Cutting Customer Irritation and Maintaining Authenticity

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Introduction - message from the editor

Full list of breakfast roundtable attendees:

Chair: Ben Sillitoe, editor, Essential RetailDave Abbott, retail omnichannel manager, Dune GroupCaroline Baldwin, digital features editor, Essential RetailMarcel Borlin, chief technology officer, CarpetrightChris Huntingford, customer relationship management (CRM) consultant, Hitachi SolutionsCarl Knibbs, head of design & product, Tesco LabsNeil McGeough, technical programme manager, Tesco Jinna Mistry, business development director, Hitachi SolutionsKate Stilborn, customer service & operations director, Blackwell’s

With shoppers more discerning and demanding than they have ever been before, retailers are looking at ways of cutting customer irritation as a route to success and forging long-term consumer relationships.

But retail businesses need to strike the balance between selling as much as they can and fostering the right atmosphere around their brands to ensure shoppers believe in their proposition and establish an emotional connection with their offering.

Access to business intelligence in real-time is fast becoming a differentiating factor between the companies growing sales and margins and those losing market share. In a world of the promiscuous shopper, organisations need to do all they can to personalise their offering in an authentic way and present consumers with the best options before, during and after their shopping trips.

Essential Retail had the privilege of hosting a breakfast roundtable meeting, in conjunction with Hitachi Solutions, alongside some of the UK’s largest retailers. Companies such as Tesco, Carpetright, Dune Group and Blackwell’s were involved in the discussion which looked at how authentic retailer-consumer interaction is critical if shoppers are going to return to a brand.

Under the wider subject of Cutting Customer Irritation, the event looked in detail at how to develop authentic shopping experiences, the loyalty vs. advocacy debate, personalisation, and how retailers are changing their boardroom structures to deal with the modern shopper. Customer director, head of customer experience and chief customer officer were job titles that did not exist only five years ago, but they are increasingly cropping up as shoppers find new ways of interacting with brands.

The following pages are dedicated to key points raised in the roundtable discussions and the wider issues surrounding the conversation. This is the second of two white papers dedicated to the subject: download part one here.

Ben SillitoeEditor, Essential Retail essentialretail.com

Cutting Customer Irritation and Maintaining Authenticity

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Cutting customer irritation – mixing the retail basics with innovationDuring the roundtable debate it was acknowledged that some of the new digital retailer innovations, revolving around same-day and hourly delivery from the likes of Amazon, Argos, Deliveroo and UberEats, are “game changing” for the industry, but there were multiple areas identified where predominantly store-based retailers can win the battle for shopper spend over their digitally-led competitors. Much of the conversation focused on using customer insight in sophisticated ways and focusing on the shopper experience above all else.

Neil McGeough, technical programme manager at Tesco, said that the personal touch offered by store staff can make a real positive impact on so many shoppers. “That’s going to be the differentiator between companies offering two-hour deliveries,” he remarked.

“We have to react to differing demands and make people’s lives easier – sometimes that’s through technology and sometimes it can be just by helping someone get something of a shelf if they can’t reach it.”

It’s an important point to emphasise because in an age of innovation, sometimes the simple things can be missed out. Retailers that grow and continue to win business in the future will be those doing the basics well and offering a consistently strong customer service across all their channels, but they will also be the organisations experimenting with technology and new communication channels to improve shopper interactions.

Technology is a significant enabler and using the right balance of mobile tech or self-service machines, for example, will aid the experience of certain shopper demographics. Finding the right customer relationship management (CRM) system with a holistic view of a person’s shopper history and retailing behaviours can help businesses personalise communication – where appropriate – to strengthen a relationship and help complete a sale or upsell. This is a pivotal way technology is now being used to add sophistication to shopping.

Mixing the old retailing skills with new technology is not always an easy strategy to develop, but there are technology tools available that can open up new opportunities for establishing loyalty and advocacy.

Carl Knibbs, head of design & product at the retailer’s innovation department, Tesco Labs, commented: “We have to be better at listening to what customers want and only introduce things that make their lives easier. “When we are doing trials, we have to have our customers in mind and test before we roll out. If we roll something out that doesn’t fix a problem, we’ve found in the past it can actually compound it.”

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Cutting customer irritation – customer experience and technologyRetailers are quick to say they are investing in technology and looking to develop what has become known in the industry as “omnichannel” strategies aimed at joining up their business divisions to boost the customer experience, but many analysts are advising them to first focus on back-end systems development on which new customer-facing tech can be combined.

Of the companies represented at the breakfast roundtable, Carpetright’s digital transformation journey is arguably the most comprehensive with an overhaul of ERP, CRM and point of sale technology all in the pipeline of development. New technology and systems are being introduced to keep head office better connected to its home flooring surveyors, too.

Carpetright chief technology officer (CTO) and a participant in the event, Marcel Borlin, said: “Home flooring surveyors’ routes and visit times are optimised using technology and it’s working really well – the customer experience is improving.

“We’re trying to replicate using this technology with the fitters because if one aspect of the service gets let down, it lets the whole thing down.”

Carpetright is looking to use this technology to drive forward the relationships with customers, and help manage the customer journey comprising a multi-week process involving online research, store visit, home surveys and fitting.

Some other recent investments and developments reported by the retailers in the room included Blackwell’s new website launch and the creation of Dune Group’s ‘Styled By You’ Instagram initiative, which allows shoppers to upload images of themselves wearing their new shoes, on to the social media platform. Both moves have been made with the target of boosting personalisation and engagement.

“The first release of our new website is live and we see this as a journey towards a great deal more engagement between our booksellers and customers over the next few months, particularly through reviews and recommendations,” explained Blackwell’s Stilborn.

Jinna Mistry, business development director at Hitachi Solutions, added: “Retailers are far more aware of the importance of listening, understanding and responding to individual customers.

“Being able to consolidate and manage the volume and breadth of customer interaction across multiple channels is complex. We’re speaking to retailers who are serious about making the omnichannel experience as personal as possible; because by cutting the irritation – whether that’s by removing irrelevant messaging, meeting expectations or making shoppers feel special – the potential competitive benefit is huge.”

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Cutting customer irritation – offering an authentic experienceAuthenticity has been a hot topic in retail throughout 2016, with a number of high profile incidents highlighting the importance of transparency in the new retail world. Amazon tightened up its reviews process and was prompted into releasing a statement saying it did not incentivise positive star ratings or the content of reviews, before then restricting the number of reviews shoppers can leave on its site to improve the quality of customer-generated information.

Clothing e-tailer Woolovers was warned by the Competition and Markets Authority, when it emerged that under previous management the company had been promoting favourable reviews.

Both companies have acted to try and retain the authenticity viewed as crucial to a successful customer-retailer relationship in today’s market – and there are other examples of organisations following a similar path. An authentic reviews programme is just one important element of the overall omnichannel model retailers are trying to establish as it can give them valuable information to shape operations, products and services.

Critically, if the online review and the in-store or digital experience are different, then authenticity is compromised and the customer relationship can be damaged.

Meanwhile, businesses such as online fashion house Missguided and furniture retailer Ikea have recently invested in user generated content on their websites as they look to make their customers advocates of their respective brands, with the former incentivising shoppers to recommend their experiences to friends and followers on social media.

Carpetright’s Borlin suggested there is a fine line between genuine advocacy and people only acting on behalf of a brand because they are interested in receiving a reward. On the subject of incentives, he said: “You have to be careful that it doesn’t take away the purity of the brand.”

One example of powerful customer engagement raised at the breakfast event was Tesco’s decision in the summer of 2016 to introduce free fruit for children when in store with their families. The UK’s largest retailer introduced the initiative as part of its overall brand statement of helping customers every day, and as a way of encouraging kids to eat more healthily and giving them better access to fruit.

Free fruit and incentives are retail strategies borne out of having a better understanding of the customer, often enabled by technology. As retailers respond to the market in ways consumers want them to, the overall experience is inevitably more authentic.

Tesco’s Knibbs remarked: “It’s a corporate act of kindness. It feels genuine because it is genuine.”

It is through a combination of basic acts of decency and by using technology that retailers can help establish the authentic shopping experience they require to retain customers. Retailers are increasingly investing in technology that will help them personalise their customer relationships and help build one-to-one communication channels, to stimulate loyalty.

As consumers continue to dish out their data across a number of shopping channels, they are demanding more from retailers and expect to be presented with a personalised, curated choice of products or services when the time comes to make a purchase.

Chris Huntingford, CRM consultant at Hitachi Solutions, noted: “As customers we’ve all experienced the irritation of having to repeat ourselves to multiple sales agents from the same retailer. It wastes shoppers’ time and money, you form a lower opinion of them and it’s less likely that you’ll buy from them again.

“Having a single, accurate customer view that is available across multiple channels, and being able to act on this insight are a massive boost for both retailer and shopper. With it, retailers can create a closer, more authentic relationship with shoppers, who benefit from products and services that are better suited to the way they buy.”

Cutting Customer Irritation and Maintaining Authenticity

Cutting customer irritation – putting customers at the heart of the business

New customer-facing roles are appearing in retail on an increasingly regular basis, primarily as a result of the need for one person in an organisation to oversee multiple consumer touchpoints and gain a single view of how shoppers interact with the brand across those channels.

Over the last couple of years Carpetright is among the businesses in the industry to hire a head of customer experience (Toni Adams), House of Fraser has seen David Walmsley take over from Andy Harding as the department store’s chief customer officer (CCO) and Kingfisher has hired ex-McDonald’s man Pierre Woreczek as its first CCO. Most recently in retail, Lysa Hardy took on that same role at country fashion retailer, Joules.

Kate Stilborn from Blackwell’s, who participated in the roundtable breakfast debate, is an example of someone who has seen their job role change in the last 12 months, in keeping with this modern requirement. Until this summer, Stilborn was head of operations at the bookseller but she was promoted to an embellished director of customer service & operations boardroom-level role.

Explaining her new job title and putting the industry trend into context, she said: “There are more and more ‘head of customer’ or ‘director of customer’ roles.

“They are usually marketing roles but I come from a more operations background enabling me (in conjunction with digital director, Kieron Smith) to particularly focus our business systems and processes so that they improve the customer experience.”

There have already been changes and improvements made within the Blackwell’s business as a result, including the introduction of a till-point facility to check the online price of a product and ensure shoppers do not end up with different experiences of the brand across separate channels, highlighting the potential this organisational change can have within retail.

“Having a role at board level that is focused on the customer encourages a change in focus at all levels of the business,” she remarked. “Around three or four times a week I’ll get an email from a bookseller saying ‘I’ve got this customer-related problem’. My role is an advocate within. All sorts of things come to me that wouldn’t have otherwise had visibility – it’s a really interesting role to have.”

Companies are deploying people in the customer-focused roles in different ways, but the position often assumes responsibilities for a blend of marketing and eCommerce-related matters within the business. As new channels continue to emerge brought on by the advent of technology and the rapid rise in online retailing, businesses operating in the sector are looking to recruit people to specifically oversee this phenomenon and help bring siloed departments together to get one view of customers across the different functions of an organisation. Retailers want a single customer view because it can help them better understand shoppers, respond to their needs and create better products and services, as well as combat consumers checking their smartphones for better deals elsewhere – or ‘showrooming’ as it is known in industry circles.

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Cutting customer irritation – conclusions

One of the most cited benefits of working in retail when Essential Retail talks to those at the heart of the industry is its fast-changing, ever-evolving nature. It does not stand still and it is forever being reinvented.

Dave Abbott, retail omnichannel manager at shoe retailer Dune Group, summed up the mood prevalent across much of the sector during the discussions at the roundtable event.

“You are never perfect in retailing – there will always be more things you can look at to improve efficiency, and the customer experience in store,” he noted.

“To stay ahead we should always question ‘are we doing enough?’”

The fickle nature of today’s consumer suggests this is the right attitude to have, and adopting this mentality can lead retailers to find a variety of available tools allowing them to get closer to their customers, better document their transaction history and communicate to them with timely and relevant emails and messages which can strengthen the bond between business and shopper.

Hitachi Solutions’ Huntingford said: “In a digitally-driven world, maintaining fantastic customer experiences has become more important than ever.

“The ability to provide information to both staff and customers as and when they need it is crucial to preventing customer irritation and completing the customer journey. Technology and the adoption of this technology are at the heart of this transformation within retail.”

Full list of breakfast roundtable attendees:

Chair: Ben Sillitoe, editor, Essential Retail

Dave Abbott, retail omnichannel manager, Dune GroupCaroline Baldwin, digital features editor, Essential RetailMarcel Borlin, chief technology officer, CarpetrightChris Huntingford, customer relationship manager (CRM) consultant, Hitachi SolutionsCarl Knibbs, head of design & product, Tesco LabsNeil McGeough, technical programme manager, TescoJinna Mistry, business development director, Hitachi SolutionsKate Stilborn, customer service & operations director, Blackwell's

Ben Sillitoe is editor of Essential Retail, an online news resource covering all things retail technology. From news on back-end systems and warehouse innovations to in-store, CRM and eCommerce technology designed to improve the customer experience, Essential Retail looks to keep the industry informed with all the latest developments. Ben has been breaking news, securing big interviews and composing in-depth features on the retail industry for approaching ten years.

Hitachi Solutions works with retailers around the world to help them migrate to and integrate new technology solutions that empower them to put the customer first. Utilising Microsoft Dynamics CRM and Hitachi’s specialist retail accelerators, retailers gain a complete 360° view of their customers. Only by truly understanding your customers, can you market, sell, and service them efficiently and cost effectively. http://uk.hitachi-solutions.com/