Transforming the Customer Journey

The transition from product-centric to customer-centric thinking requires a fundamental shift in journey strategy. Product-centric journeys use recent behavior to predict the “next best action” with an immediate conversion goal. Success is measured wholly by conversion metrics. Algorithms are prioritized for conversion first, second, and third. Current thinking in the digital economy is that no human contact is required. Chatbots handle the majority of triage. Call centers will migrate to simulation as soon as the AI catches up. Upsell, cross-sell, retention, and loyalty options are digital, without human interaction or intelligence, using email, SMS, retargeting site personalization, and loyalty apps. The current mindset is that scalability and repeatability are achieved by eliminating as much human contact as possible. Automation and simulation will rule the customer journey in the future. Human interaction is a backstop.

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Customer-centric journey

In a customer-centric journey strategy, this paradigm changes. Algorithms are prioritized to ingest knowledge, learn, be inquisitive, and propel users toward relationships with the brand. “Force-feeding” transactions in early-stage exploration are eliminated. Human interaction is encouraged. By engaging customers, as any seasoned clerk or concierge service would offline, Umego opens the door to opportunities currently lost in the digital age.

Recent behavior predicts the next question rather than the next action. It assesses which step in the journey is most critical to decision-making regarding conversion, retention, loyalty, and advocacy. It learns which customers will likely be the twenty percent driving eighty percent of the value to their business. This journey approach propels insights related to competitors, objection layers, unfulfilled promises, and lack of quality issues.

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Retail hierarchy of needs (R-HON)

Our “hierarchy of needs” framework identifies, categorizes, and scores shopper motivations based on product, service, affinity, relationships, shared values, and lifestyle matches. As Maslow's theory suggests, customer-brand relationships are motivated by particular physiological and psychological needs that progress from basic to complex. Early in the relationship, functional attributes like product, service, price, and conversion paths drive customer motivation. Later, emotional characteristics like trust, empathy, care, and the art of anticipation ascend in value. By taking a customer-centric approach to the journey and propelling insights through our R-HON framework, Umego empowers brands to see through the eyes of their most important customers and engage them accordingly. Please reach out if you'd like to learn more about how R-HON can transform customer insights.

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