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Build a Strong Technology Foundation for Customer Experience Management

Design an end-to-end technology strategy to drive sales revenue, enhance marketing effectiveness, and create compelling experiences for your customers.

Client Challenge

  • Technology is a fundamental enabler of an organization’s customer experience management (CXM) strategy. However, many IT departments fail to take a systematic approach when building a portfolio of applications for supporting marketing, sales, and customer service functions.
  • The result is a costly, ineffective, and piecemeal approach to CXM application deployment (including high-profile applications like CRM).

Our Advice

Critical Insight

  • IT must work in lockstep with their counterparts in marketing, sales, and customer service to define a unified vision and strategic requirements for enabling a strong CXM program.
  • To deploy applications that specifically align with the needs of the organization’s customers, IT leaders must work with the business to define and understand customer personas and common interaction scenarios. CXM applications are mission critical and failing to link them to customer needs can have a detrimental effect on customer satisfaction and ultimately, revenue.
  • IT must act as a valued partner to the business in creating a portfolio of CXM applications that are cost effective.
  • Organizations should create a repeatable framework for CXM application deployment that addresses critical issues, including the integration ecosystem, customer data quality, dashboards and analytics, and end-user adoption.

Impact and Result

  • Establish strong application alignment to strategic requirements for CXM that is based on concrete customer personas.
  • Improve underlying business metrics across marketing, sales, and service, including customer acquisition, retention, and satisfaction metrics.
  • Better align IT with customer experience needs.

Research & Tools

Start here – read the Executive Brief

Read our concise Executive Brief to find out why you should build a strong technology foundation for CXM, review Info-Tech’s methodology, and understand the four ways we can support you in completing this project.

Name Actions
Build a Strong Technology Foundation for Customer Experience Management – Executive Brief
Build a Strong Technology Foundation for Customer Experience Management – Phases 1-3
Build a Strong Technology Foundation for Customer Experience Management – Phases 1-3

1. Drive value with CXM

Understand the benefits of a robust CXM strategy.

Name Actions
Build a Strong Technology Foundation for Customer Experience Management – Phase 1: Drive Value with CXM
CXM Strategy Stakeholder Presentation Template
CXM Strategy Project Charter Template

2. Create the framework

Identify drivers and objectives for CXM using a persona-driven approach and deploy the right applications to meet those objectives.

Name Actions
Build a Strong Technology Foundation for Customer Experience Management – Phase 2: Create the Framework
CXM Business Process Shortlisting Tool
CXM Portfolio Designer

3. Finalize the framework

Complete the initiatives roadmap for CXM.

Name Actions
Build a Strong Technology Foundation for Customer Experience Management – Phase 3: Finalize the Framework

Onsite Workshop: Build a Strong Technology Foundation for Customer Experience Management

Onsite workshops offer an easy way to accelerate your project. If you are unable to do the project yourself, and a Guided Implementation isn't enough, we offer low-cost onsite delivery of our project workshops. We take you through every phase of your project and ensure that you have a roadmap in place to complete your project successfully.

Do-It-Yourself Implementation

The slides in this Best Practice Blueprint will walk you step-by-step through every phase of your project with supporting tools and templates ready for you to use.

Project Accelerator Workshop

You can also use this Best Practice Blueprint to facilitate your own project accelerator workshop within your organization using the workshop slides and facilitation instructions provided in the Appendix.

Module 1: Create the Vision for CXM Technology Enablement

The Purpose

  • Establish a consistent vision across IT, marketing, sales, and customer service for CXM technology enablement.

Key Benefits Achieved

  • A clear understanding of key business and technology drivers for CXM.

Activities Outputs
1.1 CXM fireside chat
1.2 CXM business drivers
1.3 CXM vision statement
  • CXM vision statement
1.4 Project structure
  • CXM project charter

Module 2: Conduct the Environmental Scan and Internal Review

The Purpose

  • Create a set of strategic requirements for CXM based on a thorough external market scan and internal capabilities assessment.

Key Benefits Achieved

  • Well-defined technology requirements based on rigorous, multi-faceted analysis.

Activities Outputs
2.1 PEST analysis
2.2 Competitive analysis
2.3 Market and trend analysis
  • Completed external analysis
  • Strategic requirements (from external analysis)
2.4 SWOT analysis
2.5 VRIO analysis
  • Completed internal review
2.6 Channel map
  • Channel interaction map

Module 3: Build Customer Personas and Scenarios

The Purpose

  • Augment strategic requirements through customer persona and scenario development.

Key Benefits Achieved

  • Functional requirements aligned to supporting steps in customer interaction scenarios.

Activities Outputs
3.1 Persona development
3.2 Scenario development
  • Personas and scenarios
3.3 Requirements definition for CXM
  • Strategic requirements (based on personas)

Module 4: Create the CXM Application Portfolio

The Purpose

  • Using the requirements identified in the preceding modules, build a future-state application inventory for CXM.

Key Benefits Achieved

  • A cohesive, rationalized portfolio of customer interaction applications that aligns with identified requirements and allows investment (or rationalization) decisions to be made.

Activities Outputs
4.1 Build business process maps
  • Business process maps
4.2 Review application satisfaction
  • Application satisfaction diagnostic
4.3 Create the CXM application portfolio
4.4 Prioritize applications
  • Prioritized CXM application portfolio

Module 5: Review Best Practices and Confirm Initiatives

The Purpose

  • Establish repeatable best practices for CXM applications in areas such as data management and end-user adoption.

Key Benefits Achieved

  • Best practices for rollout of new CXM applications.
  • A prioritized initiatives roadmap.

Activities Outputs
5.1 Create data integration map
  • Integration map for CXM
5.2 Define adoption best practices
  • End-user adoption plan
5.3 Build initiatives roadmap
5.4 Confirm initiatives roadmap
  • Initiatives roadmap

Testimonials

I think it was good, we probably could have connected via email prior so I could have prepped some discussion points.

Werner Co. viaWorkshop

Great conversation with Ben on CX - will definitely schedule more time as we evolve our CX programs.

Republic Services Procurement, Inc. viaWorkshop

Call was misdirected, but we made the most of the time. Analyst was able to adapt and provide a perspective and redirect to the right analysts.

Owens Corning viaWorkshop

Ben is very knowledgable and thorough

Fusion Superplex viaWorkshop

Very nice facilitation and enjoyable session but I am not sure the required level of depth or insight in the resulting strategy will be sufficient.

Government of Yukon viaWorkshop