Strategies for Resilience During Economic Uncertainty

 

Whether or not we’re facing the next recession remains debatable, but there are signs pointing to a potential downturn. In this climate of uncertainty, customer experience has emerged as a powerful differentiator.

 

In this session, Devin Poole, Sr. Product Marketing Manager at Coveo, and Tom Quish, SVP, Customer Experience at Rightpoint, discuss the current economic climate and what it may mean for your CX vision. Poole and Quish discuss how to manage customer experiences differently while delivering high-quality service with fewer resources. As economic headwinds are gathering, improving your CX approach can help you fortify your business in the face of what could be the next recession.

 

Are We In a recession? Understanding the Economic Landscape

 

 

Poole and Quish open with a detailed overview of the indicators that suggest a downturn could be on the horizon. A few concerning business and economic trends include:

• Corporate spend and investments are being closely scrutinized
• Inflation and interest rates are consistently increasing
• There have been large-scale layoffs among leading tech companies
• It's becoming harder for businesses to attract top talent

 

Despite these trends, unemployment numbers remained relatively low in 2023 and laid off workers typically found new roles quickly. This is sending mixed economic signals. From a consumer perspective, there are clear signs of caution. Rightpoint’s clients are seeing their customers become more price-sensitive and selective with discretionary spending.

 

This environment of consumer apprehension coupled with business cautiousness is impacting how organizations approach customer experience investments. As spending faces enhanced scrutiny, CX leaders must carefully prioritize initiatives that retain existing customers while still attracting new business cost-effectively.

 

The Impact on Customer Service and CX

 

 

With economic conditions in flux, providing exceptional customer service has become mission-critical. Good customer service inspires consumer confidence in a brand. According to Rightpoint data, nearly 90% of customers are more likely to make another purchase after a positive service interaction. On the flip side, just three negative experiences can send customers defecting to competitors.

 

This reality puts the spotlight squarely on service and support functions. As Poole explains, despite all the changes driven by technology, customers simply want their problem solved. This is how improving CX also improves business outcomes.

 

Total experience – enhancing CX, employee experience (EX), and product experience (PX) is an approach that factors in all parts of your organization’s customer-facing ecosystem. Organizations are increasingly interested in this cyclical relationship, where investing in EX and PX leads to greater returns on the CX side.

 

Empowering frontline staff elevates experiences across touchpoints. By providing reps with deeper customer context and enabling personalized outreach, positive moments get created that build enduring loyalty. The pet supply retailer Chewy is a great example of how an empowered employee base creates elevated customer experiences. They achieve this by:

• Using data: Chewy uses call center service rep or customer success representative information and purchase information to inform their actions.
• Leveraging e-commerce data: Chewy leverages e-commerce data like replenishment shopping habits to empower their customer service reps to make informed decisions on behalf of the brand.

 

According to Rightpoint, driving operational excellence and efficiency is a top-three CX goal among 63% of CX leaders. This requires the right technology to achieve – investing in AI and automation lets businesses accomplish more with less resources.

 

It's an increasingly complex CX landscape and having an overarching strategic CX vision remains foundational. Organizations are understandably cautious around where they're investing and have a more immediate need to understand the expected returns.

 

Prioritizing Total Experience with Increasing Complexity

 

 

Total experience helps organizations like Rightpoint deal with increased complexity on multiple fronts. Here are some of the many moving parts that companies are facing now:

• Technology disruptions like generative AI
• Competitive pressures, particularly from disruptive startups in industries like healthcare
• Regulatory issues
• Supply chain problems
• Expanding stakeholder bases (which requires more collaboration)

 

This is a challenging climate. It's important to map the customer journey and layer on the idea of the employee experience across all touchpoints to create a unified view of CX. Going through this process helps to illustrate how improving EX benefits customers. Take the Chewy example – empowering frontline staff with deeper customer context creates more positive, personalized moments that build loyalty.

 

Deploying technologies like AI, IoT and AR/VR thoughtfully can enact meaningful product experiences across CX and EX journeys. Generative AI's ability to streamline self-service while reducing employee effort is particularly powerful.

 

Creating an upfront total experience strategy helps mitigate the risks around investing in the wrong technology. Building a knowledge management strategy that incorporates intelligent automation helps with efficiency gains as well as improving CX and EX. It’s a way for businesses to cost-effectively maximize resources and create elevated total experiences during economic upheaval.

 

Recession-Proof Your CX Vision

 

Elevating your CX during a reception means investing in the right technology. This webinar illustrates how taking an intelligent and strategic approach to CX drives loyalty, differentiates your brand, and enables you to operate efficiently with limited resources.

 

Applying AI-powered technologies and automation judiciously across the total experience landscape are two key ingredients to achieving this. AI helps companies streamline self-service, provide intelligent and personalized engagement to employees and customers, and reduce operational costs through automation.

 

Successfully leveraging AI requires a robust technological foundation and an outcomes-based strategy with components that include things like unifying your data across all touchpoints, using analytics to make continuous CX improvements, and clearly defining how technology impacts your business. This is how you maintain resilience regardless in any economic environment, even (and especially) during a downturn.

 

Economic headwinds are gathering. Don't miss this opportunity to fortify your business in the face of what could be the next recession. This webinar speaks to how technology and the right CX approach can help you weather any economic storm. Register now and learn how improving total experience with the right technology can differentiate your business, drive loyalty, and keep customer acquisition costs low.