For the first time in Romania, CX Day celebration 2021

Ten years ago, customer experience existed as a corporate science and specialisation in only a few countries worldwide. In recent years, however, its importance has been recognised, and it has evolved rapidly: business strategies are now built around customer experience, and companies have created dedicated positions and teams within their organisational structure.

Every year on the first Tuesday in October, the world celebrates CX Day.

It’s an opportunity to recognise the achievements of CX professionals and their efforts to transform the way organisations operate in the best interests of their customers, employees, and partners.

This year, 5 October marked the first official celebration of CX Day in Romania, organised by Customer Experience Romania.

CX specialists and enthusiasts from Romania came together at an online event where they had the opportunity to meet each other and once again recognise the importance of CX in both the corporate environment and in improving quality of life.
The event’s speakers were Gabriela Ciupitu, Alina Dîmbean and Ana Iorga, 3 internationally recognised professionals in the CX field.

Gabriela is a Certified Customer Experience Professional (CCXP) and a board member of the Customer Institute. She is also a member of the juries for the International CX Competitions.

The case studies presented by Gabriela have won awards at international competitions thanks to the speed of their responses and the stability of their strategies. A common feature of the successful applications is the involvement and ownership of top management, i.e. the constant communication of progress and success to the teams.

The pandemic has had a significant impact on customer behaviour and working practices within organisations. While a crisis can be managed on a one-off basis with quick-win decisions, in the long term a well-thought-out strategy is needed to prevent similar situations.

Regardless of the industry or the products and services offered, the difference between doing well and achieving resounding success lies in building a customer-focused organisational strategy and culture. Customer experience governance within the company and the internal routines created around this topic lead to organisation-wide awareness and interdepartmental collaboration towards a common goal: THE CUSTOMER.

Alina is the leader of E.ON Romania’s Customer Experience team, which won five international Customer Experience Awards in 2020.

We were impressed by the way she leads her team to success and drives the company towards a customer-centric organisational culture. The tone of voice adopted by employees is consistent and aimed at making customers feel important and connected to the brand.

The training delivery model has been tailored for different employee groups to help them understand and integrate new customer communication skills into their day-to-day work. The success of the tone of voice training is measured using team-level performance indicators. Alina organised Customer Journey workshops to analyse customer interactions with the organisation and find solutions to identified problems. Every employee contributes to the customer experience. Changes are made continuously in small steps; that’s why the work of the Customer Experience team is an ongoing process of improvement rather than a one-off project.

Ana is one of the most influential CX specialists and the founder of Buyer Brain. In 2021, she was nominated by Customer Experience Magazine for 9th place in the UK in the CX Stars Awards competition.

Her presentation on empathy in the digital space was quite something special and caught the attention of the attendees at the event. In the online environment, the emotional aspect is usually overlooked because the focus is primarily on efficiency and speed. However, customers experience many emotions when they cannot manage a website, when it does not work, or when they do not understand what they are supposed to do — especially since, in this environment, customers are alone and have no one to assist them. This stresses customers and results in a poor experience because there is no one to empathise with them.

The three elements that influence customer behaviour are effort (friction), biases (preconceptions) and motivation.

Buyer Brain analyses effort from several perspectives: physical effort, time effort, and cognitive effort. The latter is crucial in determining whether customers will continue a commercial relationship with a company. During the digital journey, cognitive effort can be so high that we abandon an app or platform within seconds.

Customer bias can be beneficial when customers are in a new situation because they can relate to past experiences. However, it can also be a barrier because bias controls emotions and thinking.

Motivation influences how much effort clients perceive they have to put into a journey. One way to motivate customers online is to show them evidence (such as testimonials) from people like them who have bought from the same brand.

At the end of the event, we surprised the participants by announcing Ian Golding, who joined us. “Although the Romanian CX community is small, its members are both very determined and well trained. South East Europe is an area where people are knowledgeable and willing to embrace change.”

The biggest challenge for a CX specialist is when a company’s strategy focuses on short-term gains at the expense of a long-term vision for customers. It is essential for companies to acquire CX knowledge and skills. We also need to demonstrate to management that a low CX has a significant negative impact on a company’s bottom line.

When asked, ‘What skill set does a CX leader need?’, Ian answered succinctly: courage, perseverance, and passion.

Advocating for the customer within an organisation can be challenging at first, until you identify allies and ambassadors to support you on your journey.