February 7, 2020 Why A Filtration Company Embraced CX and You Should Too

A leader in aftermarket filtration solutions improved their NPS scores and customer loyalty through CX strategies.

Carlos Pimenta, CEO, Macquarium

Today’s customers no longer base their loyalty purely on price or product. Instead, their loyalty is forged by the sum total of all experiences a customer has with a company. This means manufacturers must ad- dress the realities of the customer journey and invest in the kind of research that helps them truly under- stand their customers’ behaviors and attitudes to ensure they deliver a consistent and convenient experiences.

In a market saturated with competitive products, the customer’s experience has become the key to customer loyalty. The easier you make it for your customers to find product information, place orders and get after-sales support, the more likely they are to be loyal to your brand. But, this begins with truly under- standing your customer’s journey, paying attention to all factors – from brand discovery to employee inter- actions, sales, product manuals and installations, customer care and more. It also requires ensuring aligning all the business units, people, processes and systems to ensure that your company is delivering a united and seamless customer experience.

This is how the Customer Experience (CX) agency, Macquarium helped a world leader in OEM and aftermarket filtration solutions for diesel engines, transmissions and industrial applications, improve their NPS scores and customer loyalty.

Although their customers reported high satisfaction, the company wanted to increase their overall ratings. Despite gathering years of qualitative research and responding to VoC and NPS survey data, several key business performance areas were falling short of both customer expectations and the company’s growth goals. Six Sigma methods were not surfacing the customer insights needed to understand just where and why customer the experience was falling short of their expectations. Data from Voice of the Customer, Net promoter scores and surveys demonstrated that key business areas underperformed expectations.

Macquarim proposed a customer centered approach to mapping the customer journey to fully understand the total customer experience. In preparation for the Customer Journey Mapping workshops, Macquarium conducted 22 cross-business unit stakeholder interviews, 29 employee interviews and observations and 57 customer interview and observations. Several key themes emerged including:

• The company’s Customer Care team did not have unified tools and information necessary to present a unified brand to the customer (vs. separate business units)
• Their customer facing technology was not competitive
• And, the internal systems were inefficient and not uniform across business units

Then, the hard work began in developing the Current State Customer Journey Map for three customer segments from pre-order to post-order and support. The two companies gathered cross-functional teams across multiple business units in a workshop setting to identify the journey pain points. During this process, we identified numerous issues included ordering and inquiry response times, backorder communication, pre-allocation of stock, shipping demand, pricing and rebates.

Armed with the research gathered by mapping the Current State journey map, we then mapped out new Future State Customer Journeys that re-envisioned these customer journeys in a new way by simplifying complex processes, identifying system enhancements needed, and improving collaboration and communication between the varying business units. Projects were then selected and prioritized to bring this vi- sion to life. These projects included advance notice updates, backorder pre-communication, improved order forecasting, automated rebates and approvals, increased backorder visibility, streamlined claims processing, pro-active order notifications, smart notifications and a consolidated customer portal. Each project was weighted on value, scope, timeline and effort, and alignment to corporate strategic objectives.

The Filtration Systems group developed a clear understanding of the key areas they need to tackle to improve their NPS score and customer satisfaction targets. These projects made it easier for customers to do business with them, improved employee productivity and satisfaction, and was projected to lead to a reduction in operational costs.

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