The greatest success in business comes from thinking and acting differently — there’s no benefit to doing the same things in the same way as everyone else, since any potential advantage is cancelled out. But you can’t just adopt any oblique viewpoint, you also need to be right.

When picking stocks or launching startups, for example, what you want is a perspective on the market that isn’t widely agreed upon or understood, yet is actually correct. That’s how you get outstanding returns, which brings me on to customer experience.

The consensus view in CX is that the focus should be improving satisfaction, which will increase loyalty, retention and advocacy, and lead to growth — a glorious causal chain of events.

Yet there is a non-consensus view that has better supporting evidence: brands grow primarily through acquiring new customers, we have less control over retention than we think, active word of mouth comes mostly from new customers, and pursuing ever higher levels of satisfaction probably isn’t the best use of resources.

This non-consensus-yet-correct worldview is a gift for brands and CX professionals who can act accordingly while the mainstream dig in their heels and ignore the evidence!

#customerexperience #CX

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