CX and (What I Thought Was) the Generational Divide
Maintaining the integrity of human-based interactions in customer experience.
By: Shannon Jump (Manager, Journey Management)
My father-in-law got his first smartphone a couple years ago. He’s 72 from England, and I’m pretty sure he thinks a text message is a summons to call you from his landline, because that’s exactly what he’ll do every time you text him. “If I wanted to write a message,” he’ll say, “I’d send you an email.” Of course, he’d write said email from his desktop computer, not from the aforementioned smartphone, but at least it’s a few steps up from pen and paper.
When it comes to modern technology, he’s simply not a fan. “It’s too impersonal. It makes us lazy. It’s a scam, I don’t trust it.” All fair arguments, Mr. Jump. Technology — smart phones especially — has changed the world and change of that magnitude can be scary. Kids these days (I can’t believe I just used that term) have never known a world where the answer to everything wasn’t at their fingertips 24/7; where consumer data in all its many forms wasn’t the main ingredient in designing customer experiences. For my father-in-law, that’s death-con five on the creepy scale. Don’t even get me started on his concerns with AI…
As a Millennial myself, I’ve witnessed the rise of the internet and the birth of text messaging. Hopping online once meant suffering through the horrendous sounds of dial-up internet, and if you were lucky enough to have dual landlines and a split phone jack, you were keeping up with the Joneses. Today we complain when a website takes a second to load. We want things right here, right now. The world sure has changed, hasn’t it? We poke fun at ourselves all the time, reflecting on the way things used to be. We say things like, “back in my day…” and roll our eyes at the current generations who can’t fathom having grown up without Wi-Fi and electronic devices. Some of these changes in technology happened gradually enough that we had time to adapt and lean into them but sometimes I wonder if the collective, “we,” truly understands the impact technology has had on customer experience.
CX isn’t just digital
We hear ‘CX’ (customer experience) and many of us think of digital experiences. We do our shopping online, stream our favorite shows and movies (in many cases, without commercial ads), and take part in virtual events from the comfort of our own living rooms. We don’t often need to be in person to conduct business or even to sign our names on legal documents anymore.
These days, our sights are always set on the next big thing in technology. How can we make digital tools easier to use and how can we build them more efficiently, faster than our competitors? It’s like that famous line in Field of Dreams, “If you build it, they will come.” That’s what we do now; we build new experiences, most often in the digital landscape, and we do it on an iterative scale — we do it agile. We attract customers based on what we build, and we keep them based on how we service them within that experience. We see CX in the digital space every day, in many different forms, and we put a heavy emphasis on mobile platforms — thanks to that smartphone that’s always in our hands — because as customers, most often the mobile experience is our first source of truth.
We pick up our smartphones an average of 144 times per day. One hundred and forty-four times! We use them constantly; we depend on them to the nth degree. But think about this: everything you do on your smartphone is a customer experience. Every. Single. Thing. From a CX perspective, that’s a lot of influence in one single device.
Research tells us that mobile tools are how companies stay relevant, how they compete in their respective markets, that they’re what people want. So together we’ve developed tools like chat bots and virtual assistants and innovative elements like one-click purchase experiences (thank you, Amazon). We have apps for everything. All these things are great, sure; they reduce overhead costs, increase speed to market, and get us — as the impatient consumers that we are — what we need a heck of a lot quicker. But were they meant to replace the human elements of CX, or to complement them?
Because CX isn’t just digital. CX is every aspect of a brand, and that includes customer service. That includes people and how we feel as we engage with each other.
Welcome to the plot twist
When I started drafting this article, I figured this would be a good spot for the plot twist; the turning point where I’d tell you that we can’t just build for the future, that we have to build for the now, too. This was where the proverbial generational divide I mentioned in my catchy headline would come into play. I’d remind you about my father-in-law and how he doesn’t want to conduct business on his mobile phone, how he barely knows how to use it. I was going to ask you to keep him and others like him in mind as you build customer experiences, as you imagine the future of your companies. I thought that’s what this whole article was going to be about; caring for those who came before us, making sure that when we think about CX, we think about the needs of older generations, too. I was going to tell you that we can’t lose sight of today’s customers while we build for tomorrow. That we have to think about these experiences on a human level, and that means we can’t just solve for digital.
But then I thought about it some more, and I realized it’s not even about generations and caring for our Baby Boomers or the top end of Gen Xers who might prefer working with humans over machines. It’s about caring for all of us, for all generations.
It’s thinking back on the good ‘ole days and remembering how we used to interact with each other on a daily basis. How we used to put our phones down to talk to one another and write in complete sentences and have patience with customer service reps. It’s making sure our children and the next generation of children have the necessary people skills to navigate life and business and relationships. That they don’t suffer from social anxiety when they jump the nest and go out into the real world. Because today’s CX? Today’s CX makes it so easy for us not to do that. We rely on modern technology and apps and machines to do those things for us so much that our human-based experiences are suffering.
Unplug for a bit
I personally make it a point to unplug sometimes, to silence notifications or turn off my phone. Sometimes I even leave home without it (gasp!). And that’s something I think we should all do more often. Trust me, it’s not as scary as it sounds. I unplug in other ways, too, and would challenge you to give these things a try:
· Don’t reach for your phone when you’re left alone in a room. Admit it, it’s the first thing most of us do the second we’re on our own in a public space. While waiting at the doctor’s office, the dentist, or even when our date scampers off to the restroom. Be okay with being alone.
· Live in the moment. Take a few extra minutes to say hello to people — and then surprise them by saying more than that. Ask how they’re doing, how their kids are. Do some networking, or simply have a verbal conversation instead of texting.
· Choose registers with real live people at them. Don’t wrestle with the self-checkout machine at the grocery store. Take the pressure off yourself and let the cashier do their thing instead.
My point is this: As much as we may not want to admit it, this DIY way of life isn’t one size fits all — we still need each other. Advanced technology has given us countless opportunities to improve efficiencies; it’s simplified a lot of mundane, everyday tasks with a direct impact to our bottom line, and that’s all great — yay us! But we can’t lose sight of the old way — the human way — of working in the meantime.
Customer experience extends well beyond digital tools
It’s about how we feel as we engage with these tools, with companies, their employees, and with each other. It’s about human emotions like empathy and making meaningful connections — even if they’re face-to-face. Customer experience still needs to exist at the human level, and there are ways to make sure people-driven interactions co-exist within our digital landscapes.
Prudential’s Journey Management team utilizes practices like journey mapping and behavioral science to better understand our customers. We develop personas and provide human-based insights to our designers and development teams as they build experiences for our customers. But we provide optionality, too. We let our customers choose their own path, be it self-service tools, face-to-face interactions with our experienced advisors, or a mix of hybrid engagement. We meet customers where they are and incorporate human interaction into our practices to match their individual needs. Why? Because we live in an experience economy and people buy the experience as well as the product itself. And we’re looking to build lifelong relationships with our customers.
So how do we get there?
How do we ensure the integrity of the human elements remain intact as CX continues to evolve? I won’t claim to have all the answers, but I’m happy to share a handful of our insights with you.
· Empathy for the win; genuine connections go a long way.
· Experience economy; the customer experience needs to be top of mind to build long-lasting relationships.
· Data-driven engagement; use consumer data to stay connected with customers and drive meaningful engagement.
· Support still matters beyond the purchase journey. Sometimes that’s in the form of customer service reps, sometimes it’s through tools like chat bots or virtual assistants.
· Keep it simple; customers often need to engage on the go. Platforms should be intuitive and easy to use.
Back to basics
While digital tools have become a way of life and AI (Artificial Intelligence) is about to take over the world, we can’t miss the mark on human interaction. If the concept of personalization means I want companies to know me, understand me, and anticipate my needs — essentially using empathy to understand my values and creating experiences that align with them — there needs to be a human behind that empathy for it to be sincere. And sometimes personalization means using humans instead of tech, not just putting the human elements behind technology. That might mean a phone call from one of our advisors instead of a chatbot, and that’s okay. Digital is great, and it’s necessary to survive in today’s modern world, but for some customers, we simply need to get back to basics.
I like to think I’m pretty good at adapting to modern tech (my 19-year-old would probably tell you otherwise), but something tells me I’ll be in my father-in-law’s shoes before I know it. And when that time comes, I hope humans will still be around to tie them for me.
