxwell. He has inspired him in so many occasions, wonderful guy. To answer your question, can everybody be a strategic thinker?

 

Well, it comes down to the context of the roles and responsibilities. But everybody thinks differently and that's a good thing. If we're not thinking well together, then we're not working well together.

 

And in fact, if he’s remembering rightly, one of the great things that John Maxwell says about thinking is that when we think we connect facts and feelings, and we pursue the truth out of that process. And he actually love that statement coming from John Maxwell. And he thinks if we just dwell on that for a moment, we can't do that as teams, if we don't have a diversity of thinking styles and that's just really obvious, if we're all thinking in the same way, the same thoughts, from the same context, and not critically challenging each other around what is the objective truth in the situation, then, groupthink will set in and groupthink is cancerous to any strategic thinking. And we've got to get that out of our organizations.

 

And so, he thinks, absolutely, they want that constructive thinking. It reminds him actually of an old CEO he had when he was in corporate life, which he’s talked about on podcasts before.

 

As a very young guy growing up in business in the corporate world, a big urban renewal, an urban development company and the kind of work they did was very complex, redeveloping town centres or master plan communities and neighborhoods. And so, around the table, you had engineers and planners and finance people and social community development people and marketers and sales people and lots of different types of thinkers. Engineers are very analytical, logical, rational, marketers, crazy, conceptual, off the wall, community people are touchy feely, social kind of minded, there's a catalyst of different types of thinkings in that room, and you've got to come together, and you've got to agree on a plan, what's this neighborhood going to look like? What's the urban design, what's the layout? What’s the look and the feel?

 

And he remembers he embedded into that organization, this wonderful principle of working together, which he called “Arguing gracefully.” He’s carried it with him for 20 years ever since. And the big idea he was really trying to get into the culture of the business was that when you get into that boardroom and you're a bunch of people sitting around a table, you want to fight for the best outcome, you want to create a place that's worth living in, something that's special.

 

And to do that, you've really got to let the sparks fly, nothing great happens without a little bit of friction. And you can either walk out of that boardroom hating each other, which is not conducive to great teamwork. Or you could walk out of that boardroom after a really challenging workshop, still friends and colleagues.

 

And so, he instilled this wonderful principle of culture of arguing gracefully, which meant, go for it, when it comes to the debate, die in a ditch and go for a challenge, bring new ideas to the table, argue your point, debate. But do it with a measure of grace so that you argue the point, not the person, and so that when you walk out of that room, you're still a team, and that team can execute.

 

And that's always stuck with him. And he thinks that really hits on your point. People with different thinking styles, can they think strategically? Absolutely. Because when we think strategically together, it requires those different thinking styles to come together and argue what matters most, to come up with the best plan, walk out of the room and still be a team and be better for the argument. And he thinks that's a skill lost, not just in business but in society, that's a very precious skill to hold on to in building teams in today's world.

 

App, Website or Tool that Stuart Absolutely Can’t Live Without in His Business

 

When asked about an online resource that he cannot live without in his business, Stuart shared that he would be wrong if I didn't mention Waymaker.io right now. It is a daily tool in their business because it not only helps them think strategically, but execute on a daily basis towards the goals that they're going to hit. But hey, enough of the shameless plug.

 

The other number one software tool that he can't live without, gosh, man, there's so many. He doesn't know if it's a device. He couldn't live without his iPhone and iPad, that kind of runs his world. But on top of that, he thinks the number one thing he just could not live without, he’s going to be really, really boring now. And he’s going to say Apple Notes because that is where everything goes. And it's the most simple, practical note taking tool you're expecting, that is where everything goes, and everything lives. And it's so practical and helpful.

 

Me: I use Apple notes a lot too. And it has really come out far away over the years. You can literally dump anything into it and then because the Apple ecosystem is also integrated and connected, it doesn't matter which device you're on, you can pull up the note wherever you are and kind of just continue that conversation.

 

Stuart shared that he used to be a prolific user of Evernote, and because he didn't think Apple notes was that great when it first came out. And so, for about six or seven years, everything went into Evernote. And it just got bloated; it just got too big and too complex. And he loves the simplicity. So, it's one of those classic things, he and his wife, they run their renovation at their home through it, they captured notes in his work account. With some activities if they go camping, they're going to put up a camping list and organize, they will share stuff with friends and families and colleagues. Beautiful, simple and powerful.

 

Books that Have Had the Biggest Impact on Stuart

 

When asked about books that have had the biggest impact, Stuart shared he will give two. He was given a book by a really good friend of his when he first went into business by a guy called Guy Kawasaki called The Art of the Start: The Time-Tested, Battle-Hardened Guide for Anyone Starting Anything. And he just loved that book. He loved it because it was at a time in his life when he was starting something and you've got to start it, you got to pitch it, you got to grow it. And so, that book, he thinks was just one of the best books of the last 10 or 15 years for anybody starting something, it's a great inspirational book, gives you some really good practical tools. And Guy Kawasaki is just one of those really simple but very insightful business leaders. Have you have you read that?

 

Me: I haven't heard of it. But I know Guy Kawasaki. But that's definitely one I’ll be putting on my list to check out.

 

Stuart stated that it's an oldie but a goodie. More recently, his favourites has been Extreme Ownership: How U.S. Navy SEALs Lead and Win by Jocko Willink, which is the story on how U.S. Navy SEALs work together with discipline and achieve amazing results or whatever the subline is, but Extreme Ownership is the idea of owning your team, owning your outcomes, being accountable and responsible and leading others effectively through this discipline of extreme ownership. He has given that to almost every person in his world, he thinks it's a great book.

 

What Stuart is Really Excited About Now!

 

Stuart shared that they're a classic startup, so they're in a startup journey. What's the one thing going on that he’s super excited about first them and their people; it's the foundational steps they’re taking as a business as they put in place the things that he knows are going to be here for years to come.

 

They spent about 12 to 18 months working on their product and business, doing some testing and pilot work and MVPs. And they really only launched their product six to nine months ago, they're very young. And so now they're securing their first customers around the world and working with them and seeing the company come alive.

 

And so, the most exciting thing that's happening for them right now is learning how to deliver excellence to their customers. They don't always do it perfectly and when they don't, they want to learn and they want to know we want to get it right. And secondly, how do they develop that employee experience well, and how do they build team well. So those two things are the two really exciting things going on in their world right now, growing customers and growing team members.

 

Where Can We Find Stuart Online

 

LinkedIn – Stuart Leo

 

Quote or Saying that During Times of Adversity Stuart Uses

 

When asked about a quote or saying that he tends to revert to, Stuart shared that might give two. One in business is the realization or the saying is that, “The business you start is never the business you run.” And he thinks that's a really healthy thing to remember because businesses grow and mature and adapt and tweak and sometimes we have an idea of the business we're building and we get frustrated sometimes because it's not what we wanted originally. But it's not what we want in a business; it's what our customers need. And so, more often than not, the business we start is never the business we run and that's a really healthy thing to remember if we're feeling frustrated, or have some kind of dissonance or friction going on in the business. And we've always got to come back to:

 

  • What's the problem we're solving?
  • Are we solving effectively?
  • Are our customers getting value from the way we're solving it?
  • What do we have to think about changing in ourselves and in our business to make that more effective?

 

And that's a really healthy thing to come back to.

 

The other is one he and his wife always say to each other which is, Life is an adventure. And life is an adventure and it's just that recognition that in an adventure, you have a lot of fun, you have a lot of challenges, you get a bit muddy, you get a bit wet, sometimes you fall down the hillside, you get to have great campfires, and look at the starry nights.

 

And life is an adventure it. It has some surprises around the corner. And when you kind of just step back a little bit, not try and control the world, but kind of fall in line with God's good design and order, you realize that life is a wonderful adventure and it's there to be enjoyed. And we're tatting but life is an adventure and it's a wonderful thing to be a part of.

 

Please connect with us on Twitter @navigatingcx and also join our Private Facebook Community – Navigating the Customer Experience and listen to our FB Lives weekly with a new guest

 

Grab the Freebie on Our Website – TOP 10 Online Business Resources for Small Business Owners

 

Links

 

The ABC’s of a Fantastic Customer Experience

 

Do you want to pivot your online customer experience and build loyalty - get a copy of “The ABC’s of a Fantastic Customer Experience.”

 

The ABC's of a Fantastic Customer Experience provides 26 easy to follow steps and techniques that helps your business to achieve success and build brand loyalty.

This Guide to Limitless, Happy and Loyal Customers will help you to strengthen your service delivery, enhance your knowledge and appreciation of the customer experience and provide tips and practical strategies that you can start implementing immediately!

This book will develop your customer service skills and sharpen your attention to detail when serving others.

Master your customer experience and develop those knock your socks off techniques that will lead to lifetime customers. Your customers will only want to work with your business and it will be your brand differentiator. It will lead to recruiters to seek you out by providing practical examples on how to deliver a winning customer service experience!

Mar 15, 2022

Jose Herrera is the CEO and co-founder of a Horatio, a Customer Experience company for today's fast-growing brands. Jose sets the strategic vision of Horatio and leads all growth, sales, and marketing efforts for the company.

 

Prior to founding Horatio, Jose was the Vice President at Morgan Stanley, overseeing the Latin American Investment Management institutional sales group. Originally hailing from the Dominican Republic, Jose and his two co-founders, Alex Ross, and Jared Karson, were inspired to create a company that provides tech-enabled customer support for North America's biggest brands while also creating opportunities locally on Jose's native island.

 

In 2021, Jose was named by Forbes Magazine on the Next 1000 list of today's entrepreneurs, redefining the American dream.

 

Questions

  • Can you share with us in your own words, a little bit about your journey and how you got to where you are today. So, could you share that with us?
  • Could you share with us a little bit about Horatio? And what Horatio does? What are some of the brands that you support? And is it industry specific? Or do you cut across all different industries?
  • What are customers’ expectations now in terms of a company or a brand’s response time?
  • What are maybe two or three other key performance indicators that you think are critical for a company to truly attract customers that will remain loyal to them?
  • In your opinion, do you think if your satisfaction score is high that that guarantees the customer will remain loyal to you?
  • Now, could you share with us Jose, what's the one online resource, tool, website or app that you absolutely can't live without you in your business?
  • Could you also share with our listeners maybe one or two books that have had the biggest impact on you? It could be a book that you read recently, or maybe one that you read a very long time ago, but it still has a very big impact on you.
  • Could you also share with us maybe one or two emerging trends that you see in customer experience for 2022 and beyond? Anything that you think is coming up that you think brands need to definitely pay attention to?
  • Could you also share with us what's one thing that's going on in your life right now that you're really excited about? It could be something you're working on to develop yourself or your people.
  • Where can listeners find you online?
  • Do you have a quote or a saying that during times of adversity or challenge, you will tend to revert to this quote? It kind of helps to get you back on track or get you back refocused.

Highlights

 

Jose’s Journey

 

Jose shared that he grew up in the Dominican Republic, and he pursued his undergraduate career in the United States. And after he graduated from college, he spent almost 10 years in the financial services industry. And he then pursued my MBA at Columbia Business School, which is where he met his co-founders, Alex and Jared. And after they graduated from Columbia Business School, they started Horatio as a way for them to, number one, generate meaningful job opportunities and improve the working conditions of the Dominican Republic, which is where he grew up, and also redefine what it means to provide an amazing customer experience working with some of the fastest growing e-commerce companies in the world.

 

What is Horatio and the Brands That Horatio Supports?

 

Jose shared that Horatio mainly provides omnichannel customer support across chat, email, SMS and social platforms. And they integrate the latest technologies to provide that service on behalf of their customers. They provide dedicated teams that are proud to represent your brand values and voice, they don't share resources between brands and clients and their main expertise is working with ecommerce companies across all industries within ecommerce. They also work with financial technology companies and cryptocurrency companies, as well as health tech. So, he would say their main expertise is providing exceptional omnichannel customer support for all these different industries.

 

Customers’ Expectations in Terms of a Company or a Brand's Response Time

 

Me: Amazing. Now one of the things that your website says is that you help your customers to improve response time. And one of the statements on your website is “Our average first response time is two hours.” Can you share with us how customers’ expectations have changed I would say over the last maybe two to three years, especially since the pandemic? What are customers’ expectations now in terms of a company or a brand’s response time?

 

Jose shared that he thinks that the pandemic definitely accelerated customers’ expectations and their needs, primarily through social media and live chat. That is the simplest way to answer customer inquiries and questions. And it's very important for you to understand the value that comes with being able to provide fast responses to your customers, because there's a direct correlation between how quickly you get back to your customers, and your customer satisfaction. And we all know that providing an amazing customer experience generates long term value for the enterprise and for your company at the end of the day.

 

So, the way that they do this is building out a framework that can allow them to quickly understand what the brand value and their proposition is for their customers. And then dive deeper into how can they seamlessly answer any potential customer inquiry across any platform and the way that they do that is, number one, learn the brand inside out and integrate the latest technology that can make their team more efficient.

 

So, a lot of people think that artificial intelligence is going to replace humans, in their experience, artificial intelligence actually helps their team be much more efficient and they integrate different tools to automate those easy questions that can be answered by AI and then allow their team to focus on those more complex issues that actually require their expertise and their knowledge to go above and beyond and provide an amazing customer experience.

 

So, they use a lot of software. Obviously, Gorgias is one of their biggest partners. And they love using that tool to automate a lot of things and to also derive a lot of interesting data and analytics that can make their team even more efficient as time goes by. And then also incorporating some other interesting technological tools that can allow them to overall provide an exceptional experience without compromising those response times that you outlined.

 

Key Performance Indicators That are Critical for a Company to Attract Customers That Will Remain Loyal

 

Me: So, response time is critical to the customer's experience. What are maybe two or three other key performance indicators, especially seeing that that's something that your company consistently tries to deliver through on the brands that you represent that you think are critical for a company to truly attract customers that will remain loyal to them?

 

Jose shared he thinks surprising and delighting your customers throughout the customer experience journey is critical to create loyalty, and to also build referrals.

 

Nowadays, marketing expenses for, particularly for ecommerce companies is extremely high and he thinks that by delighting and surprising your customers, whether it's sending an additional product for them to try or providing them an extra coupon or discount for their families or relative to also try a product, like those are things that made the customers very happy and loyal to the brand.

 

And obviously, over communicating goes a long ways. So, he thinks that a lot of customers nowadays, they love when the company provides tracking information and feedback as to where is the order, right, because after a while, if you don't receive your product, you grow frustrated and when you contact the brand, you're already a little bit annoyed with the experience. So, over communicating and being proactive instead of reactive is the way that they like to think about things and ensure that the organization that they work with always have the customer experience journey top of mind, across all the divisions within the company. Because in their experience, customer experience is not only the responsibility of the customer experience department, it’s the responsibility of everyone across the company.

 

Me: Amazing. So, there are two things you said a while ago that truly resonate with me one was over communicating, because I tend to say quite a bit. I think a lot of brands forget that or they think that customers know exactly what's going to happen. A lot of times we don't know what's happening on the back end in your organization and it's critical for you to not just communicate something one time, but for you to communicate it more than one time so that the repetition is there, at some point we should be able to get the message or the information that you're trying to get across. So, I thought that was brilliant that you said over communicate, because I think it's so important for you to over communicate, well it’s way better than under communicating for sure.

 

Jose said definitely. And he actually had an example of this, that happened to him yesterday. He purchased a product a couple of weeks ago and they were very good about over communicating, and telling him that the package was on its way, that the package was set to be delivered on a particular day.

But then all of a sudden, the package was not delivered and no one communicated that to him and he was expecting to receive that package.

So, when he got to the mailing room, he saw that the package is not there, he had to go into the system and he noticed that it was incorrectly delivered to someone else and the brand didn't catch that.

 

And so, his experience already is impacted by this negative situation that he had. And then he reached out to the company and he gets an automated response back from the brown saying, “We have a huge backlog. We're sorry, we'll get back to you within 72 hours.”

So, that already ruined his perception of that brand and he will probably not buy from them again because now he has to wait 72 hours to get a response. So, he thinks it's very important that you have the right data set to make those decisions and to be able to proactively reach out to your customers and understand what's happening and how can things break throughout the entire process of shipping an order right.

 

So, he thinks a lot of companies haven't put a lot of focus and understanding that data comes from customer experience. He thinks they've placed a lot more emphasis on other areas of the business. But really understanding the data that you can derive from your customer experience team and figuring out how you can continue to make improvements so that you improve that first response time, that you increase that average response time and that your overall satisfaction score continues to increase is critical for the long-term stability and growth of any enterprise or any brand.

 

Does a High Customer Satisfaction Score Guarantee Loyal Customers?

 

Me: As it relates to customer satisfaction, there's an author that I follow for many years, his name is Jeffrey Gitomer. And he wrote a book, but one of the things he said in the book was customer satisfaction does not guarantee loyalty. You do a lot of customer satisfaction scores for organizations, and I'm sure there are certain key indicators that will determine whether or not a company has a high CSAT score as you mentioned, communicating, response time, fulfilling promises, and many other I'm sure indicators that will help to give you a really good CSAT score. But in your opinion, do you think if your satisfaction score is high that that guarantees the customer will remain loyal to you?

 

Jose said yes, in their experience and with the brands that they've worked with, they have noticed that having an increased customer satisfaction score does lead to repeat purchases and overall loyalty and obviously, that also results in client referrals. So, he thinks that it's very important to understand how to actually use the CSAT metric, because obviously depends on the type of customer.

And you have to really understand like when you should actually rely on CSAT and when you should not use it. And so, in their experience, it's very important and it leads to at least a from what they've seen, having an amazing CSAT score does result in at least a 30% increase in in customer loyalty and engagement with the brands that they've worked with and that's what they've seen in terms of like conversion.

 

So, he thinks it all depends on a lot of different factors. But overall, they've seen that it does lead to an increase in loyalty and additional revenue generating opportunities for the brands. So, it does depend on how you measure it and what industry you're in, of course, if your product is not unique and that's definitely a different metric. But he thinks that if you have an interesting value proposition and your product is unique, and you provide amazing experience, then it should lead to an increasing in customer lifetime value.

 

App, Website or Tool that Jose Absolutely Can’t Live Without in His Business

 

When asked about online resource that he cannot live without in his business, Jose shared that he is a big user of LinkedIn. LinkedIn is one of the biggest tools that he uses to network and stay in touch with his network. That is one tool that he checks and uses every day to communicate with prospects and potential partners. And he also is a part of an organization called Entrepreneurial Organization or EO, which has been an invaluable network for him to bounce off ideas outside of a business setting and that has allowed him to think strategically about things that he normally wouldn't think about when running this business.

 

Books that Have Had the Biggest Impact on Jose

 

When asked about books that have had the biggest impact, Jose shared that his favorite business book is Good to Great: Why Some Companies Make the Leap and Others Don’t by Jim Collins. He thinks it's very cliche, but he thinks that the overall conclusion of that book is find self-motivating people that can lead on your behalf so that you don't have to micromanage. And he thinks that that is something that they have top of mind at Horatio, is to find people that are really driven to succeed, and they can count on to lead and continue to carry their culture. So, that's typically how they think about when running this business is being surrounded by amazing individuals and letting them grow and lead their teams.

 

Emerging Customer Experience Trends for 2022 and Beyond That Brands Need to Pay Attention to

 

Jose shared that he thinks one of the biggest trends that we've noticed over the past couple of months is, there's been a growth in terms of personalization of your support interactions. He thinks that over the past couple of years, we've relied a lot on canned responses and macros. And we've also relied on chatbot automation and a lot of templates and that has cost the brands a lot of money because customers can read through the lines and understand that you're not really taking the time to answer their questions and you're not really personalizing your interaction to accommodate their needs.

 

So, they've been starting to see a trend where, the majority of their clients wants them to go a little bit deeper when interacting with their consumers and eliminating scripts and using them as a support tool, but overall, trying to be a little bit personable and human when providing communication to their customers. And so, that is one of the trends that they've seen over the past couple of months, that's working a lot. And he thinks that the other trend that they have seen in terms of customer experience, is also understanding how to leverage the latest technological tools that are out there to make your customer experience team more efficient.

 

So, it's not about replacing the customer experience team, it’s about helping them leverage all these technological tools and platforms to make the right decisions for the business and the right decisions for the customers. So, they've seen a lot of interesting technological integrations happening over the past couple of months that have helped them make the different teams that they manage on behalf of their brands are a little bit more efficient.

 

Me: So, personalization and an integrational of technological services to enhance better decision making where customer experience is concerned.

 

What Jose is Really Excited About Now?

 

When asked about something that he’s excited about, Jose shared that they launched the company in late 2018, early 2019, so they've grown a lot over the past couple of years from a small team of 20 in 2019, to almost 800 in 2022. Something that is really exciting is developing leaders within the company and making sure that they have the right support to grow within the organization. So, they’ve spent a lot of time on making sure that their culture remains intact despite the growth that they've experienced. And so, they've implemented a lot of different interesting initiatives in place at the company to make sure that their leadership team understands how valuable they are to them as an organization and the importance that they have to carry the culture of their team overall within the company.

 

So, that is something that he’s really excited about is to continue to develop the future leaders of Horatio and ensuring that they're all achieving their goals and their career pathways is moving forward in the right direction as the company continues to grow.

 

Where Can We Find Jose Online?

 

Website – https://hirehoratio.com

Twitter - @hire_horatio

Instagram - @hirehoratio

Facebook - @hirehoratio

LinkedIn – Hire Horatio CX

 

And something that he gets a lot of people ask him like why Horatio and Horatio was Hamlet's only trusted friend in Shakespeare, so they wanted to convey that message of trust and using a partner that you can really trust and rely on as you think about outsourcing your customer experience support.

 

Me: Ah, I thought of it originally when your portfolio was presented to me to have you as a guest and I said to myself, I wonder why the name Horatio so I'm so happy that you decided to share that with us in the interview.

 

Quote or Saying that During Times of Adversity Jose Uses

 

When asked about a quote or saying that he tends to revert to, Jose shared, “Keep calm and carry on.”

 

Me: Short and sweet. “Keep calm and carry on.” And could you share with us how that helps you to get back on track.

 

Jose stated that it just makes sure that he doesn't lose sight of the big picture and stay positive in the midst of adversity and turmoil. It grounds him to understand the position he has at the company, to continue motivating the leaders within the company and keep pushing towards the end goal that they have at Horatio, which is to, number one, provide an amazing employee experience to their team members on the ground, which in turn provides amazing customer experience for their customers and they continue to deliver in that high quality that everyone expects from them.

 

Me: Awesome. Keep calm and carry on. Well, thank you so much, Jose for taking time out of your very busy schedule for hopping on his podcast today and basically sharing with us emerging trends that are coming up in customer experience, what are some of the key performance indicators for you to ensure that you can retain and sustain a high customer satisfaction score, and even looking at response time, some of the things that are critical to ensure that your customers’ expectations are exceeded and you do consistently deliver on that experience that your customers become loyal and they’ll walk and spread good news about your business. So we really appreciate all the wonderful information that you shared with us today.

 

Please connect with us on Twitter @navigatingcx and also join our Private Facebook Community – Navigating the Customer Experience and listen to our FB Lives weekly with a new guest

 

Grab the Freebie on Our Website – TOP 10 Online Business Resources for Small Business Owners

 

Links

 

The ABC’s of a Fantastic Customer Experience

 

Do you want to pivot your online customer experience and build loyalty - get a copy of “The ABC’s of a Fantastic Customer Experience.”

 

The ABC's of a Fantastic Customer Experience provides 26 easy to follow steps and techniques that helps your business to achieve success and build brand loyalty.

This Guide to Limitless, Happy and Loyal Customers will help you to strengthen your service delivery, enhance your knowledge and appreciation of the customer experience and provide tips and practical strategies that you can start implementing immediately!

This book will develop your customer service skills and sharpen your attention to detail when serving others.

Master your customer experience and develop those knock your socks off techniques that will lead to lifetime customers. Your customers will only want to work with your business and it will be your brand differentiator. It will lead to recruiters to seek you out by providing practical examples on how to deliver a winning customer service experience!

Mar 8, 2022
Welcome to navigating the customer experience, Happy International Women's Day 2022.   We have been podcasting for almost 6 years, and we are already 158 episodes in, like, Wow. Thank you so much to every one of our listeners that has ever taken the time to listen to our podcast. And we really hope that you are able to get some value out of our conversations.

 

Today, I want to spend a little time and talk about a few customer experience trends for 2022. Let's first begin by defining what our customer experience is. The term customer experience describes a customer's overall impression of your business throughout the course of their customer journey. From first discovering your brand to using a purchased product or service.

 

There are many strategies a business needs to invest in to create fantastic customer experiences. These of course may include offering stellar customer service, driving proactive customer engagement and building positive customer relations, solving your customers problems and issues and communicating with them often. All of these things can potentially be brand differentiators for customers in their own right.

 

Now, some big ticket item trends that we have seen emerging and developing further in 2022 and beyond include:

 

  • Social Media as a Primary Service Channel - Social media platforms like Facebook, Instagram and LinkedIn have become vital elements of the customer journey. A 2019 survey revealed that 85% of contact centre leaders say that social media is a simplest way to support customers. Customers are increasingly discovering brands, browsing products and making buying decisions on social media. As a result, they expect to be able to ask questions and get help on the same channels. However, in 2021, only 14% of consumers strongly agreed that companies are effectively combining newer channels such as social, digital and mobile and traditional ones like email, telephone, paper mail to provide a positive customer experience. Many companies may be struggling to bring the same standard of service to yet another channel. But as I've mentioned before, social media represents one of the most effective channels to provide your customers with timely and easily accessible support. In 2022, it's definitely worth prioritizing your social media as part of your omnichannel service strategy.

 

  • Abundant Self-Service Options for Customers - Many customers do their own research, conduct their own analysis, and many times may even proceed to purchase even without speaking directly with a representative from a company…. you may ask WHY? People enjoy serving themselves, and this allows them to be in control of their experiences and control the pace. A Harvard Business Review found that a whopping 88% of U.S customers expect organizations to offer a self-service support portal. Things like this may include an FAQ page (frequently asked questions), chatbots or even a comprehensive knowledge base. In addition to meeting these customer expectations, providing robust self-service tools reduces the burden on your customer support team. With the right resources, customers are empowered to successfully solve their enquiries, often in less time than a representative can. And of course, this will free up your customer service team to focus on more complex and hands on items or issues with customers.

 

  • Increased Communication - According to Salesforce, 84% of customers say the experience a company provides is as important as its products and services. And two- thirds of customers say they're willing to pay more for a better customer experience. One way to deliver on this expectation is to use customer service automation. Automated customer service tools powered by machine learning and artificial intelligence are excellent for improving the speed and effectiveness of your customer service team. Autoresponder emails, for example, allow you to offer a better first response time to customer queries and assume and assure them you're working on their issue. Chatbots are another example of automation that leverages artificial intelligence to walk your customers through solving common issues without the help of live customer service representative. Chatbots can provide blog links, drop-in prewritten answers to frequently asked questions or even connect your customers with a representative if necessary. In addition to assisting customers in a hands free manner, automated tools can be used to help your customer service team collect and analyze customer data, segment and prioritize tickets based on your criteria, and of course, effortlessly assign representative to tickets. If we do all these things combined, then we're going to be able to increase the frequency and the level of communication that we give to our customers.

 

  • Shorter Response Times and 24/7 Access for Customer Support - Customers are looking for lightning-fast response times now more than ever. Although survey results have varied, they all point to our need to respond quickly and effectively. Here are a few statistics that demonstrate this: 90% of U.S customers rate an immediate customer service response as “important” or “very important.” 60% of people who needed support defined “immediate” as 10 minutes or less. 71% of customers expect companies to communicate with them in real-time. And 31.2% of customers want a response to their email in one hour or less. I continuously tell my clients and even my participants in training sessions that the global standard for email correspondence used to be 24 hours, it has now been reduced to one hour or less. Customer service software has made it possible for more and more companies to offer 24/7 real-time support across a variety of channels. And as these real-time interactions become more common, more customers have developed an expectation for them. Once again, automation can go a long way toward helping your company reduce its response times and provide all our support without the need to hire more customer service representatives. From live chat tools to automated emails to chatbots, there are many tools available today that can help your company meet these rising expectations. In my own personal life, approximately a month ago, an object still unknown to me, fell on my windscreen and cracked it - a very frightening experience for me, however, after calling my insurance company GK Insurance in Jamaica, the agent was extremely responsive, she felt my pain, discomfort and the grave inconvenience this was for me and she was able to issue me an authorization letter within two hours of the incident occurring and I was able to have my windscreen replaced within 24 hours. The only reason the replacement was not completed on the same day was simply because the Windscreen Replacement provider had a cut-off time of 2:30 pm and so on by 8:00 am the following day, my car was there and by midday my windscreen was replaced. What started out to be a horrible experience turned out to be very manageable after dealing with a representative and seeing the level of urgency, and how quickly she was able to turn around an authorization letter. I will forever remember this experience.

 

We have merely touched on the critical areas that I believe if implemented consistently, will propel your company or brand and set you apart from your competition. Focusing with a clear intention to master Social Media as a Primary Service Channel, Increase Access to Abundance of Self-Service Options, Increase Communication and Reduce Response Times and Create a 24/7 Access for Customer Support are guaranteed to help your business offer a fantastic customer experience and create loyal customers for life.

 

Disney is absolutely one of the most magical places on planet earth and in his very own words, Walt Disney said, “Do what you do so well that they will want to see it again and bring their friends.”

 

Follow us on Twitter @navigatingcx or join our private FB group Navigating the Customer Experience Community. Until next time, I’m your host Yanique Grant.

 

Link -  https://www.toistersolutions.com/blog/how-quickly-should-you-respond-to-email

 

The ABC’s of a Fantastic Customer Experience

 

Do you want to pivot your online customer experience and build loyalty - get a copy of “The ABC’s of a Fantastic Customer Experience.”

 

The ABC's of a Fantastic Customer Experience provides 26 easy to follow steps and techniques that helps your business to achieve success and build brand loyalty.

This Guide to Limitless, Happy and Loyal Customers will help you to strengthen your service delivery, enhance your knowledge and appreciation of the customer experience and provide tips and practical strategies that you can start implementing immediately!

This book will develop your customer service skills and sharpen your attention to detail when serving others.

Master your customer experience and develop those knock your socks off techniques that will lead to lifetime customers. Your customers will only want to work with your business and it will be your brand differentiator. It will lead to recruiters to seek you out by providing practical examples on how to deliver a winning customer service experience!

Mar 1, 2022

Adele Spraggon is an award winning author, a thought leader and an international speaker and trainer. She has been awarded 2020, Woman of Inspiration Award and in 2021, she was recognized as a Top Behavioural Expert of the Year. Her book Shift: 4 Steps to Personal Empowerment has won three awards and is sweeping the globe, transforming how people are setting and achieving their goals. After decades of feeling stuck in patterns of procrastination, avoidance and quitting, all of which had her living her life below her fullest potential.

 

Adele set out on a journey of discovery and learning.

Her inquiry?

Why the personal and professional methodologies she was following did not work for her. The result is a creation of her proprietary 4 Step Repatterning Technique, which she delivers through a member portal called the Pattern Maker Hub. Today, she supports thousands globally to achieve extraordinary levels of happiness, peace of mind, prosperity, goal-achievement, and life fulfilment.

 

Questions

  • Could you share a little bit about your journey?
  • Could you share with us how your brain is making decisions on your behalf and how to change your underlying decision-making patterns so that you can achieve any goal that you set for yourself.
  • How do you change your brain to kind of just reallocate how it is that you approach that activity?
  • What do you think is the root cause for stress, anxiety and overwhelm? And if you're looking at your situations, and you're looking in the wrong place, could the solution be found in our brain patterns? And how do we tap into that?
  • Could you share with us what is the one online resource, tool, website or app that you absolutely cannot live without in your business?
  • What are maybe one or two books that you could recommend? It could be a book that you read recently, or even one that you've read a very long time ago, but it's definitely still had a very big impact on you.
  • Now, we have a lot of listeners who are business owners and managers who feel they have great products and services, but they lack the constantly motivated human capital. And if the people aren't motivated, of course, you know the quality of service is going to be diminished. If you were sitting across the table from that person, what's the one piece of advice that you would give them to have a successful business?
  • Can you also share with us what's the one thing that's going on in your life right now that you are really excited about, it could be something that you're working on to develop yourself or your people.
  • Where can listeners find you online?
  • Do you have a quote or a saying that during times of adversity or challenge, you will tend to revert to this quote, it kind of helps to maybe get you back on track or get you refocused if for any reason you got derailed.

 

Highlights

 

Adele’s Journey

 

Adele shared that her background is Personal Development. She has been in that field for over 35 years now. But an interesting thing was happening in the first 15 or so years of those. She was a lead coach at one of the leading top personal development industry corporations. And at the same time, she was really, really struggling to achieve her goals, she had a terrible pattern of quitting. So, she would quit things each and every time. And she also had a very high level of anxiety. And despite following all the personal development methodologies that she was teaching and had been taught, she stayed inside myself. So, she really felt like an imposter, which many people feel. And so after she tried a whole bunch of stuff, and she tried everything from meditation to proper goal setting to everything under the sun, she finally woke up and she went, “Wait a minute, is this me? Am I the problem? Or is the problem the methodologies that we’re being taught?”

 

So she enrolled in university, and she wanted to study how the human brain makes decisions, and how the human equation works in comparison to what we're being taught. And sure enough, she discovered that much of the methodologies she was trying to follow went against how her brain was actually working. And it was causing a real conflict internally. So, she created new operating instructions and that's what she now teaches. She teaches how to change the brains patterning, which is giving rise to our actions, behaviours, beliefs. And the results are tremendous 87% of the people that she works with achieve their goals, and at the same time achieve extraordinary levels of happiness and peace of mind as well. So when we work with the brain, as it's designed, it works beautifully to advance us in the direction we want to go.

 

Me: Totally agree and peace of mind is so important.

 

Your Brain Making Decisions on Your Behalf

 

Adele shared that it's an interesting development in neuroscience in the last 20/30 years, so before that we really lacked the modern brain scanners to peek inside the human brain in a non-invasive way. And so, we didn't know much about our own brain and how it was working and the findings are absolutely extraordinary.

 

One recent study by John Dolan Haynes that was done in the early 2000s, he discovered that a brain scanner can see the decisions we're about to make a fraction of a second before we consciously know we are going to make that decision. Now that's extraordinary when you think about it, so the subconscious regions of our brain are actually driving our decisions, not our choices in life.

 

So, she likes to say to people, do you want to know why your hand is in the cookie jar, it's not because you're choosing to take the cookie, it's because your brain has a pattern which is moving you in the direction of that cookie. And when we try and work with willpower and goal achievement and control, it really goes against the way that brain is working.

 

So, she likes to say, so the train’s left the station, and now you're holding on to that Caboose, trying to pull it back rather than reflecting on what you're doing? And asking yourself, okay, does this work for me? And does it work that my hands in the cookie jar? And if the answer is no, then let's change the pattern, let's change where the decision is originating, instead of fighting ourselves.

 

Changing Your Brain to Reallocate How You Approach an Activity

 

Me: Amazing, truly amazing. Now, lots of people procrastinate. So for example, even in school, you'd have an assignment to do and you literally wait until two days, a day before to start the assignment because some people believe they work best under pressure, they push out their best work under pressure. But then, let's say you got this assignment, three, four, six weeks in advance, and instead of kind of just pressuring yourself like that, you could literally pace yourself in terms of the chunks of work that you do towards completing that assignment in a more manageable, structured way rather than pressuring yourself within 24 hours, how do you change your brain to kind of just reallocate how it is that you approach that activity?

 

Adele shared that she loves this idea of procrastination because the brain doesn't actually procrastinate, it avoids, so there's a big difference.

 

And what it is avoiding is actually the uncomfortable internal experience that comes about when we think about doing that assignment.

 

So, let's take that example that you just gave of a student in school, and they're trying to write an essay. If they tune in and look at their own personal experience, they'll see that internally, there is a lot of uncomfortable feelings going on, uncomfortable thoughts going on, such as “I'm not good enough”, or “I don't know what to write”, or “I'm confused” and all of that stuff.

 

And so, it's that that we actually avoid, and we keep putting it off, putting it off, putting it off, because we don't want to actually experience that.

 

What we need to know is that, that negative experience is driven by a pattern in our brain. And when we think about it, the human brain isn’t born with patterns, as we enter this world, pretty much a blank slate and we very quickly have to form patterns.

 

And when we first form a pattern, it works to get us through the situation, but then the brain simply stores it and holds on to it. So, when you were five, six years old, and you first start school, highly likely that you weren't good enough at certain things, right? Highly likely that you did feel uncomfortable when you went to write an essay, you wouldn't be writing one at six. But when you went to write your name on a piece of paper, you'd probably feel a little bit uncomfortable.

 

And so, it's that that pattern that just keeps presenting itself every time we go through school and that's why we keep avoiding.

 

So, what we do is we change the pattern, once you change the pattern and upgrade it, then all of that avoidance, that need for avoidance just melts away and you'll actually start to enjoy the process of writing the essay, you start to enjoy the process of learning and studying.

 

Because every part of the human brain is actually trying to guide you to success, it's just a misunderstanding of how our brain works. So, the only question we need to ask ourselves is when I'm suffering internally, if you know that, that suffering is the result of a pattern that needs upgrading, then all you have to do is change the pattern and boom, you're no longer procrastinating, you no longer suffer, you're just at ease doing what you need to do.

 

Me: That is so true, so true. And that's kind of where I think most people want to get to at some point, right?

 

Adele agreed and shared and the brain is designed to do that. The brain has what is called plasticity, it is constantly attempting to rewire itself. It gets trapped in those old patterns, just simply because that action to the brain feels safe.

 

So, even though it doesn't work for you to be procrastinating, even though it causes suffering, causes misery to be procrastinating, because that was the same action that the brain took yesterday it will continue to rely on it thinking that it is safe because it is the unknown that the brain fears. So, it would rather you suffer than be in the unknown, that's a funny little blip in our brain maybe. But once we change the pattern and create a new known, then the pattern in the brain just readily goes along with that new action.

 

How the Solution of Stress, Anxiety and Overwhelm can be Found in Our Brain Patterns

 

Me: Now, of course, our podcast is about navigating the customer experience. And we found over the years, just different persons that we've interviewed at different levels, as well, from my own training sessions that we have. You can't deliver an amazing experience if it is that you are stressed. And I mean, the number one, I believe cause why people have so many chronic illnesses globally is because of stress. Stress leads to hypertension, stress leads to diabetes, stress leads to people getting a stroke, I mean, so many different things that stress can lead to, so what do you think is the root cause for stress, anxiety and overwhelm? And if you're looking at your situations, and you're looking in the wrong place, could the solution be found in our brain patterns? And how do we tap into that?

 

Adele shared that she would say that the number one cause of stress is this. And when we think about how the brain works, this makes total sense. A long time ago, when the world was more simple than it is today, more predictable than it is today, the patterns that a brain created in its youth. So patterns are created primarily throughout our childhood and adolescence is a massive other stage of pattern creation, and then it slows down into adulthood.

 

In a world which is predictable and dependable, those patterns created when you're little would continue to work quite effectively, all the way through your adulthood. Today though, the world has sped up, and it's sped up to the point where those patterns created even five years ago, even last year, let's just think about this pandemic.

 

And patterns that you created before the pandemic no longer navigate you through the pandemic because the situations required by the pandemic are totally, totally different than who you were before.

 

And so, it's adaptability today that is absolutely essential. But when the brain is locked into those old patterns that it created in its youth, and doesn't know how to change those patterns, like we haven't given it the tools to upgrade those patterns, then, of course, it's going to be stressful, because there's a misalignment between what action your brain is taking and the action that you need to be taking today. Make sense?

 

It's not that there's anything wrong with you, it's not that you can't function properly, it's not that you yourself is stressed, it's the pattern that is trying to take the action on your behalf is not actually in alignment with the action that needs to be taken and hence the disconnect, and hence conflict.

 

Me: A whole lot of stuff to really take into consideration as it relates to stress.

 

App, Website or Tool that Aaron Absolutely Can’t Live Without in Her Business

 

When asked about an online resource that she cannot live without in her business, Adele shared that today, you'd have to say Zoom. She used to do all live events, that was the only way that she would work. So, kind of do some online content but mostly, she would run full year live events and they would rent rooms and do these big, huge events, she would sell from the stage, she did everything from the stage primarily. And then the pandemic hit, and boom, all of those live events went away overnight, and you talk about need to be adaptable pretty quick, that was like, “Whoa, things are changing now.” So, she had to embrace them. So, that's one of her one must have. The other one is Kajabi. So for her, when she puts all her training onto an online platform, she uses the Kajabi app, which is a training source, she can hold everything in there. So, those are the two that she totally rely on today.

 

Books that Have Had the Biggest Impact on Adele

 

When asked about books that have a big impact, Adele shared that for her, some of the latest findings in neuroscience are very exciting. So, if people really like to read and they're really interested in how the brain works. Then Iain McGilchrist book, The Master and His Emissary: The Divided Brain and the Making of the Western World is excellent.

It dives into the difference between the brain hemispheres and how the right hemisphere is functioning different from the left hemisphere. For her, that's super exciting.

Another one is Jill Bolte Taylor. She is a neuroscientist who actually had a stroke in her left hemisphere, and came back from that to talk about the difference between the hemispheres and she's got a brand new book out too, think it's called Whole Brain Living: The Anatomy of Choice and the Four Characters That Drive Our Life. So, those two books, she highly recommends if people geek out on the brain like she does.

Another great researcher for brain research is Dr. Andrew Newberg, and he looks at the brain and enlightenment from the perspective of neuroscience. So again, anybody who likes to geek out on that, great author.

 

What Advice Would You Give a Business Owner or Manager who Lacks the Constantly Motivated Human Capital to have a Successful Business?

 

Adele shared that that’s a great question. So, motivation, let's just look at these new operating instructions as she was saying at the beginning of this podcast. The old operating instructions with this, set a goal, and then determine the steps that you need to take to get to that goal. And it's all inside of striving, it's all inside of trying to figure out what is right, what you shouldn't do, what is wrong and it creates a lot of stress and a lot of demotivation because internally, it's creating so much conflict. So, here are the new operating instructions, set a goal, instead of determining the steps to get there, ask yourself, “What is preventing me from being there now?”

 

You will notice as you ask that question, that a whole bunch of actions, behaviours, and beliefs bubble up to your mind. So you might say, “Oh, yeah, I should be picking up the phone and calling clients but I'm not.”

So that's an action you're not taking, you want to write that down. You might notice “Oh, yeah, like, I really feel nervous when I talk to new clients.” Great, write that down. Your belief might be, “Oh, gosh, I'm really bugging people like sales is slimy.” She’s just making all of this up, but write down all of those things that are preventing you from being at that goal today.

Imposter syndrome, that was one of her big ones. She was a big people pleaser, that was a big one for her that was stopping her. So, you'll start to see yourself in a whole different light. Under every single one of those actions, behaviours and beliefs know that there lies a brain pattern, which is giving rise to that action, behaviour, belief.

 

Your next step is not to try to fix that brain pattern, it is instead to remove it. And, she’d love to gift to all of anybody listening her book, they can get a free copy, all she ask is that they pay for shipping. In that book is the four steps to remove that brain pattern. Once that brain pattern is removed, your brain will do what every brain does, it will create a pattern, it will create a brand new pattern.

 

And that brand new pattern is going to take you automatically in the direction of that goal. That new banner is going to take the action needed to take why?

 

Because like she said before, your brain is always striving to always trying to get you into alignment with what is going on in this present moment. And if the success of your business depends on you taking that step, then your brain is going to create the pattern to take that step. You don't have to worry about that. Your job is to remove what doesn't work. She cannot tell you how effective this method is, it truly is something that every person needs to experience for themselves, it is not based inside of knowledge, it's based inside of experience. Once you experience that though, it's like night and day, it's like oh my gosh, bring it on world. I don't care what the problem is. I know I can solve it because you've got a brilliant brain that can solve it on your behalf.

 

One Thing Going on In Your Life to Develop Yourself or Your People

 

When asked about something that she is excited about, Adele shared that she just started when the pandemic hit, she moved everything to an online platform, and she started a membership site. And it is very exciting what's happening in that membership site. So there's a lot of activity there and she keeps adding new content. So, that's her primary focus at the moment. She’s building out all the content that she used to teach in live events into an online platform like Kajabi and supporting those members. 

 

Me: So, you said you started a membership site? 

  

Adele shared that she’s putting all the content in there. So, there's lots of classes in there which is really exciting all around the brain and different things. So, she has leadership classes in there, relationships.

So people who are in conflict, she’s finding that a lot of people probably because of the pandemic trapped inside of addiction patterns.

So, she’s working with people with addictions now, so there'll be a class on that. Peace of mind and stress, as you were saying before, that's a massive thing.

So all of this content is going in there and people, they're just loving it, like the members in there, they're just really eating it up and really gaining valuable information and valuable tools and resources for today's very complex planet.

 

Where Can We Find Adele Online

 

Website – https://www.adelespraggon.com/

 

Quote or Saying that During Times of Adversity Adele Uses

 

When asked about a quote or saying that she tends to revert to, Adele shared that she would say her quote is always, “I created that.” And she'll have to explain that one more. So, as she was saying before, patterns are created in our youth then they continue to inform us about the world today. But everything that we see about ourselves and about the world, about the situation is driven by our pattern that was created in our youth. So when she finds myself in a situation that doesn't work for her, she just gently reminds herself of that, “Oh, yeah, that's a pattern. I created that.”

And that just helps her to position it and then she can apply the four step technique that she teaches in her book and remove the pattern.

 

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Links

 

 

The ABC’s of a Fantastic Customer Experience

 

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Master your customer experience and develop those knock your socks off techniques that will lead to lifetime customers. Your customers will only want to work with your business and it will be your brand differentiator. It will lead to recruiters to seek you out by providing practical examples on how to deliver a winning customer service experience!

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