How do you get your teams to work together smoothly to make your customer experience seamless?
Big e-commerce players have already cracked that code…while other companies still encounter all kinds of problems in their internal operations and collaboration between teams.
The solution may feel counter intuitive, but it’s no rocket science.
the biggest obstacle: working in silos
The main reason your teams are not working together efficiently is because they work in silos.
In siloed organisations, each department is mainly focused on optimising:
- their own efficiency
- their own workflow,
- and their own KPIs.
Instead of working with other departments towards a shared objective.
We call this “inside-out working”.
the inside-out approach
Working inside-out has the advantage that departments run efficiently on their own. But the major disadvantage is that teams quickly become inwardly focused.
And (very important!): they have no incentive to collaborate with other teams.
This leads to operational issues, but also results in a fragmented and unsatisfying customer experience.
While customers only care about their experience and couldn’t care less about how your teams are structured.
flipping the perspective
The aim should be to roll out a collaborative way of working, that unites all teams and connects silos, so teams are more aligned, jointly working towards a seamless cx.
To achieve this we should flip the perspective:
1. stop with the inside-out approach, and
2. start with the outside-in approach
it feels counter-intuitive, but…
…the perspective of the customer should be the starting point,
(rather than organizing ourselves around internal operations)
Outside-in working from a customer journey perspective is crucial for working together across departments to service the customer’s interest: a seamless customer experience.
So the customer needs drive how you streamline your internal operations. Instead of the other way around.
This is the customer journey perspective, where the customer can take the central stage.
Mapping out every step a customer takes throughout his journey, spanning for instance:
- marketing,
- sales,
- onboarding,
- delivery, and
- customer support.
This journey perspective is what we refer to as “the horizontal axis” of the customer experience, where we focus on aligning teams and channels to meet customer needs.
Big e-commerce companies master this art. Their promise is: you order today, we deliver tomorrow.
And they succeed, because they have flawlessly aligned every part of their operation, in order to deliver a seamless customer experience.
And now, you can achieve this too!
want to know more?
We have recorded a free, in-depth webinar on how to make CX operational in your organisation.
You can register below or just shoot us a message!
