Customer service or customer experience? Are they the same thing?
There’s been a lot of talk about whether marketing and customer experience are one and the same or if they replace each other – you know, “Customer experience is the new marketing.” Well, I have a bone to pick with that one, but this post is about yet another debate – one that I’ve written about before, and one that we should continue to define and discuss: the difference between customer service and customer experience.
Since this is Customer Service Week 2013, I thought it would be a great time to bring up this topic again and to shout from the rooftops: “Customer service and customer experience are not one and the same!”
Yes, customer service is a role (e.g., customer service rep), and it is a discipline (i.e., it’s everyone’s job to deliver great service). And customer experience is a role (e.g., VP of Customer Experience) and a discipline (i.e., it’s everyone’s job to ensure the customer has a great experience).
So why can’t sales or customer service roles hold Customer Experience titles? Let me elaborate by starting with some definitions.
What is customer experience? In its simplest definition, it is (a) the sum of all the interactions that a customer has with a company over the course of the relationship lifecycle and (b) the customer’s feelings, emotions, and perceptions of the brand over the course of those interactions.
Customer service? It’s just one of those interactions or a type of interaction.
Another way to look at it: customer experience is what the customer feels; customer service is what the company does (for the customer).
Still not convinced? How else can you tell the difference?
Map the customer journey – from the customer’s perspective – and plot all the ways in which the customer touches or interacts with your organization. Yea, the touchpoints. They are parts of the experience – a point in time – but they are not the sum total experience.
Customer service starts where customer experience fails. -Chris Zane
Original Post: http://cxjourney.blogspot.be/2013/10/customer-service-or-customer-experience.html
