Managing the Customer Experience

This report explores the importance of managing customer experience in the service sector, focusing on the use of digital technology and CRM systems. It analyzes customer service strategies used by hotels, demonstrating how these strategies contribute to meeting customer needs and achieving business standards.

Managing the customer
experience
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Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................1
P5 Examination of digital technology is engaged in managing customer experience in the
service sector along with some specific examples of consumer relationship management
(CRM) System ......................................................................................................................1
P6. Illustration of customer service strategies in a service sector..........................................4
P7. How customer service strategies help in meeting the needs of the customers and meet up
the business standard..............................................................................................................6
REFERENCES................................................................................................................................9

INTRODUCTION
Managing customer experience is related to effectively manage and evaluate consumer
experience related to a product and service utilized by them (Goodman, 2019). A successful
consumer experience management needs an overall 360degree analysation of consumer. This can
be done by, effectively understanding customers need, the creation of a consumer journey map
and capturing regular feedback in order to track consumer satisfaction. In simple terms, customer
experience management is a process of product integration in between a company a consumer. In
this report discussions will be made on, utilization of digital technology in order to manage
customer experience in service sector accompanied with examples. Also, the illustration of
customer service strategies in the service sector and how customer service strategies help in
meeting the needs of the customers and meet up the business standard.
P5 Examination of digital technology is engaged in managing customer experience in the service
sector along with some specific examples of consumer relationship management (CRM)
System
Managing customer experience is related to effectively manage and evaluate consumer
experience related to a product and service utilized by them (Goodman, 2019). A successful
consumer experience management needs an overall 360degree analysation of consumer. This can
be done by, effectively understanding customers need, the creation of a consumer journey map
and capturing regular feedback in order to track consumer satisfaction. In simple terms, customer
experience management is a process of product integration in between a company a consumer. In
this report discussions will be made on, utilization of digital technology in order to manage
customer experience in service sector accompanied with examples. Also, the illustration of
customer service strategies in the service sector and how customer service strategies help in
meeting the needs of the customers and meet up the business standard.
Three CRM system:
Operational: it refers to the services which allow a firm to take care of their customers.
Further it also provides support to various business process such as marketing, sales. Further it
mainly focus on automation, improvement and enhancement of a business processes that are
based on customer supporting. Even this system also focus on direct interaction of the customers
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and these includes face to face personal interaction, interaction through any website or call
centres.
Analytical : it is the subset in which data is collected by the firm about their customer
relation with a goal of raising customer satisfaction and their customer retention rate as well.
Even this also provide customer segmentation and divide the customers into those who may or
may not utilize the services again and again.
Collaborative: this CRM system basically deal with temporal relation and integration of
customer interaction and channels of communication such as phone, email. Thus it helps to
increase and improve customer retention and liberty.
Features of Customer Relationship Management Systems:
Customer needs:
In order to ensure long term sustainability, it is important for an organisation to regularly
keep on evaluating their customers’ needs as to offer them most advanced and innovative
products and services (Peppers and Rogers, 2016).
Customer complaints:
In order to retain consumers for long run it is important for organisations to carefully
listen and solve grievances and issues of customers in order to retain their loyalty towards
company and provide them ultimate satisfaction.
Customer satisfaction:
CRM also helps to satisfy the needs of customers such that it can be measured of how the
needs and responses are collaborated and can be delivered to excel customer expectation. That is
why in this modern era, customer satisfaction is an important performance exponent which can
be explain as more is the customer satisfaction, more the business and bonding with customers.
Customer service:
In quoted firm, customer service is a process of delivering information as well as services
and customer satisfaction is also depend upon the quality of service that is provided by the
suppliers. Moreover, if the quality and trend of service that further go beyond the expectation of
the customers then only the firm supposed to have good business with their loyal customers.
Importance of Digital technology:
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 Digital technology helps to keep the customers up to date such that the company update
their new products and latest changes in email or website then it also help keep people
aware.
 Using digital technology, the company will deliver the products and services immediately
to their customers.
 Using digital technology, the business streamline the operations and also cut down the
cost internally thus, in this way it helps to reduce the extra cost of the company's product.
 With the help of Digital Marketing companies can effectively raise their brand awareness
with the help of which they can find new targeted market.
Organisation can rapidly boost their sales margin with the use of various social media sites as to
attract numerous customers from different geographical locations.
Customer Relationship Management (CRM) is a process in which regular complaints and
issues of customers are resolved as to effectively manage and build a smooth functioning with
consumers (Homburg and Kuehnl, 2017). Organisations can take advantages of digital
Technology as to safe history of consumer transactions and record their likes and dislikes as to
effectively target new customers and maximise their sale volume. There are some certain Digital
Marketing sources with the help of which organisations can effectively raise their CRM
experience system:
Email Marketing:
Organisations by sending welcome emails to customers in which they can include
information about their company and products and services. Along with this companies can ask
for guest feedbacks in order to take their opinions and views related to products and services.
Social Media Marketing:
Organisation by taking advantages of various social media platforms like, Google+,
Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest as to showcase information, videos, photos of their clients to
numerous customers including VIP and special client as to attract them towards their products
and services.
Display Marketing:
it is the advertising on a website or a social media through some banners and its main
purpose is to deliver the general advertisement to the site visitors.
Affiliate Marketing:
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It is that type of performance where a business reward one or more to affiliate each
visitors. Further it is an online sales tactics which owner uses to increases their sales by allowing
other targeting the same audience as well.
Impact of digital content and speed on business:
 This creates huge revenue opportunity such that With the help of Digital Technology
organisation can improve their Customer Relationship Management by sending them
customised marketing messages and offers.
 Everyone is getting online and by using digital marketing or advertisement, company is
also boost up the sales and can lead to wide range of customers in limited time.
 It has been analysed that digital technology is consider one of the more affordable
methods that reach a wider audience and as compared to word of mouth advertisement,
digital technology creates positive impact upon the business performance.
P6. Illustration of customer service strategies in a service sector
A. Effective customer experience management strategies used by hotels in hospitality industry
are as follows:
 Assessing the market needs – in order to manage effective customer experience the Taj
hotel must first assess the market needs such as what would be the demand for rooms in
the upcoming month so as to determine the room occupancy of the hotel, find out about
the facilities that are desired by the customers now- a- days such as individual pool with
the room, etc. thus, it is very important to assess the market needs in order to maximise
the effective customer experience.
 Experience mapping – it may be defined as an visualisation of an experience that a
'generic' person undergoes towards the attainment of goal. It helps in understanding what
facilities or which kind of experience would motivate the customers to come and avail the
services(Homburg, Jozić and Kuehnl, 2017). Furthermore, it is very important to carry
out experience mapping by the hotel in order to get the exact information about the
experience undergone by the customer at the hotel which in turn will help in improving
the services where the hotel finds any loophole and this in turn will help in effective
customer experience management.
 Touch point analysis – touch point is a point through which the consumer interacts with
the business in order to avail the facilities or because of any other reason through face to
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face interaction or online interaction. Touchpoint analysis gives the customers an
opportunity to form prior perception and opinion regarding the services provided by the
hotel. This is one of the most important analysis as it helps in determining the degree of
customer experience.
B. Customer service management strategies that are used by a business in order to improve
customer engagement are as follows:
 Create a customer service vision – it is the most important strategy as it is created in
order to provide clear direction to employees. It helps in pooling all the efforts and
working towards the achievement of common customer service vision. Creation of the
service vision is a very crucial task and involves lot of elements which has to be taken
care of regarding formation of the vision statement. This plays a very major role towards
improving the customer engagement(Ren and et.al., 2016).
 Assess the customer needs – it is very important for Taj hotel to assess the needs of the
customers appropriately so that efforts could be made to provide the services to them as
per their desire and increase their engagement because if the company fails to identify
the need of its customers then it wont be able to fulfil their needs. Hence, in order to
keep them satisfied and increase their engagement; hotel has to assess the need of its
customers appropriately.
 Hire the right employees – The Taj should hire those employees which are the best
suitable for the available job role. In order to hire most suitable candidate the hotel
should take various kinds of test such as employment test, behaviour test and attitude test
so as to check the compatibility of the employees and select the best candidate from the
available lot which possesses the skills as demanded by the job.
 Set goals for customer service – one of the most important strategy of customer service
management is to set a SMART goal so that all the activities would be carried out in a
direction towards the achievement of goal(Kandampully, Zhang and Jaakkola, 2018).
Goals should be such that they should be specific and could be measured appropriately
so that whether the goal is achieved or not could be found and then actions could be
taken. Further, too easy goals should not be established rather goals which are
competitive and which may lead the hotel towards new heights should be established so
as to improve customer engagement.
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 Train the service skills – employees of the hotel industry should be given proper
training so that they can develop their skills and provide better services to customers in
order to maximise the satisfaction level and experience of the customers so that they visit
the hotel again(Rahimi and Kozak, 2017). Proper and systematic training programme
should be carried out, in order to develop job skills as well as people skills. This is not an
area where the hotel should do cost cutting rather it should focus on more investment on
training of its employees because it will ultimately contribute towards achievement of
organisational objectives effectively and efficiently.
 Attend to negative reviews – hotel industry should acknowledge the complains from
the customers and then in order to resolve them, first listen to all the problems actively
and then make sincere efforts to solve them and finally make sure that such mistakes
doesn't repeat again because if these mistakes would remain unheard or unattended then
it will have a negative impact on the image of the hotel.
P7. How customer service strategies help in meeting the needs of the customers and meet up the
business standard
Customer service strategies that help in meeting the needs of the customers and business
standards are as follows:
Assess the customer needs – The hotel carries out effective market research in order to
assess the needs of the customers and provide services to them in such a way that their needs get
fulfilled and they achieve the business standard to make maximum utilisation of available
resources and make minimum waste.
For example: now a days people are very concerned towards their health, so kitchen
department should make sure while preparing food that it is very healthy such as by cooking in
less oil and butter (Peng, Zhao and Mattila, 2015). Hence, this will helping in fulfilling the needs
of the customers as well as in meeting the business standard such as by preparing food in extra
oil and butter will increase the cost of food as well as it will have a negative impact on the health
of the customer because of consuming high calorie food. Thus, the hotel should make sure
optimum utilization of resources to fulfil the needs of the customers.
Hire the right employees – Taj hotel should hire the right person for the right position in
order to meet the business standard of improving efficiency. In order to hire the right employees,
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there would be various test that would be carried out such as employment test, behaviours test
and personality test and then best employee from the available lot would be selected which in
turn will help in meeting the needs of the customer and business standard.
For example: in order to hire an employee for house keeping department, the company
should make sure that the employee has complete information regarding cleanliness, hygiene,
etc; so that customers needs could be fulfilled at the first time only and the chances of complain
would be minimum which in turn will help in improving the efficiency of the hotel.
Set goals for customer service – the hotel laid down the smart goals in order to provide
better customer service so as fulfil the needs of the customers and meet the business standard of
providing quality services.
For example: kitchen department of Taj hotel has decided to cover all the food items
with seal when not in use so as to ensure food doesn't get spoiled because of dust or any other
particle or insects which will in turn help in achieving the business standard that is to provide
quality services.
Train the service skills – Taj hotel has paid lot of emphasis in order to train the service
skills of its employees by scheduling various training programmes for developing their job as
well as person skills so as to meet its business standard regarding satisfaction of customer
expectation(Chen and Wu, 2016).
For example: if a customer arrives and is staying at the hotel. The need of the customer
is that he/she wants an extra bed and for that purpose he/she makes a conversation with the
employee working at the company. If the worker is unskilled then on being asked for the
requirement of extra bed, response would be such that I have to ask my superiors and then
inform you back which may lead to creation of negative image of the company in the mind of
customer. On the other hand, if the worker is skilled then the response would be different such as
if you want an extra bed then you have to pay certain extra money. Thus, in order to fulfil the
business standard such as fulfilment of customer expectation, it is very important to train the
employees of the company appropriately.
Attend to negative reviews – the hotel welcomes all the complains or negative reviews
of the company so as to attend them and resolve them in order to achieve the business standard
of providing customer satisfaction.
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For example: if a customers has arrived at a hotel to enjoy his/ her vacation but
undergoes an unpleasant experience as the food didn't taste good, in such a case the hotel should
address his/her problem and give the person food as per desired by him at free of cost and do
apologise for the mistakes; this will not only help in developing the satisfaction of the employees
but also will contribute towards fulfilling the need of the customers. Further, the efforts would be
made so that these kinds of mistakes doesn't repeat in future and would help in achieving the
business standard of providing customer satisfaction.
Create a customer service vision – The Taj hotel has created a customer service vision
in order to provide clear direction to employees so that they could work towards satisfaction of
the needs of the customers and achievement of the business standard such as expanding its
services in various other untouched countries.
For example: the hotel wants to expand its market, then it has start purchasing property
in other countries as well as start recruiting employees from the country where it is planning to
start it services. Thus, this help in satisfaction of customer needs as well as achievement of
business standard(Assaf and et.al., 2015).
CONCLUSION
The report has been concluded that by managing customer relationship organisations
can effectively raise their overall productivity and profitability. For this digital media plays a key
essential role in order to grab the attention of large consumer base form different geographical
locations. This will aid companies to raise their effectiveness and proficiencies to great extent.
Also, I have been presented an illustration of customer service strategies in the service sector and
how customer service strategies help in meeting the needs of the customers and meet up the
business standard.
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REFERENCES
Books and journal
Ren, L. and et.al., 2016. Exploring customer experience with budget hotels: Dimensionality and
satisfaction. International Journal of Hospitality Management. 52. pp.13-23.
Rahimi, R. and Kozak, M., 2017. Impact of customer relationship management on customer
satisfaction: The case of a budget hotel chain. Journal of Travel & Tourism Marketing. 34(1).
pp.40-51.
Peng, J., Zhao, X. and Mattila, A.S., 2015. Improving service management in budget
hotels. International journal of hospitality management. 49. pp.139-148.
Chen, J.H. and Wu, S.I., 2016. The impact of customer relationship management and internal
marketing on business performance: a comparison of lodging industries. Total Quality
Management & Business Excellence. 27(1-2). pp.17-33.
Assaf, A.G. and et.al., 2015. The effects of customer voice on hotel performance. International
Journal of Hospitality Management. 44. pp.77-83.
Kandampully, J., Zhang, T. and Jaakkola, E., 2018. Customer experience management in
hospitality: A literature synthesis, new understanding and research agenda. International Journal
of Contemporary Hospitality Management. 30(1). pp.21-56.
Homburg, C., Jozić, D. and Kuehnl, C., 2017. Customer experience management: toward
implementing an evolving marketing concept. Journal of the Academy of Marketing
Science. 45(3). pp.377-401.
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