The Modern Customer Podcast

How does a company that has been around for more than 100 years still provide innovative and customer-focused service? For Nordstrom, it comes down to understanding customers and evolving the experience to meet their needs and exceed their expectations. Shea Jensen, Nordstrom's SVP Customer Experience, says the brand's goal is to make customers feel good and look their best. But what sets Nordstro...

What's the secret sauce to successful businesses? How do the best companies continually innovate and grow? According to Tiffani Bova, Global Customer Growth and Innovation Evangelist at Salesforce, there's not one secret to success. Growth and success don't come from just focusing on employees or building a customer-centric culture or going through a digital confirmation—it comes from a combinatio...

Embarking on a full-scale customer experience transformation is a huge undertaking, especially for an organization as large as Cisco. The company has made huge strides recently as it evolves its customer experience to build on its existing customer-first culture. Cisco Live is the premier event for education, inspiration and making connections for technology professionals. This year had 27,000 in-...

Embarking on a full-scale customer experience transformation is a huge undertaking, especially for an organization as large as Cisco. The company has made huge strides recently as it evolves its customer experience to build on its existing customer-first culture. Cisco Live is the premier event for education, inspiration and making connections for technology professionals. This year had 27,000 in-...

Many companies think of customer service as just what happens when a customer calls with a problem, but Cisco has transformed customer experience to include the entire customer journey. According to Alvio Barrios, SVP Americas Customer Experience, the goal of customer experience is to proactively engage with customers and help maximize the value of whatever products they're getting from Cisco. As...

Imagine having a human assistant to look after your money 24/7 and proactively find ways to save more and keep your money secure. It may sound like an impossible dream, but Capital One makes the same service available for its customers with a virtual assistant named Eno. Capital One has always been a pioneer in conversational AI. It was the first financial company to launch an Alexa skill that all...

Planning a vacation is often so exhausting that you need the vacation just to recover. Choosing a destination, planning the itinerary and scheduling all the details can take up a huge amount of time and energy. But a new company takes away the need for travelers to plan their own vacations and taps into the experience economy to create unique adventures. Manifest is the brainchild of Jeff Potter,...

Digital transformation can have numerous goals, from saving money to improving customer satisfaction. But at Sprint, the goal is to empower both internal and external customers to do what they want, where they want, when they want. Rob Roy and this team called The Hive take a unique approach to finding creative technology solutions that meet the needs of customers and employees. Digital transforma...

Are loyalty programs worth the cost? According to research by Citi, the answer is a resounding yes. As the company transformed its rewards program and analyzed customer preferences, it found that modern customers are more loyal and valuable when they participate in a loyalty program with a great experience. Mary Hines, Head of Customer Engagement and Innovation at Citi Cards, aims to deliver a sea...

Two of the biggest buzzwords in customer experience are AI and empathy. But are the two concepts mutually exclusive, or can they be used together to create a harmonious customer experience? Dr. Rob Walker, Vice President Decision Management at Pegasystems, believes customer-facing AI initiatives can be programed to be empathetic. However, empathy is often lacking in customer interactions. It's dif...

Imagine being able to stream anything anywhere without having to worry about bad signals or data limits. Soon connecting to the internet will be as commonplace as connecting to electricity. 5G has the power to unlock limitless computing and impact the entire world, including the customer experience. Cristiano Amon is the president of Qualcomm, a company that has technology in every smartphone in t...

Digital transformation is all about using technology to better solve customer problems. But a new report from global telecommunications company Telstra found that many U.S. companies lean too heavily on the technology side and don't focus enough on the people behind the decisions. According to Nicholas Collins, Telstra President for the Americas, digital transformation loses its effectiveness if c...

It may have the word "medical" in the title, but by all accounts, The American Medical Association is actually a media company seeing the fruits of its digital transformation. In the last 18 months, association membership has grown by more than three times, thanks largely to a new digital approach. The AMA helps physicians in their quest to improve patient care. A large part of that is creating qu...

Most people consider customer experience the ultimate goal for companies and marketers, but according to marketing professor Peter Fader, customer experience isn't for everyone. It's no secret that modern customers are all unique. They have different preferences and also different value for brands. As Fader says, not all customers are created equal. Some will be loyal to the brand and purchase eve...

Digital transformation is everywhere these days. But the idea of updating everything about how a company works and interacts with customers can be overwhelming. Comcast's recent digital transformation shows that moving strategically and focusing on solutions customers love and employees champion can lead to great results. Comcast has made a major push in the last few years to get to a level where...

You've probably experienced this familiar scene: going to the doctor, having to wait to be seen in a sterile office, feeling rushed through the entire appointment and finally going home without feeling much better. It's no wonder healthcare is one of the top five hated industries in the world. But One Medical is out to change people's negative perceptions of healthcare by focusing on the patient e...

Customer experience is a major focus of the B2C world, but it's also vitally important for B2B companies. As B2B customers become more digitally savvy, companies need to focus on digital transformation to ensure high-quality customer experiences. According to Dushyant Mohanty, global head of transformation at Tata Consultancy Services, that means moving from being product-centric to being customer...

It's a problem nearly every woman has faced: shopping for clothes and taking dozens of items into the dressing room, only to come out with just one or two items that fit. It's a frustrating experience and one that can cause women to internalize their difficulty finding clothes that fit as something being wrong with their body.   But a new company is getting rid of standard sizing to create persona...

In a world where most of a company's marketing and customer experience budget goes to new technology and flashy ads, it's time to get back to the basics of word of mouth. According to Jay Baer, co-author of the new book Talk Triggers , it's all about talking to customers and getting to know them. From there, brands can create talk triggers. It's a simple concept but can be incredibly effective. A...

In a world where older women are often expected to look and act a certain way, Chico's is spreading a message of age positivity. The clothing store recently launched a marketing campaign and video that shows a 58-year-old influencer asking women if they would wear their age on a t-shirt. The idea is to showcase that getting older is really just getting bolder. Chico's "Bold" campaign has received...

A stock exchange might not seem like the most likely place to publish fresh social content and connect with younger generations. But then again, Nasdaq has always been ahead of its time. Nasdaq was the first electronic stock market and dates back to the 1970s. Although most people have probably heard of the company, many of them couldn't actually tell you what Nasdaq does. That's where Chief Digit...

Shopping for a new couch or rug is unlike any other kind of shopping. First, customers don't buy these kinds of household items as often they do other products, and they often don't know what to search for. Instead of knowing the right keywords to search, buying home items is more about the visual approach and knowing what items look good in the space. A customer might want a blue rug, but they do...

Some people say millennials don't golf. That might be the case in the normal world of golf, but at Topgolf the stats show a different story. 51% of Topgolf customers are people who don't play traditional golf. At Topgolf, customers visit for an experience away from other entertainment options they might have. According to Erik Anderson Topgolf Entertainment Group's Executive Chairman, they are com...

Imagine having an expert mentor at your fingertips at all times. Someone who could answer questions, provide advice and move you in the right direction. For customer experience representatives at Allstate, that dream is a reality with Amelia, an AI-powered bot trained in the language of insurance. It's just one way the company is using AI to power customer experience and lead the charge in a chang...

It used to be that customers went to a restaurant for dinner, enjoyed their meal, and left without a second thought. Now, digital technology is changing how restaurants connect with customers and opening the door for big advances in customer experience. Using digital communications to improve the online and in-restaurant experience gives brands more opportunities to get to know their customers and...