Customer Experience is More Than a Solution, It's an Attitude: #CXMChat Recap

If you joined us for our Customer Experience Management Tweet Jam on Thursday, January 19, you may have learned a few things about the past, present and future of listening, delivering and measuring a consistent, contextual, optimized message across all channels, otherwise known as CXM.

During the course of an hour, 12 individuals representing 15 CXM vendors and 12 independent professionals (that’s my head count, anyway, @josephwykes) dissected various aspects of customer experience management.

Editor's Note: To put things in better perspective, although we had 24 active participants, including those of our panel, we also had over 800 people listening in (according to the number of people connected via Cover-It-Live alone).

First, we defined it:

Q1: CXM is strategy+people+process+tech to deliver great customer experience. #WEM is software to manage digital exp. Core to CXM. #CXMChat.

— Loni Kao Stark (@lonikaostark) 

Q1:CXM could easily be also defined as CONTEXTUALIZED management. The next evolution of WCM #CXMChat

— Tjeerdbrenninkmeijer (@tbrenninkmeijer) 

Q1: in simple terms, #CXM is a multi-channel strategy and practice with the goal of keeping customers happy. #cxmchat

— Irina Guseva (@irina_guseva) 

Q1) WCM and WEM are channel centric. CXM is channel agnostic and puts the emphasis on the customer where is should be #cxmchat

— dguarnaccia (@dguarnaccia) 

Then we asked about the tools and strategy used to spearhead CXM.

Q2 #CXM involves the coordination of multiple solutions including WCM, social, CRM, analytics, eCommerce, campaign management, etc. #CXMChat

— CoreMedia (@CoreMedia_News) 

Q2: Any CXM strategy needs tools to both listen and deliver exp across all customer touch points to compete in digital age. #CXMChat

— Loni Kao Stark (@lonikaostark) 

Q2 Have measurable goals and accurate ways to measure. Elicit feedback (freely). Listen, learn & engage. Make it easy for the user #cxmchat

— josephwykes (@josephwykes) 

Q2 - Component-based content and taxonomy are key WCM tools that support dynamic, relevant user experience. #CXMChat

— David Hillis (@davidhillis) 

Q2. Key required tools: Socially-enabled WCM platform + analytics, CRM, marketing campaign management, digital creative apps.#CXMChat

— Tony White (@arslogica)

Once, that was settled, we talked about ownership. Who owns CXM? Luckily, most people agreed that it involved the C-suite and an organizations culture shift.

Q3 Short answer? The customer. #CXMChat

— CoreMedia (@CoreMedia_News) 

Q3) CxO level should ultimately be responsible for customer experience, as this cuts to the core of company culture, strategy #cxmchat

— Christian Buckley (@buckleyplanet) 

Q3 All the players in a company contribute to a consistent and successful customer experience #cxmchat

— OpenText Iberia (@OpenTextIberia) 

Q3 Who owns CXM? Everyone. It's got to be in the culture. #cxmchat

— Brian Mayer (@thecxguy) 

Q3: Partnership between CMO, CXO and CIO. The trifecta of customer experience leadership. The three musketeers of cxm! #cxmchat

— Loni Kao Stark (@lonikaostark) 

Next, we took time to reflect on the past year and what was the most important CXM lesson we learned in 2011.

Q4) Companies that clearly connect customer experience to tangible business goals outperform companies that don’t #cxmchat

— dguarnaccia (@dguarnaccia) 

Q4 – Lesson: Need a really big database. CXM requires scale. Conversions are too low on the web to make CXM work without a big list #CXMChat

— David Hillis (@davidhillis) 

Q4) lesson in 2011 - it's hard, most organizations talk the talk, few walk the walk #CXMChat

— debeastman (@debeastman) 

Q4: #cxm is a still a loaded buzzword; sandbox for analysts, vendors, journos. org maturity is not there in most cases. #cxmchat

— Irina Guseva (@irina_guseva) 

Q4) Quality NOT Quantity - Customer's time is precious - need to provide the most relevant and optimized exp across all channels #cxmchat

— Oracle WebCenter (@oraclewebcenter) 

Q4 #CXM is not a solution – it is a process and an attitude supported by a core set of flexible, extensible tools #CXMChat

— CoreMedia (@CoreMedia_News) 

Lessons naturally lead us to the future and the opportunities ahead of us, including a bonus conversation about the importance of differentiating (or not) between offline and online customer experiences. 

Q5 For customers: a chance to be relevant to their buyers. For Vendors: achance to finally make it easy #cxmchat

— josephwykes (@josephwykes) 

Q5) CXM opportunity in 2012, engage in social media, go to where your customers are #CXMChat

— debeastman (@debeastman) 

I think 2012 needs to be about getting analytics understood, then making appropriate changes #cxmchat

— Barbie Mosher Zinck (@barbmosher) 

Q5 Weaving analytics + monitoring (realtime) into every channel. Surfacing those metrics to every part of the biz. #CXMChat

— Robert McCarthy (@RobMMcCarthy) 

Q5: 2012 is Year of Personalization. How we make CXM and #wem initmate in a world of digital bits and bites. #cxmchat

— Loni Kao Stark (@lonikaostark) 

If only it were that easy! RT @buckleyplanet: Q5) in 2012, its all about ball bearings. always has been ;-) #cxmchat

— Aaron Dun(@ajdun) 

Q6)I'd hope that no one really does differentiate.Customer relationships have to be open and consistent no matter the venue. #cxmchat

— Chad Thompson (@zirous_chad) 

Q6: If you differentiate, customers will sense that one approach is neglected, and if comp. prefers one and customers the other.... #CXMChat

— DrDavidNickelson (@DrDNickelson) 

So there you have it. The future of CXM belongs to all of us, and as a result, we must keep our finger on the pulse of wherever our customers are in an effort to deliver customized messaging, and then we measure and start all over again. Thanks for an amazing chat and we hope to jam with you again soon!