During the last quarter of 2013 Paul Writer and SAP ran a LinkedIn poll targeting senior marketers in India asking the question “What do you think your customers wish you would invest in next year?” The results from this poll indicate that Customer Experience is fast becoming a top priority for Indian marketers. Download this free Snapshot Survey report to learn more. Engage customers like never before. To engage more see: http://sqz.co/Kx9p8DX

1. SNAPSHOT SURVEY REPORT
Customer Engagement
Customer Experience Top Priority in India
For Indian marketers, the focus is on offering strong products and building a better experience.
B Y L A U R E N G I B B O N S PA U L
T
he world over, marketers need to keep their collective fingers on the
customer pulse. Understanding customer priorities is key to staying
relevant to minds and wallets. Given that, a recent poll asked senior
marketers in India where they believe customers would like them to
invest their budgets in the coming year. The majority said clients would
want them to spend on improved products/services (33 percent) and
a “better experience overall” (43 percent). Indian marketers are clearly
Methodology
SAP and Paul Writer launched
a global survey via LinkedIn
in late 2013 to determine
what types of investments
senior marketers believe their
customers most desire for the
coming year. Approximately
622 respondents from India
participated in the survey.
Titles included:
n XO
C
n ice President
V
n Engineer
n usiness Owner
B
Marketing Investment Priorities
Respondents were asked to name the marketing
investments they thought their customers would value
most highly.
A better experience overall
43%
Improved products/services
33%
and mobile access (see Figure 1, “In India, Marketers
Better targeted offers
13%
Better mobile access
10%
Other
1%
Think Customers Prize the Basics”).
FIGURE 1 Base: 622 respondents
becoming more tuned into the importance of building
a strong customer experience, before they venture into
more sophisticated initiatives such as targeted offers
Source: SAP/Paul Writer via LinkedIn
“While many firms still view the customer experience
as driven by the product, over the past 12 months we
brick-and-mortar venues—is achievable with back-end
have seen some futurist marketers break away and
systems that support this seamless interaction.
work on the holistic customer experience from prepurchase to after-sales,” says Jessie Paul, CEO of Paul
Survey respondents also indicated they are looking
Writer in India, which focuses on end-to-end aspects of
over the horizon at giving customers greater mobile
developing the B2B marketing infrastructure.
access and improving targeted offers. “Customers
are looking for more mobility, i.e., access, through
“We all keep announcing new products and services,
smartphones and tablets,” said one respondent.
but what our customers really want is an overall
Additionally, prevailing marketing techniques vary
better experience,” one respondent agreed. Another
considerably from industry to industry. In business-to-
concluded that the best customer experience
business markets, for example, many companies need
combines quality, relevant products and price. “It’s
to build and maintain loyalty in their dealer network,
time to give the customer better products, service and
and targeted offers greatly aid in that pursuit. “In the
the best quality at an optimum cost,” he said.
cement industry, companies do everything to make
dealers loyal. For that, better targeted offers is the
Some respondents pointed to technology’s role in
most suitable method,” said one respondent.
providing compelling customer experiences, using
analytics to unearth customer preferences and
“As India becomes a more consumer-driven
integrating systems to achieve consistency across
economy, and as enabling technologies become more
all channels, including phone, Web, mobile, instant
widespread, we will see the focus on a good customer
messaging and in-store. “Customer experience should
experience becoming the norm, not the exception,”
be about building infrastructure that allows customers
Jessie Paul concludes. n
to do whatever they want through whatever channel
they choose to use,” said a respondent. Today,
delivering an ”omni-channel” customer experience—
an unbroken, continuous dialogue and consistent look
and feel (and touch and sound) across digital and
February 2014 |
© Copyright 2014. Paul Writer. All rights reserved.
Lauren Gibbons Paul has written extensively on customer
relationship management and customer experience
management for more than 15 years.
This research project was funded by a grant from SAP.