I am surprised that the much advertised experiental retail is not too much visible in the brick-and-mortar stores. The digital platforms have improved the customer experience greatly by e.g. simplifying the shopping process, improving search algorithms and introducing chatbots, just to name a few. But what has happened in physical stores – nearly nothing. Clearly […]
Reading Linked In and business magazines you will see headlines like: “The retail apocalypse”, “The end of retail as we know it” and “Online retail eats offline retail for breakfast”. These headlines are used to tempt people reading the articles, but they are wrong. Retail is not going to disappear and online and offline are […]
I know it, you know it and we all know it: we have had our eyes and ears full of: “ We have to create great customer experience to our customers, do something!” Outstanding customer experience is the hot issue right now. There are hundreds of books, courses, webinars etc. about how to create a […]
Customer experience is not a single event, when customer jumps for joy and exclaims: ”This was a wonderful experience!” Instead customer experience is built from all the moments when customer meets the brand or brand envoy during the shopping or service process. Hence the key issues in outstanding customer experience are well-planned, well-practiced, smooth and […]
The business is now heavily networked and we operate with many different partners. The partnership is based on trust, not agreements, although those are needed sometimes too. I am not quite sure that we have the courage to trust to our partners, staff, each other or customers. Just to give a few examples: Do we […]
Being a professional is a very good recommendation to get from your customers. During the years I have been working with hundreds of different business people, some are professionals some are not. I have always liked very much working with true professionals, although I have not always liked the people personally. Clearly, professionals have to […]
When was the last time that you felt really, I mean really happy? We are online 24/7, both at work and at leisure. The online feed is full of good and unfortunately also bad news. For many of us it is very difficult to get unplugged and just enjoy the moment. We seem to look […]
(picture from the collections of Helsinki City Museum) Retail in some form has been present at least 5000 years. This means that customer service have also been available about the same time period. So you would think that customer service should be honed to excellence – we have had time to develop it at least […]
Running a retail store is a complex business. It is the fact especially now, when the whole retail sector is in turmoil. In order to find some order for making determined business, you have to have sound basis for the actions you execute in the store. It is even more important for the customer – […]
(English text after the Finnish one) Asiakaskokemus on nyt kaikkein kuuminta myös kivijalkakaupassa. Asiakaskokemus rakentuu asiakkaan kokemasta kaupassa asioinnista, jossa keskeisessä roolissa ovat myymälän toimivuus sekä kaupan tuottama palvelu – joko ihmisten tai teknologian voimin. Kokemuksessa on kyse siis asioinnin rationaalisesta helppoudesta ja emotionaalisesta ”fiiliksestä”. Kenties vähemmälle huomiolle on jäänyt itse myymälän puitteiden vaikutus […]