Humans value convenience because we have built almost everything that makes our lives easier. Our convenience has risen to a level where it has become a business model with monetary goals to achieve. This has completely transformed the traditional ways of doing business.
Businesses are responding to today’s on-demand needs by exploring new sources of revenue by providing enhanced customer experience and slick delivery. On-demand businesses have shown there is more to business other than customers and profits. Customers expect more from the businesses only because their expectations have now shifted. As a result, customer experience strategies are going through a drastic change at the core. A customer experience strategy acts as a framework to ensure quality when the demand for quantity does not stand.
According to the Harvard Business Review, “22.4 million customers are turning to on-demand services annually, accounting for $56.7bn in spending”.
The convenience of speedy services is the most common feature of all the on-demand businesses to satisfy the modern customer’s desire for instant delight. However, convenience is not limited to imminence alone. While transforming their customer experience, on-demand businesses adopt a number of tactics and technologies to stay relevant in the era of on-demand.
A new research report from Mercator Advisory Group, The On-Demand Economy: Mobile Apps That Deliver Convenience Boost Payments Volume says that – “customer engagement to the markets of most popular on-demand services has brought a new dimension. Many of the on-demand providers have become industry disruptors and they are being met with challenges from legacy competitors and government regulators alike. But U.S. consumers are voting with their wallets and are propelling on-demand businesses to record levels of purchase transactions.”
What is the latest customer experience strategy?
The customer experience strategy defines the actionable plans in place to deliver a positive, meaningful experience. Strategies that aim to be successful take into consideration the following factors:
- Competitive insight
- Consumer research
- Marketplace data
- Mission & vision
If you are a part of this on-demand fraternity or associated with it in any way, you may already know the importance of customer experience that depends on the way you treat your customers. Thus, you need to make sure that you consider all the departments and not just the people in customer-facing roles. You should consider customer feedbacks and insights across the company. This will align the efforts towards the intended goal, which is improving customer experience and retaining customers for lifetime. Customer retention highly depends on the type of services you provide them. They are more likely to stay if you listen to their feedback and act accordingly.
“Customers love convenience and accuracy, and will actually pay more for it in truth,” said futurologist and Global Futures and Foresight CEO David A. Smith.
Defining a customer experience strategy
According to Customer Strategist Journal, there are six key areas of the digital customer experience:
- Reachability: What channels is your business active on? How are these channels being used?
- Service convenience: Can customers self-serve? What types of channels are being used to provide service?
- Purchase convenience: Is there friction in the purchase process?
- Personalization: How well does your business meet/cater to individual customer needs?
- Simplicity and ease of use: Are service/informational channels optimized for mobile? Is the customer journey bogged down or straightforward?
- Channel flexibility: Is context about the customer being used and applied across all channels? Is there a history of behavior, transactions, and conversations across touchpoints available for each customer?
On-demand startups like Airbnb, Grubhub, Peapod, and Uber have made the “on-demand economy” an inseparable part of everyday life of many US consumers. They provide the versatility of the mobile app technology and a seamless payment experience to the customer. The on-demand services are rapidly expanding all around the globe.
“On-Demand not only brings immediacy and convenience to its consumers, but the services also enrich the customer experience that results in enhanced loyalty and sustainable customer relationships. Additionally, both legacy and emerging payment providers are benefitting from the increased volume of purchase transactions being generated daily by On-Demand services” commented Raymond Pucci, Associate Director, Research Services at Mercator Advisory Group and author of the report.
