In a panel moderated by Mina Fader, Managing Director, Baker Retailing Center, The Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, four industry leaders from three different continents came together to discuss the consumer at scale. Myf Bagnold, Group CMO, Cenomi Group, Patrick Bousquet-Chavanne, President & Chief Executive Officer, ESW Americas, Richard Simonin, Vice Chairman, Al Tayer Retail Dubai and Michael Ward, Managing Director, Harrods conversed on how the customer experience can be redefined across all platforms.
The challenges for a great customers’ experience.
The changing landscape has brought challenges to the retail consumer as well as the retail companies. Customers expect more from brands and their feedback needs to be directly added to the backbone of the company’s plan. They need to define their ecosystem and how they approach new customers. Excuses can no longer be made, and brands must follow the growth pattern, or they get left behind.
Brands need to take into consideration that training their staff is a very crucial part of the customer experience. Customers interact with their staff both online and offline, thus, they represent the company and the impression that is left behind is the one the customer associates with the brand. If that is not consistent with the brand’s identity, the results are adverse for the company.
Taking risks, changing your business model and really listening to the customer to the point where you are experiential both physically and virtually can be very challenging but that is the way forward, the way to succeed.
Customer Engagement both Online and Offline
A seamless experience for both online and offline is the real goal for all the players in the retail business. But how can that be achieved when customers tend to blend both worlds when making one single purchase? Personalization is the key; both in stores and online, the customer has to navigate their way to what they want efficiently and effectively. When it comes to brick-and-mortar, you have the customer in front of you and therefore the experience can be more tailored. When it comes to online this is harder to accomplish so your call center, your online customer platform becomes your brand’s image.
Another key element for companies is for them to define their core DNA, what it is exactly that they are offering to their consumers. Once that is achieved, once convergence of all touchpoints is accomplished, the result is a great brand experience.
Retail is all about augmenting dwell time, whether that is on the website or in the physical store. The more time one spends on either platform, the more it converts to spend and sales for the company.
All in all, customer experience, whether you are a small company or a big conglomerate, will always be the lasting impression left behind for the consumers, so investing your efforts in this is of paramount importance.
Customer experience has to be as agnostic as customers are in terms of how they shop, and the experience that a customer has in a physical store, online, through a telephone call or email has to be consistent. From a retail perspective, our vision has to be to create that perfect ecosystem which is seamless, and which treats and explains to customers in exactly the same way whatever touchpoint they come to us from. 
