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251: Why Customer Experience Leaders Must Prove ROI · Customer Service Revolution | Customer Experience & Employee Experience for Business Leaders

• 0:49
  Welcome to the customer service revolution podcast.
• 0:51
  I'm your cohost Denise Thompson, and I'm here with the chief revolution officer of The DiJulius Group keynote speaker, author and all star shortstop John DiJulius Is it short or
• 1:03
  second base you play?
• 1:05
  Second base.
• 1:06
  Sorry.
• 1:07
  I knew it was an infield.
• 1:09
  It used to be short.
• 1:10
  Yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 1:11
  nope, now it's...
• 1:14
  What's that?
• 1:15
  I have to throw underhand almost.
• 1:18
  My shoulder!
• 1:20
  Yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 1:22
  Trying to get it back, but...
• 1:25
  I don't think I'm gonna get...
• 1:29
  It's coming along, it's coming along.
• 1:31
  How are you, Denise?
• 1:33
  Yeah...
• 1:34
  happy that spring is here.
• 1:35
  The weather's warm.
• 1:36
  Good to be outside a little bit.
• 1:40
  All good.
• 1:41
  Hey, today we're talking about a pressure that many customer experience leaders are feeling right now, proving ROI.
• 1:49
  So it's no longer enough to say customer experience matters.
• 1:52
  Leaders are being asked to show how it impacts retention, loyalty, referrals, growth, and even revenue, of course.
• 2:00
  In other words, they're being asked to prove that customer experience is not just a philosophy, but something that we say all the time, it's a business driver.
• 2:08
  So today I'm asking John why customer experience leaders are being forced to prove ROI and what most organizations get wrong when they try to measure it.
• 2:17
  and what leaders should really be focusing on if they want customer experience to earn a seat at the executive table.
• 2:24
  John, let's jump in.
• 2:25
  uh So why are customer experience leaders suddenly under so much pressure to prove ROI?
• 2:33
  Well, you know, the customer experience has never been worse in all industries.
• 2:37
  You know, you had the you know, the past six years, you know, the great resignation, shrink flation, tip flation, tariff flation.
• 2:45
  mean, just all these things, inflation.
• 2:49
  And which means people are getting
• 2:52
  spending more and they're getting less the experience gap and it's really pissed off people customers consumers clients patients tenants and you know people are just less
• 3:02
  tolerance and and you now there's all these fees i just saw something in the news yesterday that everyone's adding you surcharges in fees you know it might be because the
• 3:14
  oil you know crisis in the gas and all this but
• 3:18
  everywhere they're looking, they're getting hit with a fee and they're trying to do it at checkout where you've already basically did the experience and you know, what can you do?
• 3:30
  So all these things are just really frustrating.
• 3:33
  And the other thing, and this has always been the case, customer experience, every department fights for budgets.
• 3:39
  and marketing wants their share and IT and AI and sales and experience and you know, I there's just so many endless amounts of things and you know, if you don't do it well, the
• 3:54
  other ones, obviously a sales budget, you can demonstrate an ROI or what we call ROX, which is return on experience.
• 4:03
  The leaders, the C-level leaders that don't invest in customer experience or don't look at customer experience as an investment don't understand the financial implications.
• 4:21
  So whether it's a consultant or the leader, the CX leader, they have to demonstrate what that is.
• 4:29
  I mean, like to the penny.
• 4:33
  And you can easily do that.
• 4:35
  And one thing that we say when we work with customers, and this almost should be a leader's thing, is we will only take you on as a client if we both agree the value you
• 4:45
  receive from our consulting agreement is far greater than the fees you pay us.
• 4:51
  Well, now that forces us to create a return on experience dashboard and...
• 4:57
  what a 1 % increase or decrease can mean top and bottom line.
• 5:04
  I love that.
• 5:05
  I think it's such an important starting point because a lot of organizations say that they value customer experience.
• 5:10
  But as you said, as soon as budgets tighten, they want proof.
• 5:14
  Why is it that customer satisfaction alone is no longer enough?
• 5:20
  I don't know if it's because of how close we've been to it, Denise, but I've been hearing the term customer satisfaction as worthless.
• 5:29
  There was a book, I think, written by Jeffrey Gidamer, good 25 years ago.
• 5:33
  Customer satisfaction is worthless, customer loyalty is priceless.
• 5:36
  I think that was the title.
• 5:38
  mean, customer satisfaction is just such a low bar.
• 5:42
  Like, where'd you go yesterday for dinner?
• 5:44
  Were you satisfied?
• 5:46
  You you saying yes means they didn't piss you off.
• 5:50
  They didn't screw up enough.
• 5:52
  But they also didn't thrill you while you blow you away.
• 5:58
  Satisfied is such a low bar, right?
• 6:01
  If I asked Ken, know, if he's satisfied with, you know, you as his partner and he says yes, I don't know, I think he'd be a little disappointed.
• 6:12
  in that answer.
• 6:13
  Maybe you'd be happy.
• 6:16
  Right?
• 6:17
  But that's exactly what we do as customers, right?
• 6:20
  Did she complain?
• 6:22
  No.
• 6:22
  Thank God.
• 6:23
  You know, I ran an hour late and over-promised.
• 6:27
  And we think because she didn't complain, they're happy.
• 6:30
  yeah, customer satisfaction is just such a low bar.
• 6:33
  It means you're susceptible to a better offer, something more convenient, meeting someone that does what I do and they build a relationship with you, whatever it may be.
• 6:46
  So if a good score by itself isn't enough, then clearly something's missing in how organizations define success.
• 6:53
  What are the biggest mistakes organizations make when they try to measure the value of customer experience?
• 6:59
  Well, again, not knowing to the dollar amount what a 5 % increase in client retention will mean or a 5 % decrease.
• 7:10
  They should know for every 1 % of the increase.
• 7:14
  And you could do that with average ticket, annual spend, and not just a client.
• 7:19
  customer spends X amount of dollars a year here, but the average customer may refer a half a customer, right?
• 7:28
  I mean, you got people referring five and you got people referring zero, but like, and then you get the average spend of that customer.
• 7:37
  So there's a lot of really good KPIs that you can really put a dollar amount to
• 7:45
  on a plus or minus 5 % and then you get everyone obsessed.
• 7:49
  But the biggest mistake is really worrying about surveys and NPS.
• 7:54
  mean, you we've talked about this, you know, OZium that it just, those aren't good KPIs anymore.
• 8:00
  You know, how likely are you to refer?
• 8:03
  Well, number one, if you could get, 15, 20 years ago, if you can get your response rate of your customers you're surveying,
• 8:12
  in the upper 20s, if you could hit 30 that you were, that was amazing.
• 8:17
  Now it's, it's, it's, it's, you know, sometimes single digits, just because everyone's doing it.
• 8:23
  And we all have survey fatigue and the only time we do it or the only time I do it is if, you know, I may have so many surveys right now in my inbox from my last flight, my last
• 8:32
  hotel experience, literally went and got my teeth cleaned yesterday.
• 8:36
  That's, you know, surveys in there.
• 8:40
  And I'm just not filling them out unless it was, you know, shockingly unbelievable or, you know, calamity.
• 8:49
  And then even if you are filling it out, how likely are you to refer someone and you give me a 10?
• 8:54
  Well, that doesn't mean you ever do that.
• 8:57
  You put a 10, but if you have the business model that can actually track how many of John's clients
• 9:05
  have referred, that's action.
• 9:09
  I don't want to know your intent.
• 9:11
  want to know if you, you know, it's, you know, will you go out with me?
• 9:14
  Sure, but you never do.
• 9:17
  Right?
• 9:18
  You know, there's, you know, intent and then there's action.
• 9:21
  I think this is where we see a lot of companies get stuck.
• 9:24
  They collect the data, but they don't always create change.
• 9:28
  So why do so many companies collect all of this feedback, but then fail to actually improve the experience?
• 9:35
  Well, there's over-reporting.
• 9:38
  I mean, we've been guilty of it in all our businesses.
• 9:41
  I used to be so proud, you know, 25 years ago with all the reporting John Roberts had.
• 9:49
  I mean, we could tell you so many different things.
• 9:53
  Revenue per square foot, revenue spa versus hair versus nails, you know, just like crazy stuff.
• 10:04
  But we never looked at any of it because there's too many.
• 10:06
  You know, and it's like, you really got focus on, again, what we call the ROX return.
• 10:13
  And when I say ROX, I only mean when you want to know for the experience.
• 10:18
  Obviously, there's other KPIs.
• 10:20
  Sales growth, comparable to, you know, this time last year, you know, and profit and P &L and, you know, all those are important.
• 10:29
  But a lot of those do not
• 10:31
  you know, they have a lot more things than just the experience.
• 10:34
  So you got to find the, three to four KPIs, return on experience dashboard, ROX, that really line back to the experience they're getting.
• 10:45
  and, and you can't, it's not, you know, well, it also could be that we have construction out front or the economy or, you know, you know,
• 10:55
  different things, you know, and so you really have to have a clean return on experience dashboard.
• 11:01
  Yeah, yeah.
• 11:02
  And that's something, hey listeners, we'll put an example of the return experience dashboard in the show notes for you.
• 11:09
  So you can go ahead and download the one that we've created that our clients use.
• 11:14
  I think it's important because there are so many customer experience efforts that are measuring the vanity measurements.
• 11:22
  They look impressive on paper, but they don't translate into loyalty.
• 11:27
  John, why does journey mapping so often fail to improve the real customer experience?
• 11:33
  Well, you know, so journey mapping is looking at each touch point your customer can go through with your business from the initial lead.
• 11:42
  However that lead comes in, you're calling them, they're calling you online, know, whatever that may be.
• 11:50
  And then what should transpire each point.
• 11:53
  But too often, every journey map I've ever seen
• 11:56
  that we haven't been part of when we go and work with a company, they'll show us their journey mapping, just shows the five, six, eight, 10 stages that a customer will go
• 12:09
  through with a certain department in your organization.
• 12:12
  And it just lists what should happen.
• 12:15
  And it's really the SOPs, standard operating procedures, right?
• 12:19
  get their name, get their credit card, get their address, get their email, get their order number, get their blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.
• 12:27
  And you gotta be brilliant at the basics, but if that's all you do, you're not gonna be any different from your competition because your competition is collecting those things.
• 12:37
  Standard operating procedures, operational processes.
• 12:42
  are only memorable when they're not done.
• 12:45
  If you place an order for a hundred books and you need it there by Friday and the boxes arrive by Friday and two boxes of 50.
• 13:02
  You're not calling anyone saying this company blew my mind.
• 13:08
  I got the books.
• 13:10
  in the time they said I would and how many.
• 13:12
  Now, if you get the books and there's only 80 and it doesn't get there till Monday or it's the wrong book, that's the only time Operationals is memorable.
• 13:25
  I never want to de-emphasize.
• 13:27
  You got to be brilliant at the basics, but your competitors, your best competitors are just as good at the basics.
• 13:35
  You're checking into a hotel, they ask you for your driver's license and a credit card.
• 13:41
  Everyone does that.
• 13:42
  I've never not gone to a hotel where they haven't done that.
• 13:45
  So you have to add two other things, three other things.
• 13:49
  The service defects, this is so important.
• 13:51
  It's a negative part of our experience, but what do we and our industry do wrong at this touch point that
• 13:59
  frustrates the customer that makes it hard for them to do business with us that, you know, you know, all those things that we have to eliminate through AI, through technology,
• 14:13
  through better systems.
• 14:15
  So, and then you have your operational, you want to add experiential to the operational and the experiential are, you know, we use your name, we get your name, you know, we use
• 14:26
  it.
• 14:26
  Oh, Denise, welcome back, you know.
• 14:28
  How's Cleveland this time of year?
• 14:30
  Because when I got your name or your phone number populated who you were, I could see that you live in Cleveland, Ohio and did your order last month.
• 14:40
  Did you enjoy that?
• 14:41
  That doesn't take any more time because depending on the business model, it's right there.
• 14:45
  Using your name a few times, collecting Ford, family occupation, recreation and dreams.
• 14:52
  and then asking if there's anything else we can do for you today.
• 14:55
  Just a few experiential sprinkled with the operational.
• 15:00
  And then the fourth component of a stage in journey mapping is what is the above and beyond?
• 15:06
  Most of time it might not present itself, but it may.
• 15:10
  You may mention something that is happening great or not so great.
• 15:16
  Maybe we could send a card, maybe we can throw something in the order that's a swag or something for congratulations on.
• 15:26
  Anything like that, or you're frustrated because the last few orders haven't been correct timely.
• 15:34
  So we next day air it and we don't charge you for it.
• 15:36
  So those are our little things.
• 15:39
  It's a great point because the SOP itself is not the solution.
• 15:44
  And even if you have a great journey map with the service defects and with the experiential standards and above and beyond, still what you do with it afterwards, right?
• 15:55
  Because otherwise it becomes not much more than an expensive visualization for everyone.
• 16:01
  So make sure you put it in and getting everyone trained on it.
• 16:05
  Before we continue, if your organization is working to improve customer experience but struggling to connect it to measurable business outcomes, the DiJulius Group can help.
• 16:15
  Whether you need consulting, training, or you want to learn our proven framework on your own and create a world-class customer experience, that's great.
• 16:23
  Visit thedijuliusgroup.com to learn more about how we help organizations turn customer experience into a competitive advantage.
• 16:32
  back to the conversation.
• 16:34
  When we talk about ROI and customer experience, what business outcomes should leaders actually be tying their work to?
• 16:42
  So again, we call it return on experience when we work with a client and listeners, you can do this on your own.
• 16:49
  We will not start working with you until we can figure out three to four return on experience dashboards that we can benchmark historically to this point.
• 17:00
  And then going forward, is it moving north, staying the same?
• 17:04
  You know, and so it could be customer retention rates, resign rates, referrals, close ratios, number of complaints, you know, these types of things that are specific to the,
• 17:15
  you know, the experience we're providing.
• 17:19
  Customer reviews, average annual spend, you know, customer complaints, first time resolution, customer effort score.
• 17:26
  So we don't want all of those and not every business model, you know, applies.
• 17:31
  We've talked about this a million times, but the best one, if your business model allows, and the only business model that I can think of that doesn't allow would be like a quick
• 17:40
  service business where you just run in, buy something, pay with a credit card and leave.
• 17:46
  If they're not pulling you up, adding you to a database, then this wouldn't, you probably can't measure.
• 17:54
  but it's the earned sales growth and earned sales growth is really how much of your sales last quarter, last period came from repeats and referrals versus bought.
• 18:07
  And you can track that, you know, and then, you know, you hold everyone accountable because listen, if you're coming back and if you're referring, the number one way to
• 18:18
  increase earned sales growth
• 18:19
  95 % of it is an amazing experience.
• 18:24
  The 5 % other part is talking about it.
• 18:29
  know, Denise, the highest compliment I can get from you, the best tip, whatever we were saying, is a referral of a family or friend.
• 18:36
  You know, if you know it.
• 18:37
  And by the way, Denise, every time you refer someone, you get a, you know, whatever, 20 % off or, you know.
• 18:46
  in a lottery to win or whatever that is.
• 18:49
  You do have to speak about it, but at the end of the day, any incentive isn't going to motivate a customer who's not having a great experience.
• 18:57
  So you want to become obsessed with that.
• 19:00
  And I don't think there's a ROX metric that's better than that and holding not only as a company department team, but individual.
• 19:09
  consultant, accountant, lawyer, practitioner, hairdresser, salesperson by their earned sales growth.
• 19:17
  This is really good because I think it's where a lot of leaders probably need a mindset shift because customer experience is so often treated like a support function instead of a
• 19:29
  growth strategy.
• 19:30
  John, one of the things you talk about a lot is inconsistency and how that really kills a business.
• 19:35
  How do broken handoffs, inconsistency, friction, how does that quietly hurt revenue and loyalty?
• 19:43
  Yeah, Kevin Sloan from KeyBank said it best.
• 19:46
  He said inconsistency is the enemy of a brand's customer experience.
• 19:51
  And it is.
• 19:52
  And we refer to it as employee roulette, where the level of the experience your clients are receiving is depending on which person, employee, department, location you go to.
• 20:05
  And that is just horrible.
• 20:07
  And we all struggle with it, and especially as you grow.
• 20:10
  And I believe more than 90 % is not the employee's Yeah, it could be the hiring, but I really believe it's the training.
• 20:19
  It's the ongoing.
• 20:21
  It's the onboarding.
• 20:22
  It's the everboarding.
• 20:23
  Onboarding is your new employee.
• 20:25
  I'm going to teach you our...
• 20:26
  customer experience cycle, journey mapping, never's and always, service recovery.
• 20:32
  Everboarding is I'm gonna constantly be revisiting that with you, once a week in a two minute video or micro learning or whatever.
• 20:43
  And then testing and certifying, celebrating and coaching.
• 20:46
  So, and then also in that journey map is where the handoffs are.
• 20:50
  So salesperson, know, someone is dealing with the salesperson and they hit it off and they, you know, I always say when I buy something, a lot of times I'm buying the
• 21:01
  salesperson.
• 21:02
  I just love them.
• 21:03
  I love, you know, the relationship they built.
• 21:06
  I just want to do business with them.
• 21:07
  But then they go away.
• 21:09
  And now I get someone in operations, someone in the field, the consultant, doctor, lawyer,
• 21:15
  whomever hairdresser and it's kind of like starting from, you know, step one and they don't know me.
• 21:21
  They're not making me feel like a VIP.
• 21:23
  They're not asking me how my three boys are, how Cleveland is and you know, and I'm like, God, like this was nothing like the salesperson told me it was going to be.
• 21:31
  you know, customer experience is one in lost in the handoffs and even internally, same thing with, you know, you got a great
• 21:40
  recruiter HR person that's doing the interview and like you did it for years for us and you still do it for the DiJulius Group but at John Roberts Spa you are were at one time
• 21:51
  our people development director and you used to get so many people to want to be dying to work at John Roberts Spa but then you know you'd hire them and I'm not saying you did this
• 22:03
  but you know most business models are guilty of this they say all right you know
• 22:08
  you got the job, you take the job, all right, we'll see you in two weeks, report to this location and ask for Eric.
• 22:14
  And Denise goes away, the warm and fuzzy, my God, and you walk in and Eric, who's a nice guy, may not even realize he has a new employee coming in, doesn't know the new
• 22:25
  employee's, it's an inconvenience, because this is the last thing he really had time for today, and you just feel that.
• 22:33
  It's no one.
• 22:34
  It's the company's fault to make sure it's a warm handoff from a customer or an employee where the person who's built a relationship, cultivated a relationship has an onboarding
• 22:46
  with the person they're going to be going to.
• 22:48
  It's like, Denise, I want you to meet Karima.
• 22:51
  I've been telling you about Karima.
• 22:54
  my God, she's a rock star.
• 22:56
  you're gonna so enjoy working with her and da da.
• 23:00
  And now Karima feels that you know how great she is and she feels like the VIP treatment hopefully that she's been getting is gonna continue versus you starting from scratch.
• 23:12
  you're like, hi Karima, I'm sorry, tell me what we're doing here, what are the goals?
• 23:17
  And all that.
• 23:18
  Yeah, I really like what you brought up about everboarding too because it's such a, that's such a hot one right now.
• 23:25
  And as you said, it's...
• 23:28
  What's the other term you use?
• 23:29
  Employee roulette.
• 23:30
  How it affects that.
• 23:32
  Damage that happens with one person one location is often hard to see in the moment But over time it becomes a pattern that customers remember and it really hurts so in addition
• 23:45
  to Referrals and being able to see you know measurements that way what's working?
• 23:50
  What should executives actually be measuring if they want proof that what they're tweaking with their customer experience is actually working?
• 23:59
  Well, again, the consistency, you know, if you're rolling out.
• 24:03
  So externally, is, you know, the customer retention rates, re-sign rates, referrals, which is all earned sales growth.
• 24:11
  The amount of complaints, you know, they're getting.
• 24:13
  You got to think about complaints, how expensive complaints are.
• 24:17
  One, the customer's calling or reaching out to us is not happy.
• 24:22
  That right there is bad.
• 24:24
  And it's probably gotten to a point where if they're reaching out, who else are they telling?
• 24:29
  But, you know, put a pin in that.
• 24:32
  Our call center, our reps, whoever, are now dealing with that, those types of calls, and aren't able to get to people who are calling to buy or book or schedule.
• 24:45
  So we have to staff more.
• 24:47
  mean, can imagine a magic wand if you can get your complaints to virtually disappear?
• 24:53
  A, you need less staff.
• 24:55
  B, the staff you have can be focused on selling and the more pleasurable side.
• 25:01
  And C, the staff isn't going home frustrated because they got their ass kicked by six customers today that were really upset.
• 25:09
  I mean, that's just scratching the surface.
• 25:12
  But,
• 25:13
  But the other things you got to measure besides our ROX is the implementation of any changes and execution of it.
• 25:22
  So let me give you an example.
• 25:23
  are in John Roberts Spa.
• 25:25
  We are really focused on running the earned sales growth reports.
• 25:31
  And the number one thing you have to do, you have to, is you have to track where new customers come from.
• 25:39
  If we don't put that down, you can't run an earned sales growth report.
• 25:44
  So the second part of it is now taking it to Denise and John and Dave and Claudia and Nicole and say, here's your earned sales growth.
• 25:54
  But if on the front end, let's say in the salon and spa, and it's mostly in the call center when, you know, because we don't get walk-ins, someone calls up, there are brand
• 26:05
  new appointments, like a haircut, a manicure, a facial.
• 26:08
  you have you ever been here?
• 26:09
  No.
• 26:10
  All right, what's your name?
• 26:10
  Denise Thompson.
• 26:12
  If they aren't forced to ask you, Denise, how did you hear of us?
• 26:17
  Google, saw your billboard, friend, whatever it is, they have to be forced to do that.
• 26:25
  So before we've ever run the earned sales growth report, which is what is the gold, we have to run a weekly daily report
• 26:35
  on our guest care saying, right, we had 20 new clients yesterday, this week, and you only put in eight of the 20 of where they came from.
• 26:46
  That's 101, but you have to make sure otherwise the data is invalid.
• 26:54
  We're measuring you on your earned sales growth.
• 26:56
  We may be giving you higher commission on your earned sales growth, but
• 27:00
  it's only 30 % accurate.
• 27:03
  you can't trust it.
• 27:04
  So you have to measure these changes, measure that they're being done by your employees before you can measure if they're having an impact by the outside, by your external
• 27:14
  customer.
• 27:16
  Such a great point.
• 27:16
  And earned sales growth you brought up.
• 27:18
  Listeners, we recently did a podcast on earned sales growth.
• 27:21
  And I believe you did a blog on it as well, John?
• 27:25
  Is that correct?
• 27:25
  Yeah, so we'll make sure we put links to that in the show notes as well.
• 27:29
  So if you want to go back and listen to that podcast or read that blog and catch up a little bit more on earned sales growth.
• 27:38
  if a customer, chief customer officer,
• 27:42
  had to prove customer experience value this quarter, or maybe they wanted to send somebody to the customer experience executive academy and had to prove the value of it.
• 27:53
  Where should they start?
• 27:55
  Well, yeah, so, you know, the past, you know, probably from maybe the late 90s till maybe the pandemic, you know, 20 years, the chief customer officer, chief experience officer was
• 28:08
  the fastest growing position in corporate America.
• 28:10
  It was also the first one to be let go when times got tough and times always get tough.
• 28:16
  It doesn't have to be, you know, when shit hits a fan in any business.
• 28:19
  You know, and it wasn't because the position wasn't correct.
• 28:24
  It was because the job description didn't have the accountabilities.
• 28:28
  You know, it was just so warm and fuzzy.
• 28:30
  wasn't measurable.
• 28:31
  It's like, know, Denise, yeah, I think you're doing a good job, but at the end of the day, nothing, nothing's changing, right?
• 28:37
  Nothing measurable that we know of versus, you know, our earned sales growth is through the roof.
• 28:43
  You got, you know, our, our laggers, you know,
• 28:46
  up, know, our clients are coming in or, you know, doing business with us, you know, one and a half more times this year than they were last year.
• 28:59
  You know, when you have a client, depending on how often a client comes in, but let's say a customer does business with you 10 times, you know, and they can, you can get them to
• 29:07
  come in, you know, two more times.
• 29:11
  You just grew your
• 29:13
  business 20 % without adding a single customer, right?
• 29:19
  So, you know, making sure that these measurable things are in there and that you see that they're helping coach and move the needle.
• 29:27
  I think it's creating, you know, again, it has to be creating the Return On Experience dashboard, the measurable things.
• 29:34
  working out the kinks in your CRM system with your IT that, you know, what you need to be measured can be measured as fully accurate and what actions have to be taken to make sure
• 29:45
  that those are authentically accurate.
• 29:48
  And then having, you know, your, you know, whether it's one person or a team that, you know, are obsessed with those numbers and are holding people accountable and celebrating
• 29:59
  and rewarding.
• 30:01
  What's one shift every customer experience leader should be making right now to be seen as essential to growth?
• 30:08
  It really comes down to that.
• 30:10
  mean, you will not, it's why sales is so important and sales is a little bit more black and white.
• 30:17
  You know, if a salesperson is hitting their numbers, right?
• 30:21
  That's probably the easiest to track.
• 30:24
  And so you have to make it the same way.
• 30:26
  Are you hitting your numbers and what are those numbers?
• 30:29
  And it goes back to, those numbers,
• 30:31
  what financial top and bottom line are those numbers having on our company.
• 30:36
  If you don't have that, then you're not demonstrating your value.
• 30:41
  There's nothing you can really hold people accountable.
• 30:44
  It's really fungible.
• 30:46
  And as the layoffs come and due to AI or the economy, you're in danger.
• 30:53
  But like the best salesperson on your team, there's proof there of what
• 30:59
  you know, you're doing sales, successful salespeople, you know, usually, you know, aren't ever in danger of losing their job.
• 31:07
  This has been a really good topic and you're such a wealth of knowledge about it.
• 31:12
  Whether it's because through consulting you've had to prove it many times or it's just of that great of interest to you, but you really have a lot of good information on it.
• 31:22
  I think this conversation really reinforces something that leaders needed to hear.
• 31:26
  Customer experience can't survive on good intentions alone.
• 31:30
  It has to be connected to outcomes.
• 31:32
  And if organizations want customer experience to be taken seriously, they have to move beyond scores, reports, presentations, and really start showing how the experience impacts
• 31:43
  loyalty, retention, referrals, and growth.
• 31:46
  Otherwise, we all just end up with lots of feedback and not much change, or you hope feedback.
• 31:52
  Sometimes you don't even get that.
• 31:54
  Right, right.
• 31:55
  much.
• 31:55
  Thanks so much listeners for joining us on this episode of the Customer Service Revolution podcast.
• 32:02
  And if your organization is trying to connect customer experience to measurable business results, again, visit thedjuliusgroup.com to learn more about our consulting, training,
• 32:12
  and the Customer Experience Executive Academy.
• 32:15
  And if you found this conversation helpful, be sure to subscribe, share this episode, and join us next time for more insights on how to create a world-class experience for your
• 32:25
  customers.
• 32:25
  and employees.
• 32:26
  Thanks for listening and thank you, John.
• 32:28
  Thank you.