Engaged teams generate more revenue, have lower turnover and deliver a more fulfilling experience within the company
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What happens inside an organization is felt on the outside by customers.
I’ve been preaching that concept for years. When you create a fulfilling employee experience, employees are more engaged with their roles and responsibilities, and that, in turn, accelerates and amplifies the engagement with customers. Even when employees never interact with customers, they recognize that their role affects the people who do, or that they are impacting the system that supports other employees and customers.
On a recent episode of Amazing Business Radio, I interviewed Stephen Baer, author of Stickology: How to Build Unbreakable Connections with Employees and Customers for Life, to discuss the importance of workplace culture in driving a better customer experience. What follows are some of the key themes from the interview with my commentary.
Internal Engagement Fuels Customer Experience
Happy employees make for happy customers. The more engaged employees are at work, the more they will engage with customers. Furthermore, engaged teams generate more revenue, have lower turnover and deliver a more fulfilling experience within the company, resulting in higher customer satisfaction. Baer says, “Internal and external engagement are totally connected. You can’t separate how you treat your employees from how your customers are treated.”
The Difference Between Connection and Engagement
Connecting with someone is just the first step. Baer used the difference between Velcro and glue as a metaphor to illustrate the difference between connection and engagement. Velcro can stick but also comes apart easily. Glue takes time to properly apply and set, but when it does, it holds and doesn’t come apart easily, if at all. True engagement is like using glue. Building trust and confidence takes time, but when you achieve it, the result is a bond with employees and customers.
Personalization Is More than Using the Customer’s Name
My State of CX annual research finds that 82% of American consumers prefer companies that personalize their experience. Remembering your customer and using their name is nice, but that’s not true personalization. You must know the customer, and that comes from paying close attention to every interaction you have with them. Prove you know and appreciate them, and you start to build a level of emotional connection. Customers feel good doing business with the companies and brands that know them. It’s about creating some type of emotional connection.
Human Connection Beats Loyalty Programs
A loyalty program that offers points and perks can’t take the place of a genuine human relationship. That doesn’t mean loyalty programs don’t work. They do drive repeat business. So, imagine if you added a layer of human engagement to the experience, where employees go out of their way to help and show appreciation. The combination of that experience with a traditional loyalty program can turn repeat customers into loyal customers.
The Engagement Virtuous Cycle
Baer described what he calls the Engagement Virtuous Cycle. When companies invest in empowering employees to experiment, collaborate and solve customer problems, the result is a better customer experience. Happy, empowered employees drive satisfied, loyal customers, whose repeat business and loyalty fuel further investment back into employee engagement. It’s a continuous and ever-improving cycle.
Final Words
Disengaged teams create transactional, one-off types of experiences. It’s not about the relationship, it’s about what’s happening in the moment. Employees go through the motions of taking and processing orders, and that’s as far as it goes. That’s not what you want. Baer sums it up by saying, “When employees are empowered and trusted, customers can feel that passion and care. Investing in your people directly translates into an incredible customer experience that drives loyalty and success.”