Customer Experience

In the field of business and commerce, customer experience has become an area of keen interest as it influences or affects the acceptability of a company's products or services to its market. Customer experience refers to the total of all interactions a customer has with a product or service and its providers. It is the perception formed, either consciously or not, by a customer while interacting with a brand over a length of time. For instance, if a customer is treated to periodic freebies and generous offers for buying a product or using services, we will observe that the good experience that customer has will win his or her loyalty in favour of such. The same goes otherwise for a negative customer experience.

Customer experience begins from the time the customer is exposed to a product or a brand. It is either the customer seeks out the product himself due to a need or the product gets introduced to a potential customer through mediums of advertising and marketing. Either way, the customer already has an expectation by opting for such a product amidst others. Whether or not the expectation is met, exceeded or not will contribute to the customer experience. The saying 'first impression matters' becomes very evident because it is unlikely that customers disregard their first experience, regardless of the subsequent ones.

For companies or brands that are customer-oriented, there is a need to understand customer experience and learn strategies to improve this, especially by those who represent the brand at any level and those involved in customer relationship management. Some brands build customer experience through the media, either mass media or social media, or through direct interaction such as over-the-counter interaction or through phone customer care services, as well as delivery agent services for retail and direct service providing. Customer experience, (also regarded as CX), has thus become an area that has been investigated into and professionally studied to increase customers' loyalty and products gaining more popularity, hence leading to increased profitability of a brand's products and/or services.

Also, in manipulating customer experience, brand building and development becomes highly important, such that will covertly appeal to customers or observers and ensure recognition, particularly in multiple competitors situation. Ensuring recognition for subsequent interactions is one of the first steps to creating a good experience for customers who are first timers or uninformed retailers. the hat is to say, proper branding is a sure way to influence the customer experience.

Customer experience, however, goes beyond introducing special offers and low prices. It comprises all the perceptions gathered by a customer when in direct or indirect contact with anything or anyone that can be attributed to a product or service. As a result, there is the need for a company to maintain a positive reputation from the lowest level to the top so as to be on best terms with customers and create an experience that will always be positively remembered and spoken about.