I heard this question while speaking to a group not too long ago. It’s a great – and surprisingly complex – inquiry. When I quizzed the group, here are a few ideas I heard: “The minute someone decides to buy, that’s when they become a customer.” “The first time the customer has a problem or [...]

I was lured into a new show on CBS last night after the Superbowl was over and the kids were tucked in. Undercover Boss debuted last night and it was surprisingly compelling. The idea is simple. A big-wig executive from a major corporation goes undercover for a week to experience what life is like for [...]

Over the last several days, I’ve been watching the Net Promoter Score conference #NPS2010 tweets and updates. (Not familiar with NPS? Check it out here.) Just the tweets themselves have been filled with insight and education, so I can only imagine how great the conference was! One well-tweeted bit of wisdom came from the Steve [...]

I was honored to be interviewed for B2BVoices – an excellent blog dedicated to “a meaningful conversation among PR pros, marketers and social media thought leaders in the B2B space.” It was a fun conversation. Let me know what you think – I’ve re-posted the interview in its entirety here. Listening & Responding to Customers: [...]

I feel focused on so many things sometimes, but professionally I always come back to the experience. How does the experience you’re presenting impact your customers, your employees, your bottom line? A lot of people talk about this subject but few really get it, in my humble opinion. So I follow the ones that get [...]

Last week, the talented Valeria Maltoni delivered an outstanding blog post on customer experience, titled Customer Experience More Important Than Ever. I commented there to describe what I think is the biggest challenge of any customer experience endeavor – overcoming the overwhelm. And this got me thinking. How do you, as the change agent you [...]

My friend and I were having one of those crazy conversations that ambled between a pity party and a gratitude gab fest. We compared notes on how horrendous the year had been in some ways but thanked heaven for the roof over our head, the friends to lament with, and the family to love. It [...]

It’s not rocket science to know that employee engagement is one of the main influencers of your customer’s experience. But today, facing negative news almost constantly, companies are retaining employees for all the wrong reasons. Employees are chomping at the bit, waiting for the economy to improve so they can find the next job. The [...]

A concert at Chicago’s Symphony Center got me thinking. It was the 15th annual Welcome Yule celebration. A full choir, children’s choir (including my niece and nephew) and orchestra provided a great celebration for Christmas in Chicago. I was sitting next to a 5 year old  (my own) and each time I thought we were [...]

Yesterday I spent a great day with loads of smart people at Supergenius, the Word-of-Mouth (WOM) conference hosted by Gaspedal. After attending 11 amazing sessions, I decided to share my Top 11 Ideas here. One thing to note – many of the speakers were consistent in messages. So while I give credit here to these [...]