Data / Data Cloud

It Starts With Seamless Operations: A Salesforce Perspective on Customer Experience

By Erik Eklund

Branded content with Neostella

It’s no secret that delivering exceptional customer experiences is vital to success. Companies are increasingly investing in advanced technologies like Salesforce Data Cloud to gain insights into customer behavior and preferences that can be used to “wow” their customers. Yet, despite investments in data-driven marketing predicted to top $36B this year, 80% of consumers say the customer experience still falls short

While the reason for this has left many business leaders scratching their heads, the reality is really quite simple: all the customer insights in the world won’t matter if the product or service doesn’t meet customer specifications or if it isn’t delivered on time.

Organizations that know how to keep their customers coming back for more have figured out that there is a sweet spot – that magical place where customer data and operational data work in unison. Here are three steps for organizations to take.

1. Don’t Overlook This Critical Piece of the Puzzle

Operational data – critical information about the steps and time involved in production, fulfillment, or delivery processes – often lives in a silo, accessible only to certain departments or teams. Worse yet, it may be fragmented, incomplete, or derived from faulty processes and workarounds.

Often this culminates in what Harvard Business Review refers to as “disconnection debt”, the financial impact to businesses that fail to fully connect all data when making strategic business decisions. Overlooking insights into delivery processes is particularly risky and can be costly when standards or deadlines aren’t met. 

2. Take a Holistic Approach to Data and Insights

Investing in Salesforce Data Cloud to aggregate customer information in one platform enables companies to gain unparalleled insights into who their customers are. Evaluating this data is great for empowering marketing teams to build more effective, personalized campaigns, as well as for providing support teams with the necessary context to resolve issues quickly.

But that piece in the middle (where goods or services are produced and delivered) needs to be as smooth as possible – otherwise, the end processes won’t really matter. Ask yourself if you know how well those processes are truly performing.

Analyzing operational processes and the impact they might have on customers is more than crucial; it’s everything. Will initial customer interactions live up to the hype of the marketing touchpoints? Will you earn the right to retain or grow a customer by knocking initial production and delivery out of the park? 

Understanding process efficiency, common bottlenecks, and team bandwidth risks, for example, not only helps companies to optimize workflows so that they can hit those customer experience ‘homeruns’, it also helps them get ahead of potential problems before they turn into swings and misses.

By pairing customer insights with operational data natively in Salesforce, companies are finding more and more ways to identify trends and patterns in customer behavior – all while simultaneously surfacing operational issues and risks that could leave customers saying “wow” for all the wrong reasons. Armed with this information, leadership can adjust their approach in real time, reallocating resources as needed and maximizing the efficiency of their team’s efforts.

3. Keep It in the Salesforce Ecosystem

Complementing Salesforce Data Cloud by coordinating workflows and harnessing comprehensive data insights from Work-Relay creates synergistic bliss. Data Cloud provides customer data that helps match the right product with the right customer, while Work-Relay provides a Salesforce-native framework to ensure that the customer gets the product – or service – they expect when they expect to get it.

Personalizing interactions, handling inquiries efficiently, and proactively engaging customers based on real-time insights within Salesforce builds a cohesive, effective machine that helps foster continued customer satisfaction and loyalty. 

Summary

Organizations looking to wow their customers should leverage both customer data and operational data. With Salesforce, unifying customer data insights from tools like Data Cloud with operational data from native apps like Work-Relay helps to create a sweet spot for success.

Get started on your data-driven approach to wowing customers. Schedule a no-pressure demo of Work-Relay’s Salesforce-native application now.

The Author

Erik Eklund

Erik is the Director of Neostella and is a 9x Salesforce Certified Application Architect.

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