According to InMoment research 2022 APAC Experience Trends Report, to be successful in 2022, businesses need to break from the status quo and make a choice to innovate by listening to their customers, non-buyers, employees, and other stakeholders to determine their strategy in the future.
The circumstances of the past few years have forever changed us as individuals and our expectations as consumers. As we move forward and adapt to the pandemic, experience-focused businesses are faced with a new challenge: there is no going back to normal.
The report collected opinions from more than 1,000 APAC consumers interacting with eight industries: supermarkets, retail outlets, restaurants, insurance brands, healthcare, banks and credit unions, automotive brands, and peer-to-peer services like Uber and Airbnb.
Consumers were asked about three core topics:
- The Future Stakeholder Journey: Customer expectations for 2022; what are the new drivers of loyalty, retention, and acquisition?
- The ‘New’ World of Experience Understanding: How do brands across industries need to adopt the new digital and in-store customer experience?
- The Emerging Internal & External Personas: What do emerging customers look like? How can brands meet their needs?
What four trends are changing customer experiences?
TREND #1: Experience Standards Are Changing… Again
The report insists that companies need to be aware that their customers will be comparing the experience they provide to the ones they receive in other industries. “That means that you can no longer examine your industry standards in a silo. Because trends will defy industry lines”.
Required action
- Adapt quickly and early: “Agility has been crucial to enabling positive experiences in the past few years. But don’t stop now!” the report says. Because of that, please make sure you continuously respond to your customer and employee feedback to keep up with their evolving expectations.
- Plan for future stakeholder journeys: The following action means asking your team: “what are we doing now to prepare for the next generation of consumers?”
- Above all, be human: The most valuable thing we learned in the past few years it’s that your customers need you to honestly care about their experiences and, even more so, the role your brand plays in their lives. So, understanding customer needs is essential for moving forward.
TREND #2: Understanding Pre-Purchase Data Is Crucial to Converting Non-Buyers into Happy Customers
Six in ten consumers claim to do Research before purchase, and Gen X and Gen Y are particularly savvy about searching before purchase.
Unsurprisingly, high stakes purchases were in the categories of Automotive, Banks, and Insurance sectors.
Above all, since January 2021, 61% of consumers answered that they had been introduced to a product or service offering through social media, 56% said a video advertisement, 37% said a social influencer and 20% said a podcast.
The conclusion is that the experience consumers have with your brand starts well before they engage with you, at the pre-purchase stage. Therefore, you must understand what consumers are researching and saying on public channels to own the narrative and control the journey from end to end.
How do you do that?
Firstly, complement your structured data analysis by ingesting, understanding, and acting on unstructured data.
At the same time, the report pinpoints three areas where pre-purchase Research is key across the Asia Pacific, and they are all digital:
- Online Reviews are essential for 63% of Gen X, 61% of Gen Y, 60% of Gen Z and 61% of Baby Boomer.
- The company Website was visited by 43% of Gen X, 55% of Gen Y, 66% of Gen Z and 59% of Baby Boomers.
- Social media is relevant for 50% of Gen X, 53% of Gen Y, 40% of Gen Z and 36% of Baby Boomer.
Consequently, it is difficult for companies because more than 80% of data available to businesses is unstructured, received through social call centres, chat logs, and staff feedback. In other words, there is a massive amount of intelligence and value in that data that isn’t being used, and companies must be aware of that.
Required action
Experts say that unstructured feedback is valuable in and of itself, as it contains customers’ words and tone. But understanding and actionability can only come from unstructured feedback via a few essential tools:
- level up your text analytics
- make sure your cx platform is collecting all your data
- meet your customers where they are
TREND #3: Surveys Alone Will Not Be Enough for Ongoing Experience Improvement
Fascinating that as a VOC platform, InMoment found out that “surveys alone will not be enough for ongoing experiences” as the third changing customer experience. However, surveys are far from “dead.”
Businesses need to evolve their approach to meet the needs of tomorrow.
In influencer marketing, this is an effective tactic for brands—especially brands whose audience is millennials or Gen Z.
Required action
This trend is all about transforming how you listen and moving beyond surveys.
So, how can you effectively listen to consumers in 2022?
Firstly – Design your customer listening program with the end in mind.
Secondly – Look at inferred/internal data: emails, slack, intranet, operations.
Thirdly – Find out what indirect data says, like social media, credit card, and IP targeting.
Lastly – In case you have gaps, then take direct surveys.
TREND #4: New Loyalty Indicators & Drivers Are Emerging
Indeed, we know the customer journey is more complex than ever before.
CX Loop agrees that today’s brands genuinely need to collect data from everywhere. First, therefore, to understand the experience stakeholders have with other brands. And most importantly, to identify opportunities and provide differentiated experiences that increase loyalty.
According to InMoment data, customer loyalty will be influenced by how brands respond to their feedback.
Over half of consumers strongly believe (55%) that companies read and care about feedback. So this fact means there is much room for brands to exceed expectations.
On the other hand, the report data shows that ignoring negative feedback is detrimental to growth. But on the flip side, closing the loop with consumer feedback will increase customer loyalty.
Required action
Offer new incentives – Loyalty will show itself in different ways in 2022. So, that means companies need to encourage that loyalty in various ways. Moreover, your Customer Experience program can be beneficial in this area. But above all, that will help you identify the perks customers most appreciate.
And finally, close the loop at scale – InMoment suggests: “When you’ve done all the work to collect feedback, customers need to know you’re hearing what they are saying and taking their insights on board. It is non-negotiable to let them know you’re listening and that you care”.
This year, the report says that companies have to break from the status quo.
Indeed, 2022 offers customer experience programs the opportunity to do just that. There may never be a better time for us to rethink our strategies. Also, forget the obstacles of yesterday, and embrace innovative methods.
CX Loop keeps at the forefront of industry trends to ensure they help their clients define or optimise their customer strategy and find a way to close the customer experience loop.
For more information on how we can help your business contact us:
Phone: 1300 846 246
