Senior managers are demanding solid evidence that spending money on CX solutions will achieve positive return on investment (ROI), according to research outlined in the Accelerating ROI in Customer Experience Report. The Global State of Customer Experience Survey 2022 revealed that 57 percent of respondents report a growing urgency to prove CX’s ROI, with only four percent of respondents saying this urgency is reducing.
The good news is that when CX projects are tracked, the results are generally positive for more than half the CX practitioners surveyed. Forty-two percent of survey respondents said they mostly achieve the returns forecast for a CX project and are usually successful in obtaining stakeholder participation. A further 10 percent reported almost always achieving forecast ROI results because of accurate calculations and a strong customer-centric culture.
Linking customer-centric solutions that offer seamless CX and employee experience with long-term benefits is key.
Rekha Weerasooriya, senior general manager of CX and people development at Dialog Axiata, recommends showing long- and short-term monetary returns, as well as cost-effective CX improvements, such as reduced customer and employee effort scores: “Make clear demarcations of the form of savings this technology solution will bring in qualitative as well as quantitative terms and by when.”
For CX practitioners struggling to present persuasive business cases for CX investment, Ryan Creamore, director of global customer success from Infobip, recommends demonstrating the benefits of in-depth analytics and leveraging data intelligently.
“CX practitioners need to deep dive into analytics and first-party customer data that has been captured via their own channels,” says Creamore. “By doing so, they will continuously improve the customer journey and eventually meet the returns promised. Constant A/B testing, data analysis, and hyper-personalization are the three things CX practitioners must keep in mind and be diligent on to meet forecasted returns.”