Executives Don’t Live the Brand the Way Customers Do and This is Why CX is Shorted

Brian Solis


Looking over the horizon.

The one thing about CRM is that it often has very little to do with “customers” or “relationships” and more to do with the “management” of dated perspectives, systems and processes. So many executives these days are chasing technology and recruiting new expertise to track customers, analyze their data, map journeys and push the most relevant content, messages, promo on the right device at the right time. You’re probably asking, “what’s wrong with that?”

In many ways, it is exactly the right thing to do. But, it’s just the beginning. This is a time to understand the evolving expectations, preferences and values of your customers (and employees). Otherwise, we are not really moving in any new direction other than applying new technologies and processes to dated perspectives and metrics of progress and success.

We are not our customers and as such, it’s difficult, if not impossible, to engage them in meaningful ways. Without empathy, we will continue to talk at them, usher them through outdated and inconvenient touch points, and serve them through means of which are no longer preferred. We are managers and enforcers of legacy. We lean on innovation to move us incrementally forward. But, this is a time for radical reinvention and invention. We’re competing for market share as much as we’re competing for relevance. That takes understanding. Then it takes vision, purpose, design and execution.

Customers (and employees) demand experiences. We cannot simply improve “what exists” as a solution and expect different outcomes. To architect relevant and meaningful experiences, we must understand first, what experiences people cherish and seek and work backwards from there.

This is what I’d like to speak with you about since you’re here.

While I was in DC speaking at the CRM Evolution conference, I stopped by to meet with Butch Stearns and his crew. In our discussion, I discuss the findings from my latest research on the “6 Stages of Digital Transformation.” More so, I also share that the heart and soul of digital transformation, CX, or any important change in business, must be centered in empathic experience design.