Often when a business wants to change its strategy, managers will focus on revising individual components. They'll look inward at how employees can improve their work or outwardly analyze the customer journey — when they should look at the total experience.
A successful business is the sum of its parts, and by analyzing the total experience of each system, your brand can outshine the competitive landscape and gain a loyal following. So how can you take advantage of this strategy? In this post, we'll define what exactly total experience is, its benefits, and how you can begin to incorporate it into your processes.
What is Total Experience?
Total experience (TX) is a business strategy that interlinks employee experience (EX), customer experience (CX), user experience (UX), and multi-experience (MX) to provide a better and more holistic experience for everyone.
To better understand each part of the total experience, let's break it down by each part:
- Employee experience (EX) consists of interactions an employee has throughout their tenure with a company, from recruitment to retirement.
- Customer experience (CX) consists of customer interactions with a brand before, during, and after a product purchase or service engagement.
- User experience (UX) is a specific product or service's overall design, usability, and functionality.
- Multi-experience (MX) is individuals' overall experience with your brand across different digital channels and devices. Multi-experience evolves omnichannel engagement models by re-emphasizing the user experience's importance beyond each channel's connectivity and capabilities.
Total experience works internally and externally to enhance employee and customer satisfaction metrics. By improving more than one component of your business and implementing this transformational strategy., you have a better chance of reaching your business goals.
Total Experience Benefits
1. Build trust and gain loyalty.
When a business regularly delivers positive experiences from prospect to customer, it has a better chance of building customer trust. And when Customers continue to have good experiences with ongoing support, that company can develop customer loyalty and potential advocacy.
2. Better brand consistency.
Consistently presented brands are three to four times more likely to experience better brand awareness. The consistent image and expectation built from a company using TX strategy can make your brand's most easily identifiable traits more desirable — relative to competitors with less cohesive images.
3. Higher chance of increased revenue.
90% of customers will spend more with companies that personalize customer service. By adopting the TX strategy, your team can align and improve processes to better accommodate individual business needs — making customers feel empowered and supported.
How to Take the Total Experience Approach
1. Evaluate the state of your brand.
To improve the functionality of your business, you have to take a step back and evaluate its current state. Ask important questions such as:
- How do customers view the brand?
- Could departments benefit from an audit of existing processes?
- Is the brand delivering on its mission and vision?
2. Brainstorm what you want your brand to be.
Now that you've taken a pulse check, think about your ideal brand vision and how you can get there with the total experience. This is the time to identify what your brand should be known for. This will require you to meet with every team leader to turn these ideas into actionable plans.
3. Engage each team to break down organizational walls.
Company disconnection can be a massive roadblock to meeting growth goals —by implementing the TX strategy, your business can better align and operate in flow.
To create a uniform and aligned business, have each team share transparent plans and tie each directive to clearly specified brand guidelines. While each team won’t be working on the same projects directly, they'll understand the goals of each system and know how each contributes to the total experience.
4. Share your employee and customer well-being with your audience.
Employee Well-Being
90% of customers say it's vital that brands treat their employees well — and that mentality goes hand in hand with the total experience strategy.
Customers love nothing more than a loveable marketing campaign, and branding your employee experience can improve both your company's public image and performance. Companies exist to serve customers, and customers look at the ethicality behind their purchases. So if they see a supported workforce grounded by TX, they'll feel more inclined to work with them and indirectly receive better service than those who are underpaid or overworked.
Customer Well-Being
Well-supported employees make satisfied customers who may want to share stellar customer testimonials. By highlighting your loyal customers' positive experiences, your brand can attract more business.
After all, 49% of consumers trust reviews as much as personal recommendations from friends and family.
Conduct Good Business Inside and Out
Getting an entire organization on the same page takes time and good alignment, but it's worth the effort. By prioritizing a well-rounded total experience, business leaders can set their companies up for longevity and success.