June 27, 2016

How Technology Is Disrupting Customer Experience

The evolution of customer experience is one of many important topics that will be discussed and debated at our upcoming digital marketing conference on July 14.

It’s clear that technology is playing a key role in that evolution, but how exactly is it impacting customer experience and how can marketers take advantage of it?

We picked the brains of a selection of our conference speakers and here’s what they had to say:

Ben Tomlinson, product marketing & partnerships manager, Communicator

“The rise of artificial intelligence in marketing technology is starting to have a real effect on our industry. We have some innovative customers already experimenting with artificial subject line recommendations and they’re seeing some great results – the ROI is phenomenal. Facebook’s Messenger ‘chat-bots’ will start to make machine learning mainstream.”

Franco De Bonis, head of digital solutions, RedHotPenny

“We are living in the SoLoMo era. First discussed (to my knowledge) by Mary Meeker in 2008/2009, the intertwining of Social, Local and Mobile has truly revolutionised every aspect of customer engagement and experience. Of all of these though, I feel that Local is the keystone, hence its position in the middle. Marketers can now localise every aspect of a campaign and can even deliver unique web experiences based on location. Consumers now want local information, they want to buy locally, so that they can receive the product the same day and so, should they need to, the returns and customer service process is simpler. When companies embrace ‘Local’ in their strategy, even global multinationals can be the local provider of choice.”

Carol Strachan, marketing manager, Unified

“When it comes to which technology is causing the most disruption to the customer experience, we look to our all-in-one CMS provider, Kentico. When we hear the word disruption in business we tend to regard it as having a negative impact but, for customers of Kentico, their intuitive software only enhances the entire customer experience. Kentico is a fast growing organisation empowering more than 25,000 websites in 90 countries; creating successful websites, online stores, community sites and intranets using its integrated marketing solution.

“For today’s marketers, ensuring the right content is delivered to the right person at the right time (cutting through the overwhelming amount of digital noise) is probably one of the most challenging of task. With Kentico’s sophisticated solution marketers can do this with ease using many of its ‘out of the box’ features to create truly unique and personalised online experiences. And the fact Kentico can easily integrate to any organisations existing 3rd party system, CRM or other management solution means that content can be shared over multiple sites through one single update.

“We firmly believe that Kentico is changing the landscape of digital development making it easier for businesses, large or small to reach and communicate with their customers.”

Agi Kendrick, account director, Chalk Social

“I wish I could say it was something new and exciting but it seems that for about the fourth year it is still mobile and, in all honesty, I think it will continue to be mobile for a while. Our love of the small screen means that marketers need to ensure content is snackable, mobile experience seamless and they are tracking everything cross device to have a true understanding of what their customers are responding to.

“Within mobile the biggest thing is video, in the past few months we’ve seen the arrival of 360 videos which on mobile provides a truly immersive interactive experience. Facebook has also launched live video which is seeing 4x the level of engagement when compared to standard video performance.”

Skip Fadura, client services director, Dotmailer

“It has been around for so long it might be too old to be disruptive but the technology that many marketers have still not gotten their heads around is mobile devices. The mobile device adds a level of context which does not fit in most marketing processes. Gone are the days when we as marketers control.”

Andy Bolter, creative partner, Yes & Pepper

“Technology as a whole has become the ultimate enabler for all of us, whether we have our marketers, or our private, hat on. Through technology we can empower and be empowered. Devices keep us close to our audiences and allow us to measure genuine, real-time sentiment. It is a modern marketer’s job to look for ways to enhance our customers experience, constant innovation has never been more needed.”

Full details of the Digital Marketing Conference can be found here. For further information, please email us at conferences@figarodigital.co.uk.