Hard Clams

Communications planning around the customer experience is an exciting position. I don’t mean external communications planning, that’s probably Marketing’s job, but internal comms, geared at increasing engagement and clarifying all programs and projects with a customer impact. It’s a position that many enterprise-level companies understand the value in having, but rarely invest in a new hire. Ideally, it liaises with Marketing and HR (internal engagement) and reports into corp comms with a presence on sales and customer care steering committees. 

Here is sample situation:  

1. The CEO wants to make the customer experience a strategic priority as the frontline is not delivering on customer expectations and it’s becoming more of a competitive differentiator. It underpins all performance reviews and ties into the annual internal engagement survey. 
2. Marketing sends out a card of proof points around the customer experience to all employees — but it doesn’t stick.
3. There are a number of customer experience programs underway and no roadmap.  
4. These initiatives focus on a section of the customer value chain.
5. There are communications initiatives that occur independently of each other. 
6. There is a desire to communicate customer experience improvements plans to front line employees. 
7. Operations (headcount) and HR (engagement) want to improve annual engagement survey scores.

How a communications position focused around the customer experience can help in this situation: 

1. Comms audit covers all tools, processes and systems that were the biggest “pain points” to frontline employees. n  Comms prime liaises with different business units to complete a roadmap of key messages for all programs and projects that would impact customer service. 
2. Comms prime creates internal brand and brand image. it represented all initiatives and ties the communications together in a clear, concise and relevant fashion. 
3. Comms prime creates, manages content and distributes an e-newsletter with customer experience focus
4. Comms prime creates and steers a council with other comms professionals who have a stake in understanding the initiatives and/or want to contribute to the e-newsletter.
5. Strategic comms plan is created to include the customer experience vision, plan and progress. 
6. Comms prime collaborates with marketing to create a map of the customer life cycle — with touchpoints and e2e programs/projects.
7. Tactical comms plan is created for different business units and ties into overall strategic communications plan.
8. An internal loyalty campaign recognizes efforts of employees who make great contributions to the customer experience. 
9. An internal video is produced to communicate the customer life cycle to employees. 
10. A dedicated portal is created for employees who wanted to contribute their ideas on improving customer service. Best ideas win… 
11.  Online training module is written for new hires. 
12.  Ad-hoc internal and external comms around customer experience attributes (such as on time, delivery and the quality of products).

Posted in communication plan, communications, communications 101, communications audit, communications planning, customer experience, employee engagement, strategic communications, thought leadership |